Lady Margaret Tebbit

Speaker 30:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 30:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety five, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:28

My Castaway this week is a politician's wife. She married nearly forty years ago when she was a nurse and he an airline pilot. A devoted couple, they had three children. Her husband entered politics, where he became enormously successful.

Presenter0:42

In 1984, they went together to the Tory Party Conference in Brighton. They stayed at the Grand Hotel, where, in the early hours of October 12, the IRA detonated a huge bomb. She and her husband were trapped for hours under tons of rubble. They survived, but she's been severely paralysed ever since. Today she surveys life from a wheelchair, but shows no trace of bitterness, simply an acute eye for the needs of those who, like her, have become the victims of sudden, terrible injuries. Although she can recall every moment of that awful night, I think it much better, she says, to look forward than to look back. She is Margaret Tebbit. It's an impressively positive attitude, Lady Tebbit, but let me ask you what is nevertheless a central question.

Presenter1:29

Do you blame anybody for the position in which you find yourself?

Lady Margaret Tebbit1:33

No, I don't think I blame people. I don't completely forget or forgive. But one has to completely look forward.

Presenter1:44

And was that your attitude from the beginning, or have you had to work towards that attitude?

Lady Margaret Tebbit1:49

No, I think really from the very beginning I was angry, but not angry enough at times.

Presenter1:57

I remember the story was that the that the Queen came to see you shortly after and said to you, Come on, Margaret, get angry, you should be angrier.

Lady Margaret Tebbit1:57

I remember the story

Lady Margaret Tebbit2:05

Yes, and I found it quite hard to be angry'cause I was just I felt hanging on to life at that point and hadn't got any excess energy to devote to anger. And you could always see people in a spinal unit far worse off than you were. I thought I was fifty and lucky to have survived that long by comparison to some of the younger people there.

Presenter2:29

Well, there was even space for you to feel lucky, was there? Oh, gosh.

Lady Margaret Tebbit2:33

Yes. Yeah. We always saw people really so much worse off than you. And at twenty.

Lady Margaret Tebbit2:39

It's a terrible thing to happen to anyone.

Presenter2:41

But it it's that that kind of attitude, I suppose, that that lack of negative feeling, that makes people invest you and um people like you with with noble characteristics, isn't it? They say that you're brave and courageous. You undoubtedly are, but I wonder if if it quite feels like that coming from your end?

Lady Margaret Tebbit3:00

No, I think it's a case of getting on with with life and being thankful that you've got a good family around you and lots of good friends. I have down days like everybody else, and I know I get angry with carers and lose my patients and all sorts of things like that. But no, to be positive is is much more fruitful.

Presenter3:20

Fool. But has there ever been

Presenter3:23

a moment or or or perhaps several when you felt that you you might give in to it all and and and go under.

Lady Margaret Tebbit3:30

At times, I felt quite depressed. And if I'd felt that I couldn't communicate with people, I know I would have ended my life if I could have done.

Presenter3:42

Yeah. Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit3:42

Yeah.

Presenter3:42

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit3:42

Uh

Presenter3:42

But

Lady Margaret Tebbit3:43

It's the fact that you can still speak and feel and love and live, albeit not quite like I would sometimes like to live.

Presenter3:43

It's the fact that you can

Presenter3:57

Tell me about your first record.

Lady Margaret Tebbit3:59

Our first record is Glen Miller and String of Pearls, which is just a marvellous time for dancing, albeit not with my husband. He's not a dancer. Glen Miller and String of Pearls just brings back lots of happy memories of youth.

Presenter5:16

Glenmiller and String of Pearls. What what mobility do you have, Lady Tebbit? You can move your arms, I see.

Lady Margaret Tebbit5:22

Yes, I can take my weight through my legs if I'm supported and held well. I can move my legs in bed. I can kick my husband now, which is great help. I can move my arms. I can take drinks and I can pick up some things as long as they're not too heavy.

Presenter5:40

But that's all quite new, isn't it?

Lady Margaret Tebbit5:41

Oh yes, yeah, that's it.

Presenter5:42

How how new is that? Because I know there was a time when you were really paralyzed from the neck down.

Lady Margaret Tebbit5:44

And there was a dog

Lady Margaret Tebbit5:46

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit5:47

Really in the last two years it's been the most improvement, but it's really been a long, slow battle with lots of physio.

Presenter5:55

So it's exercising, is it, that in the end results in so so you haven't plateaued out, you could go on getting better, could you?

Lady Margaret Tebbit5:57

In the end, results in

Lady Margaret Tebbit6:00

Go on getting better, could you? I was going to plateau out when I left hospital nine years ago. So my consultant said then he's taking it back now.

Presenter6:11

So do you set your sights on more and more mobility or do you

Lady Margaret Tebbit6:16

No, I just worry about that. No, I don't worry about it in that sense. You know, I'm just thankful that I can take my own weight. I would just love to be able to lift myself off my bed onto a chair myself and to be able to take the odd step. But I don't visualize myself walking around or going climbing or anything like that again.

Presenter6:39

But what's the effect on your everyday life? You say you can you can just manage to pick up a glass or a cup, can't you? But I mean you can you feed yourself?

Lady Margaret Tebbit6:44

Come on.

Lady Margaret Tebbit6:47

Yes, I can feed myself. I can't cut food up.

Lady Margaret Tebbit6:50

As my grandchildren say, oh, you're you're very much better now. You don't make nearly so much mess. That's quite very consoling from once grandchildren. Quite swapping of roles. Yes.

Presenter7:00

Swapping of robes. But can you put your makeup on? Can you do your hair?

Lady Margaret Tebbit7:04

I can put my lipstick on, I can put makeup on, but I need a lot of help with makeup'cause I'm too fussy. I'd rather uh carers or nurses did it for me than me make a mess. But I can put my own lipstick on.

Presenter7:16

'Cause Norman used to do that for you, yes.

Lady Margaret Tebbit7:18

Yes, we were very glad when I could do that myself.

Presenter7:21

But how long does it take you to get up in the Morning. Ab about two hours.

Presenter7:26

You can ride though, I understand. You can once you're put on a horse, you can

Lady Margaret Tebbit7:28

Once you're put on a horse you can. two people to hold me and one person to lead the horse as well. So it's not really riding in, you know, it certainly can't canter or anything like that.

Presenter7:38

Site.

Presenter7:43

But nevertheless it must give you a sense of

Lady Margaret Tebbit7:44

And you're looking down on people, which is rather great. It makes a change. It makes a change.

Presenter7:45

Freedom.

Presenter7:48

It makes it change.

Presenter7:50

And you can swim or you can swim in tour.

Lady Margaret Tebbit7:52

I go into water. I I use water a lot, but mainly on holiday because it's warmer in the pool and outside.

Presenter7:59

And you can stand up in the water helps you in the water. Oh, can you? But you can actually make your one leg move in front of the other.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:01

Yes, and I can walk in the water.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:03

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:05

One leg move in front of the other. Yeah, but that's only in water.

Presenter8:09

But again a great sense of

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:10

Yeah

Presenter8:12

Obviously, what you describe is a great advance on how you were, but nevertheless, for for a woman who before she was paralyzed

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:15

Nevertheless

Presenter8:20

didn't even employ a cleaning woman. The dependency that you have on other people must be deeply frustrating.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:27

It is. I think that's the hardest thing actually. I can't get to bed on my own or get up on my own or get my own meal or anything like that.

Presenter8:36

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:36

Uh

Presenter8:36

Mm.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:36

And over in the night. No, I'm getting better at that. My husband still turns me at night, but I am getting better.

Presenter8:43

And what about in your dreams? I I've often read that that people who are wheelchair bound are not so in their dreams. You dream yourself for

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:51

You take this.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:53

Okay.

Lady Margaret Tebbit8:54

You don't normally dream yourself in a wheelchair. I don't know about everybody, but a lot of friends have said that, which is strange, isn't it?

Presenter9:02

So you enjoy your dreams.

Lady Margaret Tebbit9:04

Yes, but they're like dreams that sort of sometimes you don't even remember fully and you can't visualize whether you were in a wheelchair or not. So I wonder whether, you know, it's a subconscious playing tricks on you, okay?

Presenter9:18

Tell me about your second record.

Lady Margaret Tebbit9:21

Ah, this is Kiri singing the aria from the magic flute. And this gives me great memories of one last night of the proms which she invited us to, and that was a splendid night up.

Speaker 410:09

Yeah.

Presenter10:31

Kiritikanoa singing the Aria Achich Fuls from Mozart's The Magic Flute with the Academy of Saint Martin in the field conducted by Sir Neville Mariner.

Presenter10:40

Margaret Tebbit, you met Norman uh forty years ago at a party. He was a pilot at the time with BOAC. What were your first impressions of this man?

Presenter10:49

I think it's essentially fun. He said himself in in in his um autobiography that he was at the time, and I quote, feckless and irresponsible and not the marrying kind. Oh, yes, very definitely not.

Lady Margaret Tebbit10:59

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit11:01

And I wasn't either, actually. It certainly didn't enter into my head to get married.

Presenter11:06

So so what happened? I mean if he

Lady Margaret Tebbit11:08

What happened? He was friendly with Stewardess and I was friendly with someone else. So we jo both thought the other one would fill in time, you know.

Lady Margaret Tebbit11:17

And then we realised we were doing an awful lot of filling in, and it sort of crept up on us.

Presenter11:21

But did you have a a vision of what life would be like with him? I mean, apart from fun, could you could you tell that he might go places?

Lady Margaret Tebbit11:29

No, I mean he was an airline pilot. He talked fairly early on about politics, but I thought nobody would be fool enough to give up a flying career to go into politics. I mean he was a great company from the word go. Life was not dull.

Presenter11:44

And he had the gift to the getter.

Lady Margaret Tebbit11:45

And he had the gift of the gab, so it was um don't know what is it.

Presenter11:50

Anyway, it happened. Your own background was happy, as I understand it, but humble. You were one of nine brothers and sisters, huge family.

Lady Margaret Tebbit11:57

Brothers and sisters

Presenter11:59

And you were training to be a nurse at the time. What did your family think of Norman? Did they think he was quite a catch?

Lady Margaret Tebbit11:59

Can we

Lady Margaret Tebbit12:05

No, I don't think my parents thought like that. He got on well with them, and I remember my mother being terribly impressed because he bought me a bunch of carnations from Rome, one for her and one for me, which he she thought was fabulous.

Presenter12:19

So you were married, I think, eight months after you met. It was quite a whirlwind romance, really, wasn't it?

Lady Margaret Tebbit12:22

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit12:24

This way.

Lady Margaret Tebbit12:25

Yeah.

Presenter12:26

You gave up your nursing to become a full-time housewife and he went away flying a lot, but then you started a family, which I want to ask you about in a minute. But let let's pause there for your next record.

Speaker 412:28

To become a fine.

Speaker 412:33

Uh

Lady Margaret Tebbit12:33

Mm-hmm.

Lady Margaret Tebbit12:37

Hmm.

Lady Margaret Tebbit12:38

Earther Kit, Just an Old Fashioned Girl, which was one of our first very few records that we had. And I can always remember we still laugh about it now, we've still got the record. And we're playing it at different speeds. And the fact that you could get really long, low, slow Earth a kit and then a really high pitch as well as a delightful singing as well. And it always reminds me of mad times when you're very broke but very happy.

Speaker 413:08

I'm just an old-fashioned girl with an old-fashioned mind Not sophisticated, I'm the plain and simple kind I want an old fashioned house with an old fashioned fence And an old fashioned

Presenter13:29

Ethiquette and just an old fashioned girl. So it was after you had your third child, William, in nineteen sixty five, that you suffered from postnatal depression. Can you describe what happened to you, Margaret?

Lady Margaret Tebbit13:42

It was within the first fortnight of William's birth and I was just continually feeding him and losing track of time. So I was up day and night. I remember Norman went to do a went off flying, but I had girlfriends coming in. And when he came back, I just walked to the car and collapsed. And it's so often you keep up and then relief comes and then you go. And was taken into hospital, just seriously ill. And I couldn't remember having had a child or kept saying to him, you know, whose baby is this? And he'd say, this is our baby. You know, that's how desperate it can be.

Presenter14:27

He said that that you were a potential danger to yourself and to the baby. Do you remember that?

Lady Margaret Tebbit14:33

No, I used to worry in case I had tried to um you know

Lady Margaret Tebbit14:40

kill the kill William or in fact to injure the other children, but you're so muddled. And it certainly made me have much more understanding of personal depression having gone through it.

Presenter14:52

But can you shed any light on it beyond the knowledge of its existence and an understanding of what it's like? I mean, w do you know what triggers it, what makes it happen, where does it come from? Is it just sheer chemicals?

Lady Margaret Tebbit15:01

It is a chemical no, it is a chemical reaction to things, you know, a hormone thing.

Presenter15:08

But in your case it's something that's stayed with you because since then you've gone on

Lady Margaret Tebbit15:11

Yeah. Having that kind of depression from time to time, haven't you? But that was y years ago. It came after during the second election and again the third election.

Presenter15:23

So it's at times of stress that the majority of stresses are.

Lady Margaret Tebbit15:24

times of stress but it comes comes back again. But uh I know now I could feel if I was going off the rails, as I put it. If I go very high, I know it's a bad time. That's as dangerous as being very low.

Presenter15:43

And you know how to control it, do you, with with with the right drugs?

Lady Margaret Tebbit15:44

Yeah, with with with the right drugs. Yeah, but I'm I've been on drugs for a long time. But I don't suffer from it now because it's controlled.

Presenter15:52

But if you didn't take the drugs, it's there, is it waiting to to come back in?

Lady Margaret Tebbit15:54

There is a waiting

Lady Margaret Tebbit15:56

Possibly, yes.

Presenter15:57

I wonder if that's one of the reasons that that you coped with your paralysis so well when when it happened, that that perhaps you have a an und not just because of the presence of the drugs, but because you have an understanding of the kind of deep

Lady Margaret Tebbit16:06

The presence of the drugs.

Presenter16:09

dark holes that you can descend into that in a sense

Lady Margaret Tebbit16:11

You can descend into this. That if you're physically ill, it's controllable. If you're mentally ill, it's not so controllable. I feel that having been mentally ill, I knew what it was to be unstable. And so I felt relieved that I didn't have that problem, that I'd only got the physical side.

Presenter16:33

You're not suggesting that you would prefer to be physically paralyzed than to be mentally ill, which is treatable with drugs.

Lady Margaret Tebbit16:40

Yes, I think I am actually.

Lady Margaret Tebbit16:43

But if one had to make that awful decision, I know which of the two. I felt far worse about I know this is I know it's a strange thing s to s to say, but I'm happy and I'm balanced now, and I know what it is to feel unbalanced and to feel absolutely desperate.

Presenter17:03

And that feeling is worse than it is to sit in a wheelchair unable to look after yourself.

Lady Margaret Tebbit17:04

And that is the situation.

Presenter17:11

Record number four.

Lady Margaret Tebbit17:12

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit17:14

Morning Has Broken, I think, um, Cat Stevens, which is a marvellous song, and during the time I was in hospital this was one of the songs that frequently came back into my mind.

Speaker 417:27

Morning has broken

Speaker 417:30

Like the first morning.

Speaker 417:35

Blackbird has flown.

Speaker 417:37

Okay.

Speaker 417:39

Like the first bird.

Speaker 417:43

Praise for the sea, praise for the morning.

Speaker 417:51

Praise for them springing.

Presenter17:55

Uh

Speaker 417:55

Fresh from

Presenter17:56

Cat Stevens and Morning Has Broken.

Presenter17:59

You must have relived that day in october'eighty four' so many times, Margaret, not least because it it had actually been rather a good professional day for Norman, hadn't it? He'd he'd become the darling of the party. I think he'd got a longer standing ovation than Michael Heselton.

Lady Margaret Tebbit18:09

Become the

Lady Margaret Tebbit18:10

Do I think he

Speaker 318:11

But a longer standing evation than Michael Hesselton.

Presenter18:14

So you'd gone to bed happy, really, hadn't you?

Presenter18:17

What was the first you knew?'Cause you were sound asleep, I think, when the bomb went off.

Lady Margaret Tebbit18:21

Yeah. Yes, John Cole had been the last person to talk to us outside our bedroom. You know, I'd said, Well, I don't know about you chaps, I'm going to bed and sort of wandered into the bedroom. I sleep very deeply and I can remember the curtains blowing and loud wind and things as as I thought and then um this enormous um crash.

Lady Margaret Tebbit18:48

and sort of Norman grabbing my hand and we just fell.

Lady Margaret Tebbit18:54

and landed with the mattress over my back, I think. And I was sort of in the sort of fetal position, you know, sort of hands and feet almost touching, and a terrific amount of weight on my shoulders with rubble and things sort of falling on me, and just that sort of sensation of, well, just being crushed, really.

Presenter19:22

And where was Norman in relation to you?

Lady Margaret Tebbit19:24

He was quite near me at that point, but then there was another blast and he was blasted off across the room, and that was the really scary bit. I felt I could cope if he was there. And then I started to shout, of course, and he said, Don't shout, there's no point in shouting.

Presenter19:44

But did you know what had happened?

Lady Margaret Tebbit19:45

Well, he said that was a bomb, or words to that effect.

Presenter19:50

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit19:50

And

Presenter19:50

Uh

Lady Margaret Tebbit19:50

Yeah.

Presenter19:50

It was dark.

Lady Margaret Tebbit19:51

And it was dark, it was three in the morning. And I know I said, How long do you think people will be in finding us? And he said, Hours And we sort of talked a lot, you know, about the kids and things like that, as you do.

Presenter20:07

And did you have any idea of how badly injured you were?

Lady Margaret Tebbit20:12

No, I knew my shoulders were killing me, and that's really where the worst in injury has been for me.

Lady Margaret Tebbit20:18

You know, you feel a lot of pain at the beginning, but then when I couldn't feel any pain, I realized what had happened.

Presenter20:24

You realized you were paralyzed.

Lady Margaret Tebbit20:24

Actually it didn't fully register to me until my marvellous fireman came and um said what you know who's that in there? And I said who's that out there? I mean it just sort of creases me when I think that you can be so sort of um you're high really, aren't you, um, still, I suppose. We're just delighted to hear somebody.

Presenter20:49

This was Fred Bishop.

Lady Margaret Tebbit20:51

Dear old Fred

Presenter20:51

The noble farmer who came to the rail.

Lady Margaret Tebbit20:52

When it came to the rest.

Presenter20:53

But

Lady Margaret Tebbit20:53

Exactly. You know, and he said, um, can you tell me anything about your injury, Margaret? So I said, My arms are cold and I didn't want to say any more because I didn't want my husband to realise,'cause I realised and I kept saying, You must get him out first. He's having breathing difficulties and they assured me that they'd have to get me out first, just the way we were.

Presenter21:18

But because your hands were cold, you know, your nursing training, I suppose, told you that the.

Lady Margaret Tebbit21:23

Training I suppose told you that something was adrift.

Presenter21:27

How long did it take them to get you out, do you know?

Lady Margaret Tebbit21:30

Just minutes really, I think.

Lady Margaret Tebbit21:32

I don't know. Time stands still in situations like that. You can't really remember. I remember him saying, Oh, pass me a collar. It was when they said pass me a collar that I realized they were trying to immobilize my spine a bit.

Presenter21:47

But did you also fear that that Norman was in a worse state than you were? Yes.

Lady Margaret Tebbit21:50

Yes, I was more worried about his breathing. But that's the nursing that um makes you always think you know how to deal with the chap.

Presenter21:59

He perhaps is the white in you as well.

Lady Margaret Tebbit22:01

Oh, a bit a bit of a bit of that, I expect, yes.

Presenter22:05

And then you were out and you were taken to hospital where you were to spend the best part of the next two years, really.

Lady Margaret Tebbit22:11

A year in Stoke and then a year in Stanmore. Tell me about record number five. Harry Seecomer, who I admire terrifically, actually, and his voice as well as personality. And God be in my head, I think I might need it.

Speaker 422:27

I had in my wonder standing.

Speaker 422:36

God in my life, and in my Lord King.

Lady Margaret Tebbit22:38

Wide eyes and in white

Speaker 422:45

God in my mouth and in my speech.

Lady Margaret Tebbit22:47

My mouth in my speech.

Speaker 422:56

God in my heart.

Speaker 423:02

Come in my sing.

Speaker 423:19

I departed.

Presenter23:25

HARRY SEECOM and God Be in My Head.

Presenter23:28

You cope with life in a wheelchair, Margaret, by having full time carers, as you said. Two of them, I think, round the clock. So you'll there's always somebody there if you need them.

Presenter23:38

But as I understand it, there's been a string of such carers. They change quite frequently. Why is that?

Lady Margaret Tebbit23:43

Well, at the very beginning they needed a lot more care. So they tended to be nurses then. A lot of them are travelers who are coming here and going on to travel anyway. And then gradually we've introduced girls who have not been qualified, but as carers.

Presenter24:01

But uh you employ, as you say, in the main, people who aren't English, they're New Zealand or Australian or South African. Does it? I uh or is there some implication that that that the British don't train people so well for these jobs?

Lady Margaret Tebbit24:15

I'm always hesitant about criticising really any training that's given, but I do feel that we've rather lost our practical nurses like ward auxiliaries and enrolled nurses. I would like to see introduced back into the community girls of the equivalent of the auxiliaries and the enrolled nurses who don't need to do university training to really overlap with people when they come out from hospital, because you do feel desperately alone then. And it would be good I can't understand why we can't have a system where we train carers in the hospital and they come out with somebody. Then they go back to the hospital again to go out with somebody else.

Presenter25:04

Other disabled people might say that you're lucky to be able to afford private help, and I'm sure you'd agree. And it must cost hundreds of pounds a week. So often in ordinary families, it has to be the husband who looks after the wife or vice versa, doesn't it? That must be very damaging to the relationship, don't you think?

Speaker 425:14

Mm-hmm.

Lady Margaret Tebbit25:17

Please

Lady Margaret Tebbit25:21

But that doesn't

Lady Margaret Tebbit25:23

Well, I feel it is and that they shouldn't have to feel that they have to do it. I know they don't feel they have to do it. But I would like to feel that we had carers trained who could give those people, which either spouse it is, some help by relieving them.

Presenter25:41

Of course, you um were paid quite a lot by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board, weren't you?

Lady Margaret Tebbit25:47

Thank you.

Presenter25:47

I'm sure you know now that uh a ceiling has been put on what people can be paid out, and and that ceiling is a quarter of a million.

Lady Margaret Tebbit25:51

What people

Lady Margaret Tebbit25:55

Mm-hmm.

Presenter25:55

How do you react to that? Could you have coped on that sort of money?

Lady Margaret Tebbit25:59

You do spend a lot of money.

Lady Margaret Tebbit26:02

a week, if you're doing it the way I'm doing it.

Lady Margaret Tebbit26:06

or the way that most people do it.

Presenter26:08

Do you think it would be better if there weren't a ceiling on it? That you you you could

Lady Margaret Tebbit26:09

See

Lady Margaret Tebbit26:11

Well, I don't know. There are so many ceilings being put on so many things, because after all, it's your tax and my tax and everyone else's tax that provides for us when we are injured. It's very difficult.

Presenter26:26

It is difficult, isn't it? Because people will look at at your case and say,

Lady Margaret Tebbit26:27

Yeah.

Presenter26:30

Well, you know, she received a lot of money because she is who she is. The Tebbits are who they are. It's all right for them.

Lady Margaret Tebbit26:38

Oh I know. I'm well aware of that. Which is why I would like to feel that perhaps with some of the ideas of carers and just drawing attention to things that can be helped along, that we're putting a little bit more back into society again. Next record.

Lady Margaret Tebbit26:57

Ah, the trumpet voluntaries. This is really as a reminder of all those marvellous royal occasions, particularly the one in Westminster Hall, the Silver Jubilee celebrations. A fantastic experience.

Presenter28:10

The regimental band of the Cold Stream Guards playing Jeremiah Clarke's Trumpet Voluntary. Life staring at people's midriffs rather than into their faces, Margaret, must be quite difficult. What what do you want people to do? Do you want them to stoop down beside your wheelchair, or do you want to look up at them? I I think people are rather stumped as to how to behave, aren't they?

Lady Margaret Tebbit28:30

I don't want people to have to stoop down to me, but uh no, I think as long as people realize that you can't possibly hear what they're saying, if they don't talk clearly and to you when you're in a wheelchair.

Lady Margaret Tebbit28:46

Yeah.

Presenter28:47

It must also give you a terrible creep in the neck.

Lady Margaret Tebbit28:48

Yeah, I mean you you're not being distant when you're in a wheelchair, when you're looking a bit vacant. It's because you don't really want anybody else to talk to you up at that level because it is very difficult to, as you say, sit there like that. And I like people, if they want to sit down, to sit down, you know, draw up a chair and sit down. That's why I enjoy having friends in to dinner.

Speaker 429:02

Okay.

Lady Margaret Tebbit29:11

sort of thing.

Presenter29:11

But then you're also

Presenter29:16

What sort of people are are, can I ask you, worst at coping with it? I mean, are there sort of certain sorts of people who just get completely thrown?

Lady Margaret Tebbit29:26

No, I think there's all sorts of people that get thrown for various reasons. I do think you're a bit of a social misfit in a wheelchair. Very difficult for some people to find, even if their house is perfectly suitable and you know it is, um who find it very difficult.

Presenter29:36

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit29:44

But people did sort of drop you, didn't they, afterwards? Oh some people do. But you make new friends. I mean we the the acquaintances so many of the friends who are closest now were only acquaintances. But they turned out to be better friends. But they were marvellous at coping and putting themselves out.

Presenter29:57

They turned out to be better.

Presenter30:03

But why do you think there were those who couldn't cope?

Presenter30:07

People who think that's a good idea.

Lady Margaret Tebbit30:07

Because they're too busy socially. Because they're not really good friends, are they? Um, that doesn't bother me. There's always another good friend around the corner.

Presenter30:17

Well, so they would find it an embarrassment to have you to dinner. Or or they'd just think it's all a bit too much trouble.

Lady Margaret Tebbit30:19

Have you to dinner?

Lady Margaret Tebbit30:21

Yeah.

Presenter30:24

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit30:24

Quite depressing that.

Presenter30:25

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit30:26

Well, but people are depressing um sometimes, but they're always nice people as well.

Presenter30:31

More music.

Lady Margaret Tebbit30:32

Ah, Frank's sonata and my wife. Well, I mean, it's self-explanatory, really, isn't it?

Speaker 430:38

Record shows

Speaker 430:41

I took the blow!

Speaker 430:44

And did it

Presenter31:08

Frank Sinatra and My Way. You have five grandchildren to date, Margaret Tebbit. Um and I suspect, as you say, they cope with your being in a wheelchair better than anybody, don't they? Is it right they call you Chair Bear?

Lady Margaret Tebbit31:20

There's three of them call me chairbear.

Presenter31:23

What about Standing Bear? What about Grandad Norman? I'm sure he's an old softy with them.

Lady Margaret Tebbit31:26

Norman, like it's

Lady Margaret Tebbit31:29

Oh, yes, yes, he adores particularly being down in Devon with them.

Presenter31:33

But I have to ask you, I mean, what what's it been like living with somebody who's been publicly described as a semi house trained pole cat?

Lady Margaret Tebbit31:42

Oh.

Lady Margaret Tebbit31:43

You laugh about it mostly. Sometimes you get annoyed about things like that.

Lady Margaret Tebbit31:49

And it's always amusing to be with him shopping or something and somebody will come up to him and say, You're a much nicer chap than I thought you were or you know, I did enjoy what you were saying the other night.

Presenter32:02

But have you always been amused, or have there been times during his political career that you've you said, Norman, you've overstepped the mark there, you you were just a bit too rough there?

Lady Margaret Tebbit32:10

Oh, yes. Oh, yes. There have been often times when I've said that.

Presenter32:14

For them.

Lady Margaret Tebbit32:14

Most wives do, don't they?

Presenter32:16

And he doesn't take any notice anymore.

Lady Margaret Tebbit32:16

He certainly doesn't take any notes anyway.

Presenter32:20

Let let me ask you finally ab about your desert island, because you say that that in your dreams you can walk.

Lady Margaret Tebbit32:26

Hmm.

Presenter32:27

And this, after all, is a dream island we're sending you to. So, what are you going to do there?

Lady Margaret Tebbit32:33

Well, if it's really going to be a dream and I can step off a magic carpet, it would be marvelous for me to be able to walk on the sand again, because I haven't done that for ten years, eleven years, to find shells and plants, I hope. That would be the thing that really I would enjoy. Just walking actually and climbing and going into rock pools and putting your toes in sand. Last record.

Lady Margaret Tebbit33:05

Julian lied Weber with the cello because it's gentle.

Lady Margaret Tebbit33:10

Soothing.

Lady Margaret Tebbit33:12

Also William did start to play the cello, so it would be a reminder of what he ought to have um perhaps stayed at a bit longer.

Presenter34:13

Julian Lloyd Webber playing Evertauber's Nocturne with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Nicholas Clebery. If you could only take one out of those eight records, Margaret, which one would it be?

Lady Margaret Tebbit34:25

I think it would have to be the last one, the Julian Lloyd Webber, because it would repeat much more. I wouldn't get so bored with that, I think.

Presenter34:33

Yeah.

Lady Margaret Tebbit34:34

What about your book as well as the Bible and Shakespeare? I think I'm going to take...

Lady Margaret Tebbit34:38

The Royal Horticultural Society magazines bound with Hillier's Dictionary of Plants, and that would keep me occupied, and I could really read it from cover to cover, which I swear I'll do, and never seem to get round to it.

Lady Margaret Tebbit34:56

And then you have to choose a luxury.

Lady Margaret Tebbit34:58

Well, I'd like really the magic carpet, but um But you can't have it. I can't have it. And as it's really a fantasy world I'll stay with the idea, I think, of having the team of Man Fridays, because I couldn't possibly cope on an island without some help.

Presenter35:17

So it's an endless stream of man-fried man.

Lady Margaret Tebbit35:19

It's an endless stream. Put your makeup on and do anyway.

Presenter35:20

Put your makeup on and then you can do it.

Presenter35:26

Margaret Tebbit, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island is. Thank you, sir.

Speaker 335:40

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk/slash radio four.