Baroness Campbell

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Thank you for downloading this podcast of Desert Island Discs from BBC Radio 4. For rights reasons the music choices are shorter than in the radio broadcast.

Presenter0:10

For more information about the programme, please visit bbc.co.uk/slash radio four.

Presenter0:35

My castaway this week is Baroness Jane Campbell.

Presenter0:39

A contrary character, she seems to have spent her life proving people wrong.

Presenter0:43

The doctors, who, when she was an infant, gave her less than a year to live the disability charity which told her she was too disabled to work for them.

Presenter0:52

and the medics who believed her life wasn't worth saving.

Presenter0:56

A pioneering disabilities campaigner, she says.

Presenter0:59

You take the hand you are dealt, and believe me, if you said to me that I could be born to morrow without my condition, I'd say

Presenter1:07

No thanks. I am me because of my condition, not despite it. So, Jane, that seems curious to me, because on the one hand I can imagine that

Presenter1:17

You may be the sort of character who doesn't want to be defined by your condition, but at the same time it has defined who you are. E explain a bit of that to me.

Baroness Campbell1:28

But I think as you we're all defined by our experiences. It's the nurture or nature argument.

Baroness Campbell1:36

And I think in my case, all of my life I have learnt through experience. I have learnt through watching and observing and feeling how the world fits together. So for me, my life has taken the course that it has because I am a disabled person who

Baroness Campbell1:59

basically needs another person to live. And that for me has been a really, really interesting, sometimes difficult, sometimes frustrating journey.

Presenter2:13

The condition you have is spinal muscular atrophy. And in order for you just to go about your business every day, you you need somebody there to help you because it's a degenerative condition that means that you're not able to do the things with your arms that that most of us would need to do just to get through the day. And you also um it affects your your breathing too. Uh at night you have to be put on is it a a ventilator?

Baroness Campbell2:36

Yes, yes, a breathing machine.

Presenter2:38

How does that affect your sense of self in terms of your privacy?

Baroness Campbell2:43

Well, yes, I I think people not in my position, they often tell me, Oh, goodness, I could never ever have carers in the house, you know. My privacy would be just shot to pieces and it must be awful to have to rely on other people. Actually

Baroness Campbell3:00

I feel that I can be alone if I want to. We can all be alone in our heads. That's where I probably get my privacy in terms of putting people around me all the time.

Baroness Campbell3:10

Well, in most cases it has been an absolute privilege. You know, I've had hundreds of women and men come into my life to drive me, to dress me, to do my hair. And

Baroness Campbell3:25

Each one of those persons has given me a little gift of understanding, and I probably understand people more than

Baroness Campbell3:36

Most people, because I've had a lifetime of observing and trying to understand them.

Baroness Campbell3:43

And all I would say is, you can be private. I am private. I've got up to the most naughty and mischievous things, and I haven't really missed out one little bit.

Presenter3:56

You uh celebrated your fiftieth uh birthday not long ago. It was a milestone that you weren't expected to reach. What would you do? Do you have a party?

Baroness Campbell4:03

Oh, I had a huge party and invited all my friends and colleagues. And I pretty much do every year.

Baroness Campbell4:10

Because as you rightly said, I've never been expected to live beyond my first birthday.

Presenter4:16

We're going to have some music, Jane. Can you tell me about the first piece of music we're going to hear this morning? What what is it and why have you picked it?

Baroness Campbell4:22

Well this is Mot the Hoopo and all the young dudes. When I was young I absolutely adored rock music. It's very much alive, it's loud and it annoys the parents and so being a bit of a rebel but not being able to do many rebellious things I had a kind of music rebellion and luckily my sister Sharon she would sit with me in her bedroom and she would dance around and the fact that I can't dance doesn't mean to say that I'm not dancing in my head.

Speaker 35:05

When he's stealing clothes from Martin's Fox And Greta's got spots from ripping up the stars From his face, funky little boat race The television man is crazy Sam with juvenile delinquent wrecks Oh man, I need T Brave

Baroness Campbell5:18

Crazy.

Speaker 35:36

Hey!

Presenter5:37

That was Motla Hoopo and all the young dudes. So, Jane Campbell, you've been chair of the British Council of Disabled People and the Social Care Institute for Excellence. You founded the National Centre for Independent Living.

Presenter5:49

You've been a commissioner on the Equality and Human Rights Commission. I mean, I you know, I could go on, I won't because we've got to fit the whole programme in, but it's it's an impressive career. Topping all of that, in two thousand seven, you were made a People's Peer.

Presenter6:04

I haven't actually been into the House of Lords. I don't know how many wheelchair users there are in the House of Lords. How many?

Baroness Campbell6:09

More than you would ever think. And a lot of scooters, because of course some of our more elderly members, are using scooters to get around. And they are so dangerous. Um, some of us have been using our wheelchairs since we think.

Baroness Campbell6:24

We kinda know how to to get in and out of the chamber without.

Baroness Campbell6:28

Demolishing an entire row of piers, not the scooter users.

Presenter6:34

Right.

Baroness Campbell6:34

Um, the appointments bring diversity for people like me. Well, you're not political, so you're there to do one very, very important thing, which is to revise and make legislation fit for purpose.

Presenter6:44

Just

Presenter6:51

There are plans, of course, to reform the House of Lords. They're still on the table. And the idea of these reforms would be that it would be an entirely elected second chamber, entirely democratic. Somebody from your political

Presenter7:03

A background I would think could only welcome an entirely democratically elected chamber.

Baroness Campbell7:07

I would if democracy welcomed disabled people.

Baroness Campbell7:14

It's incredibly difficult to get elected as a disabled person, not just because of the stereotypes that society holds about us in that

Baroness Campbell7:25

You know, oh, they're lovely, but they couldn't really cut the mustard. So we have all of that. Then we have the environment. Can you imagine me going round door to door knocking on people's houses, asking them to vote for me? I mean, I can't even get out of their driveway.

Presenter7:43

Is it true that your father told you when you were very young that you were destined for great things?

Baroness Campbell7:48

My father definitely believed that I was destined to do something special, and he was one of the most formative people in my life. Wherever the family went, I went too, and he did not accept she can't come in here, ever.

Baroness Campbell8:10

And he was a big bloke. He was a six foot, gorgeous looking, very charismatic person. I I remember the times when we go to museums and cinema, when they say, Oh no, she can't come in, she's a fire hazard, or she can't come in, she'll get in the wet.

Baroness Campbell8:30

And of course he would then grow another six foot, and look very scary, and say, She's coming in, and I am her legs, so there'll be no problem.

Baroness Campbell8:41

And as far as I'm done.

Baroness Campbell8:43

We were never.

Baroness Campbell8:45

Turned away after that.

Presenter8:48

Let's have some more music, Jane. It's the second disc of the day. What are we going to hear?

Baroness Campbell8:52

We're gonna hear Frank Sinatra and it was a very good year.

Baroness Campbell8:56

Because, as I said, my father

Baroness Campbell8:59

It's highly charismatic.

Baroness Campbell9:01

He lived.

Baroness Campbell9:03

A very full eye.

Baroness Campbell9:05

And he thought that he was either

Baroness Campbell9:09

Frank Sinatra, James Bond, or Captain Kirk of the USS Enterprise.

Baroness Campbell9:15

And he lived that life.

Baroness Campbell9:18

And

Baroness Campbell9:19

He was loved.

Baroness Campbell9:22

by everyone, including all the ladies.

Baroness Campbell9:26

Sorry.

Baroness Campbell9:28

Listen to the song and you'll know just what he's like.

Speaker 39:32

It was a very good year for city girls.

Speaker 39:38

Who lived up the stairs?

Speaker 39:44

With all that perfumed hell

Speaker 39:51

And it came undone

Presenter9:57

Uh

Speaker 39:58

When I

Presenter9:59

I was twenty one That was Frank Sinatra, and it was a very good year and and memories there for you, Jane Campbell, of your father, who you say was a a big character, a charismatic character, and your mother was no shrinking violet either. What sort of person is she?

Baroness Campbell10:13

Well, she was married to the lovable rogue, so you can imagine she needed to be extremely strong. She's an extraordinarily strong woman, um, who has

Baroness Campbell10:24

Dealt with

Speaker 210:25

With

Baroness Campbell10:26

You know, she had two kids who had slung muscular atrophy at a time when there were no

Speaker 210:26

She had

Speaker 210:28

Fine muskarat.

Baroness Campbell10:32

Resources no support for women with severely disabled children.

Speaker 210:32

Results

Baroness Campbell10:37

So she just got on with it.

Baroness Campbell10:39

And in a way, that was quite good, because I felt very ordinary, very normal.

Presenter10:46

How were you treated by your big sister when you were growing up?

Baroness Campbell10:50

And just like any other big sister, she bossed me around. She.

Baroness Campbell10:56

was very

Baroness Campbell10:58

ordinary with me. She never ever felt sorry for me. In fact, quite the opposite. She thought it was a real swizz that I didn't do the washing up or the household chores. So she thought I was spoilt and needed to be um brought down a peg or two. Actually.

Baroness Campbell11:17

Things haven't really changed.

Presenter11:19

You g you're close neither, are you? You get one.

Baroness Campbell11:21

We're extraordinarily close. All the Campbell women, that's my mother and my sister and myself, are all quite strong personalities. So when we're in the house together...

Presenter11:33

What else?

Baroness Campbell11:34

Some people can stand it.

Presenter11:36

And how would you get on with with other kids in the street? I mean, did they include you?

Baroness Campbell11:40

Oh yes, well the thing is, um, because I had such a dreadful time at special school and I didn't really have any friends, so

Speaker 211:47

Mm-hmm

Presenter11:47

Yeah.

Speaker 211:47

Yeah.

Baroness Campbell11:50

My life really started when I got home and.

Baroness Campbell11:55

Because I was quite good at organising games, the kids in the street loved me, and they must have loved me so much that I had a whole queue of people ready to push me, because we didn't have electric wheelchairs.

Speaker 212:10

Yeah.

Baroness Campbell12:11

In those days.

Baroness Campbell12:14

They were my route to freedom.

Baroness Campbell12:16

And so it had to be really good.

Baroness Campbell12:19

That's making them want to be with me. So I was a game maker.

Presenter12:25

Let's have some more music, Jane, um what are we gonna hear now?

Baroness Campbell12:28

Well, we're going to hear McMann and Loff's second piano concerto.

Presenter12:32

And why have you chosen this?

Baroness Campbell12:33

My mother adores piano concertos. She's a huge romantic and she gives all.

Presenter12:37

Is here Drap.

Baroness Campbell12:42

a sense of romanticism um that has carried us through our lives and

Baroness Campbell12:47

We used must have watched this film Brief Encounter about five times when I was young and

Baroness Campbell12:55

It's cool.

Baroness Campbell12:56

So romantic

Presenter13:54

Ashkenazi playing part of the second movement of Frachmaninoff's second piano concerto with the Concert Gerbau Orchestra conducted by Bernard Heitink. So, Jane Campbell, you described your father as charismatic and persuasive, and you've described yourself as a a young girl as organized and

Baroness Campbell14:09

The young girl is

Presenter14:11

Well, I've written down here manipulative. I mean that in a benign way. You know, you got people to to think it was fun to push the wheelchair and get involved in the games that you knew you could fit in with. They all seem to be, if you've taken on some of your father's characteristics, great attributes for somebody who's working day to day in the House of Lords. Would that be fair?

Baroness Campbell14:32

I like to call it persuasiveness rather than manipulative. Manipulative. I like to persuade people that there is another.

Presenter14:34

Rather than manipulative.

Baroness Campbell14:40

Way to live. You have to persuade people that not only is it

Presenter14:44

Not a

Baroness Campbell14:45

Okay to be like this, but that actually you could love them, need them, want them, and of course

Baroness Campbell14:54

My father

Baroness Campbell14:55

was adored.

Baroness Campbell14:57

Because he was such a big character.

Baroness Campbell15:00

And so I guess.

Baroness Campbell15:02

Yeah, I am a chip of the old block.

Presenter15:04

So you had an older sister and after you were diagnosed as just n not even quite a toddler, but you maybe were around about a year old when your mother thought you weren't eleven months. Eleven months, right. Your parents were told, is this right? They were told to go home and enjoy the time they had with you.

Baroness Campbell15:14

About months.

Baroness Campbell15:22

Yes. Yes. Go home and enjoy her mother because she probably won't live the year out. So that was tough. Mum told me she didn't look at me for two weeks. I had to go and stay with my grandmother. Um but then she just brushed herself off and got on with it. I mean he she is a coper.

Presenter15:45

You were sent to a school you described it earlier as being entirely unsatisfying as far as you were concerned. At the time it was a a special school that was described as one for the incurable handicapped. Can you take me through a day? What what would you spend your time doing?

Baroness Campbell15:58

Um I used to spend the majority of the time either in the physiotherapy department or having a nap.

Baroness Campbell16:07

I did learn to read and write, and in the final year they thought, Oh gosh.

Baroness Campbell16:13

This little one is bright. I did two CSEs, but nothing for years. I was born out of my mind.

Presenter16:23

Um, tell us what we're going to hear on your fourth track.

Baroness Campbell16:26

Right oh, this is Fairport Convention. And the fathering gay and this Sandy Denny has the most beautiful voice I have ever heard. And this song about a bird that's caged, I dunno. It just touches the nerve.

Speaker 316:48

How often she has gazed

Speaker 316:50

From castle windows o'er

Speaker 316:53

And watch the daylight passing

Speaker 316:56

Within her captive wall

Speaker 316:59

With no one.

Speaker 317:02

To heat up all

Presenter17:12

The evening hour is fading That was Fairport Convention and Fotheringay. So something of a caged bird yourself then, Jane Campbell, at school, but you did find a way out. You went to college and you got some exams. How just briefly, how did that actually happen, that you went from sort of not being taught at all to suddenly passing exams in a relatively short time?

Baroness Campbell17:30

Well, I guess I went to what was the disability grammar for kids who didn't get a g education. I began to learn what it was like to do proper lessons, to read proper books, and it was just a joy, and I just ate it up.

Baroness Campbell17:49

Like a hungry lion.

Presenter17:51

Did you feel like your your life was suddenly happening in colour, having been very black and white at school?

Baroness Campbell17:56

Oh yes, it definitely started moving into colour, um, especially when, of course, I got my first boyfriend, because there were boys and nice boys, intelligent boys, boys, well one particular boy, that I was destined to marry later on. So it was fantastic. Just think, education and sex.

Baroness Campbell18:21

It will be denied me.

Presenter18:21

It'll all be denied me. Um, I have you down as probably quite a good flirt. Are you quite a good flirt?

Baroness Campbell18:27

Well, so some people say.

Presenter18:31

And how what would you have been wear I mean, today you're wearing'cause you've got red hair, I should tell people, and you're wearing sort of tones of peach and brown and things that that go with the red hair. You you like to take care of the way you look. How would you have looked when you were a student? What were you wearing?

Baroness Campbell18:44

Well, I've always liked clothes, I've always liked to dress up. My mother was very, very beautiful woman, and she always instilled a sense of you must look good because you are good and you're gorgeous.

Speaker 218:54

Uh Uh

Baroness Campbell18:59

I mean, the reason I think that I feel so comfortable about myself is that my parents instilled in me from a very early age that I was beautiful. And of course, that helped enormously, because most disabled women don't actually feel that they're beautiful. Not really, not deep down inside.

Presenter19:20

The baby

Presenter19:23

So you and Graham, Graham was uh the man who would go on to become your husband. Wh what was the first time you met? What happened?

Baroness Campbell19:30

Well, basically he was he was gorgeous. I have to say he was very able-bodied. He had haemophemia. And in those days, amongst the disability culture, you tried to go out with the most able-bodied person that you could, because somehow you were getting as normal.

Presenter19:52

Yes, that validates you.

Baroness Campbell19:54

So I did set my sights on him, and yes I fell in love, and he was this lovely, strong Yorkshire lad from the Dales, um, and everything that I wasn't.

Presenter20:10

How was your health generally then? I mean, given that, you know, your parents had been told this is a little girl who will be lucky to survive beyond the age of two or three, here you were at university, living as independent a life as you were able. W was your health generally pretty stable at that point?

Baroness Campbell20:23

No, not at all. I mean my life goes from being totally healthy and talking to you like this to being in crisis. So I would catch a cold, that would go down to my chest, I'd catch a chest infection, and then I'd be in big trouble. And that would happen two or three times a year.

Presenter20:43

What does that mean? That means being hospitalized.

Baroness Campbell20:46

I mishospitalised, not being able to breathe, clinical team bringing up my parents saying they didn't think I was going to live. My poor parents went through that, time after time. I mean, I have had times when I definitely thought, Oh gosh, this is it.

Baroness Campbell21:04

Um

Baroness Campbell21:06

And it's quite extraordinary that I'm still here.

Presenter21:11

Let's have some music, shall we? Um tell me what we're gonna hear now.

Baroness Campbell21:14

We're gonna hear Elson John and goodbye everywhere.

Baroness Campbell21:19

Graham loved Elton John. He had all his albums, and they were played over and over. Well, there were three in the marriage myself, Graham, and Elton John.

Speaker 321:33

Are you gonna come down?

Speaker 321:36

Are you going to love?

Speaker 321:40

Should I stay on the phone? I should have listened to my mind.

Speaker 321:48

You now you can hold forever

Speaker 321:52

Didn't sign up for you

Speaker 321:56

Not a prison for your friends to open Most Boys too young to be singing

Presenter22:04

That was Elton John and Goodbye Yellow Brick Roads. I said Do you like to be called Baroness Campbell? Does it feel quite to put a swish in your tail when you hear that?

Baroness Campbell22:13

Well

Baroness Campbell22:14

I quite like it when I'm in the House of Lords and they say, Good morning, Lady Campbell,'cause I'm looking round to see where this person is and I think, Oh, that's me, I'm here. How exciting. But um, actually, I liked it when I became a dame,'cause I went round being Dame Jane and I thought, Oh, I'm just like Judy Dench now.

Presenter22:35

Great. So your first job then, long before you were a dame, was working for a charity for disabled people. I I mentioned in the introduction you were, rather unfortunately, regarded as too disabled for them. Can you tell me briefly what happened?

Baroness Campbell22:50

Well, don't forget it was in the days when there were charities for disabled people, and actually disabled people were pretty absent. Having the crypts in the court.

Baroness Campbell23:01

wasn't quite what they wanted and

Baroness Campbell23:05

They put me to something that was very physically demanding.

Baroness Campbell23:10

And of course I tried, because I thought in those days, God, I've got to do everything the same as non-disabled people.

Baroness Campbell23:19

Um, and of course I failed, even though I'd got a master's degree. You know, they said that I just wasn't up to working.

Presenter23:29

And so through your experience at your first school and maybe also partially through your experience at work, I mean, you became would it be fair to say radicalized? Was that is that who you felt yourself to be then, radicalized by your experience?

Baroness Campbell23:43

Like met a group of disabled people who said, Enough is enough, we want to be let in.

Baroness Campbell23:49

For example, I

Baroness Campbell23:51

I would find myself sitting in the middle of Westminster Bridge.

Baroness Campbell23:55

bringing the traffic to a standstill. And of course

Baroness Campbell24:00

I helped organize very big.

Baroness Campbell24:04

demonstrations with over a thousand disabled people to campaign for the Disability Discrimination Act.

Baroness Campbell24:12

You know, the police didn't know what to do with us, whether to pat us on the head, or, you know, put our handcuffs on us. They were quite confused.

Presenter24:22

Um during that period you you were married for the first time then, and and you found out that your husband Graham, who you've mentioned before was a haemophiliac, became ill. How quickly did you know that he was seriously ill?

Baroness Campbell24:34

Mm-hmm.

Baroness Campbell24:36

Well, we learnt that he had um the HIV virus six weeks before our wedding, so that wasn't a great start. Um

Presenter24:48

It had been contracted through blood transfusion.

Baroness Campbell24:50

Yes, it was the most awful time of my life, I think, and probably the thing that made me the most angry. Um we were able to keep Graham at home until he died, but you know, it ruined his and my life, and I'd never felt so scared in all my life. I realised my rock had gone, and not only had it gone, basically I fell apart.

Presenter25:16

I mean what

Speaker 225:16

Yeah.

Presenter25:24

I think we should have some music, Jane. What are we going to hear?

Baroness Campbell25:27

Johnny Crescendo and Choices and Rights. Johnny was one of the main leaders of the more radical fringe of the disability movement. Choices and Rights is what we fought for and what I'm still fighting for.

Speaker 325:47

I want choices and rights.

Speaker 325:50

Christ is a rag

Speaker 325:53

Choices and rights in my life

Speaker 325:58

Adamato Charity.

Speaker 326:01

I used to be paid to care for me for one

Speaker 326:04

Choices and rhymes in my life

Speaker 326:09

I don't wanna be in your care Or to be put someplace out there

Presenter26:16

That was Johnny Crescendo and choices and rights. So Jane Campbell, in recent years an area you've been very vocal in is the assisted dying debate, a very hot topic. You have argued very strongly against a change in the law, I'm sure influenced not least by your own experiences. You were once admitted to a hospital where the medics weren't used to dealing with your case and didn't know you as a person. Can you tell me what happened?

Baroness Campbell26:45

When I went into hospital with my routine chest infection, I was extraordinarily ill, as I always am. And the doctor who was clerking people in, and I was then with my second husband, Roger, and he turned to Roger and said, Your wife's very, very ill. I presume she won't want to be resuscitated in her condition. I was too ill, I was out of it. And thank God I was with somebody, and Roger said, No, you must do everything that you can to help her.

Baroness Campbell27:22

What do you mean in her condition? And so I was treated, and then I they had to put me in intensive care, and yet again they said, Well, look, she must be pretty much at the end of the road.

Baroness Campbell27:36

And

Baroness Campbell27:37

He was so afraid that he came back and he grabbed the picture of me getting a doctorate and showed it to the people there and said, This is my wife, not what you assume you see in the bed. You treat her like you would treat any person.

Presenter28:00

The assisted dying debate raises very strong feelings, understandably, on both sides of the argument, and there are.

Presenter28:08

many people who are the movers and shakers behind wanting a change in the law, who are themselves people who suffer from terminal conditions, who have degenerative conditions and who say

Presenter28:20

They absolutely respect that you don't want to do not resuscitate on your notes, you want to live your life for as long as you possibly can, but that they also have the right to say

Presenter28:33

I want to decide. My time's up, that I've had enough, that what I perceive as a struggle is not a struggle worth having, and surely they also have that right they have the right to be protected and catered for within the law.

Baroness Campbell28:46

It's a very, very tricky one.

Baroness Campbell28:50

And I don't underestimate individuals' views that they have the right to decide.

Baroness Campbell28:59

But we also have to think

Speaker 228:59

Uh

Baroness Campbell29:01

What effect that would have?

Baroness Campbell29:02

On others.

Baroness Campbell29:04

in society. And I believe

Baroness Campbell29:07

that if we cross that line

Baroness Campbell29:09

that we would put hundreds and hundreds of other disabled and terminally ill people at risk.

Baroness Campbell29:18

And I just think that until we live into a society that

Baroness Campbell29:22

Values

Baroness Campbell29:24

people like me in the same way that they value you.

Baroness Campbell29:28

Then we cannot go down that road, because it is a dangerous road, and it is unsafe.

Presenter29:36

Let's have your seventh choice of the morning, then, Jane Campbell. What are we going to hear?

Baroness Campbell29:40

Well, we're going to hear.

Baroness Campbell29:42

Some um yes prime minister.

Baroness Campbell29:45

I um

Baroness Campbell29:47

I've always loved politics. I've always wanted to be in politics. Yes, Minister is exactly how it happens. I know because I've seen it.

Speaker 230:02

Party have had an opinion poll done. It seems all the voters are in favour of bringing back national service. We'll have another opinion poll done showing the voters are against bringing back national service. We can't be for each other. Well, of course they can, Bernard. Have you ever been surveyed? Yes. Well, not me, actually, my house. Oh, I see what you.

Baroness Campbell30:12

Uh

Speaker 230:18

Well, Bernard, do you know what happens? Nice young lady comes up to you. Obviously, you want to create a good impression. You don't want to look a fool, do you?

Speaker 330:18

Well done, did you know what happened?

Speaker 230:25

No. No. So she starts asking you some questions.

Speaker 230:28

mister Willey.

Speaker 230:30

Are you worried about the number of young people without jobs?

Speaker 230:34

Yes.

Speaker 230:35

Are you worried about the rise in crime among teenagers? Yes. Do you think there's a lack of discipline in our comprehensive schools? Yes.

Speaker 230:43

Do you think young people welcome some authority and leadership in their lives? Yes. Do you think they respond to a challenge? Yes. Would you be in favor of reintroducing national service?

Speaker 230:56

Oh, well I suppose I might

Speaker 230:59

Yes. Of course you would, Bernard. After all you've told you, you can't say no to that.

Speaker 231:03

So, they don't mention the first five questions, they publish the last one.

Speaker 231:07

Is that really what they do? Well, not the reputable ones, no, but there aren't many of those. So, alternatively, the young lady can get the opposite result. How? Mr. Woolley.

Speaker 231:18

Are you worried about the danger of war? Yes. Are you worried about the growth of almonds? Yes. Do you think there's a danger in giving young people guns and teaching them how to kill? Yes. Do you think it's wrong to force people to take up arms against their will? Yes. Would you oppose the reintroduction of national service? Yes.

Speaker 331:35

Uh

Speaker 231:37

A Y U T Bennett?

Speaker 231:40

The perfect balance sample.

Speaker 231:43

So, we just commissioned our own survey for the Ministry of Defence. See to it, Bernard.

Presenter31:47

Nigel Hawthorne and Derek Foles discuss leading questions in Yes, Prime Minister. You mentioned then, Jane, that you are married now for the second time to Roger. You say that he fell for you when he saw you give a speech. W when did you fall for him, and what was it about him that captured your heart?

Baroness Campbell32:06

His

Baroness Campbell32:07

Sense of comedy

Baroness Campbell32:09

I can get through some of the dark times.

Baroness Campbell32:13

just because um I see the comedy in in the situation as well. And I lost that sense of comedy and I lost the ability to laugh.

Baroness Campbell32:27

When Graham died and and to be honest.

Baroness Campbell32:30

Roger brought laughter back into my life.

Baroness Campbell32:33

I also sense of

Baroness Campbell32:35

Normality and

Baroness Campbell32:38

A sense that one doesn't need to take themselves so seriously.

Presenter32:45

I was suddenly reminded there as you were talking of your father and this person you described as being, you know, persuading everybody in the street that uh he was the man to watch and he was the sort of top of the pile and and him telling you that, you know, you're going to go and do something extraordinary one day, Jane. How often do you think about him? Is he somebody who's still sort of present in your head in this very vivid inner life that you have?

Baroness Campbell33:09

My father was larger than life.

Baroness Campbell33:13

But he wasn't an easy man to live with.

Baroness Campbell33:17

Bye.

Baroness Campbell33:18

No, but

Baroness Campbell33:21

Wherever he is, and I don't have any faith, but wherever he is, he's looking down and thinking.

Baroness Campbell33:31

Hmm.

Baroness Campbell33:32

There she goes. I knew I was right.

Baroness Campbell33:36

He believed in me.

Baroness Campbell33:38

And

Baroness Campbell33:39

I think when your parents believe in you

Baroness Campbell33:42

You're unstoppable, don't you think?

Presenter33:44

I agree entirely. On that note, we'll have your final track then, Jane Campbell. What are we going to hear?

Baroness Campbell33:51

This is Van Morrison Have I Told You Lately, and I think there's a line in the song that says You Fill My Life With Laughter.

Baroness Campbell34:01

You know, when somebody comes in to your life and makes you laugh again and loves you and you have a second marriage that is as blessed as your first, you really have got it all.

Baroness Campbell34:17

This is the track.

Baroness Campbell34:18

that we played at our wedding in the New Forest.

Speaker 334:24

Albato You lately that I love you.

Speaker 334:31

Have I told you there's no one above you?

Speaker 334:39

Robot with fashions.

Speaker 334:43

Take away my sadness

Speaker 334:46

These my troubles, that's what you do.

Presenter34:49

Uh

Presenter34:52

That was Van Morrison, and Have I Told You Lately? So I'm going to give you the books now. You get the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare, Jane, and you get to take another book too. What would you like to take?

Baroness Campbell35:02

Well, this is a tricky one for me. I've actually liked to take a very good atlas, because I had to choose my subjects to get them all done in time. So I never did maths, and I never did geography.

Baroness Campbell35:18

And, you know, we're going to Italy this summer, and I hardly knew sort of where Italy was. So I want to I want to know more about the world.

Presenter35:30

Right, it's yours. I shall get you the best atlas that money can buy. And a luxury, too. What would you like your luxury to be?

Baroness Campbell35:35

Well, you know, it's got to be um a super souped up electric wheelchair with caterpillar tyres, um, solar powered and of course with robotic arms, so that I can build my own shelter. Otherwise I'm going to be really stuck.

Presenter35:51

I'll give you that. It's certainly yours. And if you had to choose just one of these eight disks, which one would you save?

Baroness Campbell35:57

Yeah.

Baroness Campbell35:58

Well, I'd have to choose Sandy Denny and Fotheringay, because quite frankly, I'd feel pretty scared and caged on the island. So I'd need to fly away as soon as possible.

Presenter36:12

That's your disc. Jane Campbell, Baroness Campbell of Surbiton. Thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Baroness Campbell36:19

Thank you very much. I think it's really enjoyable.

Presenter36:59

You've been listening to a download from the BBC. You'll find more information on the Radio 4 website: bbc.co.uk slash Radio 4.