Rt Hon Lord Denning

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive.

Speaker 10:05

For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in 1980, and the presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:30

On our desert island this week is England's senior civil law judge and master of the roles, the Right Honourable Lord Denning.

Presenter0:38

Now, first, Lord Denning, what are the rolls? Are they the the scrolls of the law? Do you have them in your possession?

Rt Hon Lord Denning0:44

Well, they're the old parchment rolls which many hundreds of years ago all the records were kept on, of the courts and the government. They were all on parchment and not in books like we have now, but rolled up. And these were the rolls of the realm, and the master of the rolls was in charge of them, and we have many now in the public record office, but I was in charge of the rolls of the realm.

Presenter1:04

Yeah.

Presenter1:07

And nominally you're still responsible for the

Presenter1:10

Yes, yes, and uh I'm master of old still. Right. Now, this desert island situation, could you endure loneliness, do you think?

Rt Hon Lord Denning1:20

Well, I need either some of your records or any I'm not a lonely sort of person. I'd rather have someone with me.

Presenter1:26

Eh? I'm afraid we've got rules about that, but you do have some music as a consolation. Does music mean a lot to you?

Rt Hon Lord Denning1:31

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning1:32

Uh

Presenter1:32

Old bed

Rt Hon Lord Denning1:32

Depends on what kind of music you know. I'm not at all musical. Uh I like the lighter stuff as a rule. You have no musical skill yourself? No, none at all, no, no. You've never sung in public at a smoking concert? No, all my brothers were selected for the choir in the church, but my voice was too bad. They wouldn't have at all meant the vicar wouldn't have me in his choir.

Presenter1:34

I love it.

Presenter1:44

No, but

Presenter1:50

Oh, they wouldn't.

Presenter1:53

Is there any general reason for your choice of a record? Are you choosing nostalgically? Are you looking back?

Rt Hon Lord Denning2:00

Oh, yeah, a certain amount looking back, because I've looked back into things which uh I I've hummed and kept in my head or I've known in the past for particular reasons. And that's the reason I've selected what I have. Well where do we start? What's the first one? Well, I'm going to start with perhaps the most English tune that I know of.

Rt Hon Lord Denning2:22

It's mentioned even in Shakespeare Greensleeves, and I remember it because when we had a meeting of the Speakers of the Commonwealth of Westminster Hall, the Lord Chancellor came in to the tune of Greensleeves, a real English tune.

Presenter3:36

The Vaughan Williams Fantasia on Greensleeves, the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir Adrian Boat.

Presenter3:43

Now, Lord Denning, you were born in a small town in Hampshire. I believe your father kept a draper's shop. Yes.

Presenter3:49

You went to the

Rt Hon Lord Denning3:49

The local school, first of all? Well, uh, we went into our own little school, yes, and then I I uh

Rt Hon Lord Denning3:55

Well, got a little scholarship to the grammar school at Andover and then we went by train there. What were your best subjects?

Presenter4:02

It's cool.

Rt Hon Lord Denning4:03

Mathematics

Rt Hon Lord Denning4:05

I had to get a scholarship like that to Oxford and English, mathematics and English literature. Did you have any particular ambition as a schoolboy?

Rt Hon Lord Denning4:14

Not particularly, except my mother says when I was a little boy I said I think I'm going to become a barrister. She remembers me saying that at about the age of ten, but I had no idea what a barrister was.

Presenter4:20

Keep in

Speaker 14:21

Uh

Presenter4:26

When you left school, when you left Andover Grammar School, of course the First World War was on, you joined the army.

Rt Hon Lord Denning4:33

Yes, I went for a little time to Oxford. I was too young, and then I was in the Royal Engineers, then I had as a commission as a second lieutenant. And we were rushed out to France in March nineteen eighteen when the Germans had forced us back to the gates of Paris and Amiens, and all us youngsters of nineteen were rushed out to hold the line.

Rt Hon Lord Denning4:56

And uh of course my brothers had been there before me, but we were we were rushed out then and we held the line. You know Lord Hague's words There must be no retirement. Every position must be held to the last man. With our backs to the wall and believing in the justice of our cause, we will fight on to the end. That was Lord Hague's message to us, and as you know, we did fight on and went to victory.

Presenter5:26

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:29

How

Presenter5:29

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:29

Bone

Presenter5:29

Were you overseas?

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:30

Uh

Presenter5:31

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:31

About twelve months. I was too young to go before.

Presenter5:34

And when you would immobilized you

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:35

He went back to Oxford. Almost at once we were delobalized on the Thursday, and I started at Oxford again on the Monday.

Presenter5:43

Uh

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:43

And you were reading

Presenter5:45

Mathematics. Is that right? Yes. And you took a first.

Presenter5:49

What happened when you came down?

Presenter5:51

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:51

Oh, well, I taught at Winchester, taught mathematics for a year then, because I didn't want to study that all my life.

Presenter5:56

Did you want to

Rt Hon Lord Denning5:58

Yeah.

Presenter5:58

So the law instead. Back to Oxford.

Rt Hon Lord Denning6:01

Hmm.

Presenter6:02

And how long did it take you to take your law degree?

Rt Hon Lord Denning6:05

Oh, well, I got through it quickly at Oxford in I think eight months.

Presenter6:09

Eight months to take a first-in-law from scratch in eight months.

Presenter6:14

That must be rather unusual, Lord.

Presenter6:17

What's your second record?

Rt Hon Lord Denning6:19

Well, I think we might recall

Rt Hon Lord Denning6:22

That first war, in this sense, when we were going up to the front line.

Rt Hon Lord Denning6:32

The band used to lead all of those us were going up in our packs and our rifles and everything like that, and used to play down marching to the station yard, the march Colonel Bogie. Then we got to the station gates we went all in on our way up and the trains to the line. The band went back. But we had Colonel Bogie as the last march in our ears before we left up for the line.

Presenter7:03

Uh

Presenter7:36

Colonel Bogey played by the Royal Marines, the Naval Home Command, Portsmouth.

Presenter7:42

What was your very first brief? Do you remember

Rt Hon Lord Denning7:43

I think it was for two guineas in the West London County Court. And then I'd g have the little briefs for dock briefs at Winchester, my own town, at Sessions, one pound three and sixpence. You would sit in court and wait to be brief. Wait and be brief for dock brief t the accused would b would pick us out. There was no legal aid in those days. We might have a day or two days for one pound three and sixpence. And

Presenter8:12

Then you were called to the bar in I think nineteen twenty three, is that

Presenter8:15

Can you tell us about some of the judges before whom you appeared as a as a as a young barrister? Do you remember any particular great characters?

Presenter8:24

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning8:24

Ah, yes, there were great characters uh uh who could be uh rather frightening to a young man. mister Justice Swift, I remember, a very robust judge. Lord Justice Scrutton. There seemed to be greater robuster characters in those days than there. We are all too polite nowadays. If we did anything wrong in those and in the countercourts we could be rebuked most severely. And lose your clown.

Presenter8:44

It was

Presenter8:50

Oh dead.

Presenter8:52

What's your third record, please?

Rt Hon Lord Denning8:55

Ought to be a pilgrim. John Bunyan.

Rt Hon Lord Denning8:57

Yes, John Bunyan.

Rt Hon Lord Denning9:00

He's always been sort of

Rt Hon Lord Denning9:02

Behind the family, if I must put it that way, with his Pilgrim's Progress, with his good language, short, easily understood sentences, and uh, if I may say so, his imagery, and his leading people in the right way, whether you take Vanity Fair or Slow Despond and so on, Pilgrim's Progress has been sort of a a family book.

Presenter9:24

Yes.

Rt Hon Lord Denning9:25

And at the end, mister Valiant for Truth.

Rt Hon Lord Denning9:30

gives this poem To Be a Pilgrim, and people don't often remember it, but it is John Bunyan's poem, but it's now in our hymn books, To Be a Pilgrim.

Speaker 19:42

That he gave all this love.

Speaker 19:48

There's in constancy for the boss.

Speaker 19:57

I got this more.

Presenter9:58

This God is found to make it was real.

Speaker 210:06

This was our intent to be

Presenter10:16

He who would valiant be by the Worcester Cathedral choir.

Presenter10:21

Now you took silk, Lord Denning, nineteen thirty eight.

Presenter10:25

Appointed a judge in nineteen forty four. Am I right in saying that you've been a judge longer than any one in English legal history?

Rt Hon Lord Denning10:33

As far as I can discover, yes. I've looked back. But you see, now I've been over thirty six years a judge. I started quite young, as English judges go, and I've looked back. I haven't found anyone who's been a judge in England longer than I. And you, of course, have a freehold?

Rt Hon Lord Denning10:51

Ah, yes. The newer judges appointed since nineteen fifty nine have to go at seventy five. I was appointed so many years ago. I can go on indefinitely.

Presenter11:01

Now you were promoted to Lord Justice of Appeal.

Presenter11:05

and then Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, and you remained in the House of Lords until nineteen sixty two, when you were elected to retire and become Master of the Rolls.

Rt Hon Lord Denning11:15

Don't about retire. I d went back because it's not nearly so much fun in the House of Lords to be one of five and dissenting. Nobody takes any notice of a dissenting judgment there. So in nineteen sixty two I went back, the Lord Chancellor invited me, to be master of the

Presenter11:32

Now the Master of the Rolls runs the Court of Appeal, and the judgments of the Court of Appeal can be overturned by the Lord. So surely in a way you were You were being demoted by

Rt Hon Lord Denning11:43

Yes, if you call it like that, but mark you, I'm in charge of the show, and we have many, many more cases in the Court of Appeal than the House of Lords, which are not appealed at all, and in that way we can influence, and do influence, the day to day working of the law far more than the House of Lords.

Presenter11:59

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning11:59

They may reverse us, but that doesn't worry us.

Presenter11:59

Yeah.

Presenter12:01

Yes, you have had a number of your judgments rebuffed by the Lords in in recent months. Well, maybe. But that doesn't mean they're right, you know.

Presenter12:09

Mm-hmm.

Presenter12:11

In the Court of Appeal how many judges are there altogether?

Rt Hon Lord Denning12:14

Well, there are about eighteen altogether, but remember we sit in courts of three only.

Presenter12:19

Yes.

Rt Hon Lord Denning12:19

In a judge, a person that sits alone he may have a jury with him, but he sits alone in the Court of Appeal

Presenter12:19

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning12:26

Eighteen of us each in courts of three members. And in the Lords it's five. Five. There uh nine or ten of them they sit as five.

Presenter12:34

Now you as as head of the Court of Appeal you allocate the cases.

Rt Hon Lord Denning12:38

Well, I have some say in it. I in a sense I like the cases to be dealt with by people who are expert in it. For instance, if it's a commercial case, I like an expert and commercial judge on it. And if it's a case which has uh particular significance, it's a case which I think I ought to sit on myself as Master of the Rose. And so I do have some say in the cases as they're allocated between the various divisions.

Presenter13:01

Now, of course, you talked about the fact that it's in the Court of Appeal that the law gets formulated and the shape of it is changed. You've taken a very considerable part in in reforming the law.

Rt Hon Lord Denning13:13

Well, yes, some people rather they uh criticise me on that. But you've got to remember it's the whole court together, and uh uh it's my view that we ought to keep the law in accordance with the needs of the times, and I always try to do what I think is just. Don't always succeed, you know, because sometimes I dissent. I always tell a little story, you know. When I was a judge of first instance, I say, sitting alone, I could and did do justice.

Rt Hon Lord Denning13:43

But in the Court of Appeal of three I say the chances of doing justice are two to one against

Rt Hon Lord Denning13:51

And uh that's only my little joke. But on the other hand uh

Rt Hon Lord Denning13:55

The students do.

Rt Hon Lord Denning13:58

It's sort of No that I try if I can to perform or change the law and one law student, a girl, wrote to the Times once, and they published a letter, and what she said was, Sir,

Rt Hon Lord Denning14:13

With respect to the Master of the Rolls, will His Lordship kindly refrain from changing any more laws before the law examinations in August? You see, that's how the rumour and things go round, but that is the sort of talk that goes round. Which particular thing?

Presenter14:32

particular areas.

Rt Hon Lord Denning14:34

Yeah.

Presenter14:34

Yeah.

Presenter14:34

Have you affected you?

Rt Hon Lord Denning14:36

See, I don't do the criminal law. Lord Chief Justice deals with that. As you mentioned only, I deal with the civil law. And like the whole range, for instance, commercial law I'm most interested, and we had a great deal to do with husbands and wives.

Rt Hon Lord Denning14:51

We had both in the very beginning, you know, at one time wives were very unequal. They were kept right down. They weren't given the share of the home or everything. And we did manage to develop quite a lot and give protection for the deserted wife. And nowadays much more equality. We've got equality of women all the way through the law now.

Presenter15:12

Wives owe you a great deal, Lord Denny.

Rt Hon Lord Denning15:14

Well, some people say that I've had letters from one man.

Rt Hon Lord Denning15:18

Who said you're a disgrace, he said, to all mankind.

Rt Hon Lord Denning15:26

To let these women break up homes, he said.

Rt Hon Lord Denning15:31

I only hope you have the same trouble as us.

Rt Hon Lord Denning15:34

He says, So take a rose and run right off Beachyhead and don't come back. That's the sort of letters I get from time to time. That was the husband who was disappointed with the decisions of the Court of Appeal.

Speaker 115:35

Take

Presenter15:39

Okay.

Presenter15:45

You'll get some nice ones from the wife.

Rt Hon Lord Denning15:47

Ah, yes. Well, not in that, but in a way I was comforted just recently when the House of Lords reversed us about the trade union matter. Yes. I was very comforted about all sorts of ordinary people up and down the land wrote and said they supported us and the Court of Appeal, and that was a great comfort to me when the House of Lords were reversing us.

Presenter16:06

When the house

Presenter16:09

Record number four please

Rt Hon Lord Denning16:09

Peace.

Presenter16:11

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning16:11

Who rebuilded this?

Presenter16:11

Rebell

Rt Hon Lord Denning16:13

I remember we took all the children.

Rt Hon Lord Denning16:16

To see the king and I.

Rt Hon Lord Denning16:19

When it was first produced at Drury Lane,

Rt Hon Lord Denning16:23

Valerie Hobson was performing in it, and I remember how the children liked it and how we liked it, and she did it so awfully well. I think it's the first time she'd done much in the way of singing.

Speaker 216:36

Whenever I feel afraid, I hold my head erect, And whistle a happy tune, So no one will suspect I'm afraid.

Speaker 216:50

While shivering in my shoes, I strike a careless pose, And whistle a happy tune, And no one ever knows I'm afraid

Presenter17:03

Valerie Hobson singing I Whistle a Happy Tune from The King and I.

Presenter17:09

Now there can be few men in the country with so many honours and distinctions. The number of honorary fellowships in various universities is is is quite immense. It's a very impressive list. Kubwella

Rt Hon Lord Denning17:20

Perhaps I oughtn't to put them in for one year diversity. But they're always awfully good of them. In a way I always like to keep in touch with the universities uh and it pleases me if they uh do invite me to go. You're a bencher in three inns, of court, or is it four?

Rt Hon Lord Denning17:37

Three. Three. That's almost a record. I must. Lincoln's Inn I started with, my sort of home inn.

Rt Hon Lord Denning17:43

Then Middle Tempo, where I used to lunch all the time, and Grazin, I am to be a bencher all three.

Presenter17:49

A story about you which I admire very much. You are, I believe, the only judge ever to have reversed one of your own judgments. You reassembled the court and announced that your previous judgment should be considered interim. That is unique, is it?

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:03

Perhaps so, but I don't mind if I'm wrong, I don't mind saying I'm wrong and starting again. I've got to get the others with me, of course, all the time, but uh we everyone goes wrong, and I'm wrong from time to time, and if uh

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:16

Uh if it's wrong, well I'll I'll Well, I did that particularly. I used to be the only judge.

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:23

for pensions appeals from the boar.

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:27

And there was no appeal from me.

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:29

But one time it was wrong, so next time I'll put it right.

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:33

Record number five. What's it to be?

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:37

Well should we go back again?

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:40

To one when I was young.

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:43

and really just about that time of that first war,

Rt Hon Lord Denning18:48

and we repeated it later on my eightieth birthday the Bar Theatrical had a special collection of matters I was interested in, and we picked the roses of Piccadilly.

Rt Hon Lord Denning19:06

and I recalled then, and I spoke to them of the war in those days, and some of the songs which appealed to us most when we were out there in France.

Presenter19:21

And the record of Roses of Piccadilly which you've chosen is by Webster Booth.

Speaker 119:27

As I shining in a picardy In the hush of a silver deal.

Speaker 119:39

Roars as a blowing in a peak of he But there's never a roars like you

Presenter19:52

Band of wars as will die

Presenter19:56

Webster Booth with Fred Hartley's Quintet.

Presenter20:00

At various times you've published technical law books. Recently you've published a couple of books which are more personal and which have a more general appeal.

Rt Hon Lord Denning20:10

Well, I when I wrote them I was thinking more of the students of law which would be interested in them, and I thought it might help them.

Rt Hon Lord Denning20:19

But uh to my great pleasure, uh not only the students of law, but lots of quite ordinary uh of good folk read them and have been very encouraging about it. And so I've been very pleased that I've tried to make things simple, uh principles of law and ordinary living, but simple for for the ordinary folk. I always try and do that in my words, and that's what I've tried to do. First in the one book, The Discipline of Law, the next, The Due Process of Law. And you found yourself with a couple of bestsellers on your hands. Well, they're good enough to uh to say so, and that was very encouraging. I'm glad that people should be interested in them. The discipline of law was published on

Presenter21:02

Your eightieth birthday.

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:03

Yeah.

Presenter21:03

Yes. And the new one, uh the due process of law, that's just out.

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:07

Yes, that's right. One a year, if we can find time for it. You have another one on the stocks, I believe, a family. No, I should like to, because I refer to the others to the family's story.'Cause we are, if I may say so, I hope

Presenter21:12

Family has no

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:20

Deservedly proud. You see, we were five brothers and one sister.

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:25

Two of the brothers, one in the army and one in the navy, were lost in the first war.

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:31

And the other two does the general know?

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:35

The Admiral died a little while ago, but he did very well in the war, and in this me.

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:42

And then my sister? Well

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:44

She's getting on. She's eighty nine.

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:47

When do you find time to write?

Presenter21:48

I mean, you're you sit in court five days a week, you have all your reading to do at night.

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:55

Yeah.

Presenter21:55

This is

Rt Hon Lord Denning21:55

It's almost a holiday task. You've got to remember I've got my library at home in the country. I've got a lovely garden to be by.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:05

And uh in the holidays I did think it was worth while well, I'm still going on.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:11

To be able to do something of this kind, and that's what I've done.

Presenter22:13

Mm-hmm.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:14

I have no time in the in the ordinary term time. I've only got to do it in times like that. In the vacation.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:20

Record

Presenter22:21

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:21

Number six

Presenter22:21

Uh We've got to.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:24

No.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:25

I'd said, just a little while ago, How my navel brother had died

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:31

Well at his service.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:35

We had this old Methodist hymn which goes down to John Brown's body lies a mouldering in the grave. It became the battle hymn of the Republic in these words Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

Rt Hon Lord Denning22:53

It was sung at Churchill's funeral. I was there in St. Paul's, as it was.

Rt Hon Lord Denning23:00

at Lord Bambatten's, and at my own neighbour brothers and it always recalls me in a way er it almost exemplifies their character, and that held him, June,

Rt Hon Lord Denning23:15

has really stuck in my mind. It's worth hearing.

Presenter23:23

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord. He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored. He hath loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword. His truth is marching on. Glory, glory, hallelujah. Glory, glory, hallelujah.

Speaker 123:58

Gloria, his troph is marching on.

Presenter24:05

The Battle Hymn of the Republic.

Presenter24:08

My eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

Presenter24:11

by the Robert Shaw Chorale and the R C A Victor Symphony Orchestra.

Presenter24:16

Now you still live in that same small Hampshire town in which you were born? Yes.

Presenter24:21

And the river Test flows at the bottom of your garden, I believe. Are you a fisherman?

Rt Hon Lord Denning24:26

No, but my friends are. I like to see my friends enjoy themselves, but also it's very nice to have the river running through the garden. I've done it all my life, you see the bright crystal waters of the chalk streams, the trout and the fish there, and our garden with the little bridges. It really, if I may say so, it is uh the most desirable.

Rt Hon Lord Denning24:51

home one could have.

Presenter24:53

And I believe you built the little bridges of stones from Lincoln's Inn.

Rt Hon Lord Denning24:57

Yes, we crossed the bridges to the other side.

Rt Hon Lord Denning25:01

The poplar trees which I grow, we brought the old stones down from Lincoln's Inn, and we've made our own bridge across the river.

Presenter25:09

Well, obviously you are a handyman. I'm disappointed that you don't fish. I'm thinking how you're going to manage on this desert island, because you've really got to get your own food and and cook it

Presenter25:21

Make some kind of shelter. But well, if you can build a bridge, you can do most things.

Rt Hon Lord Denning25:26

But I don't know that bridges are much good on a desert island.

Presenter25:29

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning25:30

You know what I should uh

Rt Hon Lord Denning25:33

I wonder whether to get a cup of tea on a desert island. Can you get a cup of tea, or can you get any fresh milk?

Presenter25:39

Uh fresh milk is difficult. Now y I I know you were thinking of of of tea as your luxury. Now that we can provide because we can easily give you some solar power that'll heat the kettle and we can give you some tea, so you can have plenty of tea, but I don't think we can manage fresh milk.

Rt Hon Lord Denning25:47

Right.

Rt Hon Lord Denning25:54

Oh

Rt Hon Lord Denning25:56

Well then well I tell you what, there's another little thing. Is quite a little time ago someone asked my wife oh what I ate and what I had. Oh she says all we like any ordinary roast beef or lamas on and rice pudding. She just put it like that. And then a headline came out in the paper, He adores rice pudding.

Presenter26:17

Yeah.

Rt Hon Lord Denning26:17

Well no

Rt Hon Lord Denning26:19

Oh, yes, and it's about after that.

Rt Hon Lord Denning26:22

I went to luncheon at the Savoy Hotel with some business men there and everything like that, and lo and behold, they provided rice pudding for lunch at the Savoy Hotel. Now, please, will you have any rice pudding on this desert island?

Presenter26:38

I don't think we can't manage the milk, you see, because your luxury must be an animus, and we we can't have any cows there, and fresh milk won't keep long under the sun. Well, we'll stick to tea without milk, Dick. Tea without milk, I'm afraid.

Rt Hon Lord Denning26:51

With your special solar energy and the like. That's right.

Presenter26:55

Now we've got to your seventh record. What's that going to be?

Rt Hon Lord Denning26:58

Well, no, I think on this desert island I'd like a little light relief and from Gilbert and Solomon if you please. I would always like the caricature of the good judge, and a good judge too in trial by jury after the breach of promise action and of course the elderly ugly daughter. She'd pass for forty-three in the dusk with the light behind her. That's always and it recalls the career of an old ba rather like my own at the sessions ancient Bailey appearing and then he becomes a judge. Now I'm ready to try this breach of promise of marriage. Well that's for me and I I've heard the old Savoy opera, the the Dole Descartes doing it, Leo Sheffield and the like.

Presenter27:52

Leo.

Rt Hon Lord Denning27:52

So so please I'd like to have that too on the desert.

Presenter27:56

The judge's song from Trial by Jury.

Presenter28:03

When I, good friend, was called to the bar, I'd an appetite fresh and hearty, For I was as many young barristers are, An in the curious party, I'd a swallow-tailed coat of a beautiful blue, A brief that I bought from a booby.

Presenter28:18

A couple of shorts and a collared or two and a ring that looked like a ruby.

Rt Hon Lord Denning28:29

In Westminster Hall I dance to dance like a semi-despondent fury. Flying thought that I never should hit on the charge.

Presenter28:36

Of dressing a British jury, but I soon got tired of third-class journeys and dinners of bread and water.

Presenter28:44

So I fell in love.

Presenter28:46

Get up.

Presenter28:47

The option.

Presenter28:55

Leo Sheffield was the judge in a 1929 recording of trial by jury by the Doily Cart Company.

Presenter29:03

And now your last record. What's that to be?

Rt Hon Lord Denning29:06

Well, there's one country.

Rt Hon Lord Denning29:09

which we all love.

Rt Hon Lord Denning29:11

Which I love more than anyone, always because all the spirit love of England, land of hope and glory, mother of the free. That's what I always be believed in in my career, if you will see, for the freedom of the individual. In all my career I've tried to stand up for the freedom of the individual against the executive power or the power of any great authorities. Land of hope and glory, mother of the free.

Rt Hon Lord Denning29:39

Pomp and Circumstance is the sort of general title by Sir Edward Elgar.

Presenter30:34

Land of Hope and Glory, Sir Adrian Bolt conducting the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

Presenter30:40

If you could take only one disc out of your eight, which would you hang on to? Green sleeves. Green sleeves.

Presenter30:47

Now we've heard your luxury tea and hot water. What sort of tea, by the way? We want want to make things right for you.

Rt Hon Lord Denning30:53

Well, they often ask that. I prefer Indian tea to China.

Presenter30:58

That shall be provided. And one book apart from the Bible and Shakespeare, and please not a big encyclopedia.

Rt Hon Lord Denning31:05

No, well, I think Palagraves Golden Treasury I've known it since I was a boy at school. We had to learn it there. And it really is the best, I think, the best selection of English poetry all over the centuries, representative. I know many of them by heart. And uh to record them, it brings all the qualities of England and words and the choice of words together. I'd like that to be able to dip into from time to time on this desert island. Right.

Presenter31:37

Palgrave's Golden Treasury, and thank you, Lord Denning, for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Rt Hon Lord Denning31:43

But thank you very much for letting me come. It's been most interesting, if I may say so. Goodbye, everyone.

Speaker 131:55

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