David Penhaligon

David Penhaligon0:00

Hello, I'm Kirstie Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty seven, and the presenter was Michael Parkinson.

Presenter0:48

Our castaway was once described as a reforming radical, oft performing as a Cornish comic. On the one hand, as the Liberal MP for Truro, he's won a reputation as a tough and capable West Country politician. On the Showbiz side, he recently became the only Liberal Chancellor in waiting to stand in for Jimmy Young.

Presenter1:06

David, am I look looking forward to this uh desert island? No, not the least bit. It doesn't appeal to me at all. I um think to be on an island with no human company at all is quite devastating thought. But isn't there a sense in you're a Cornish man, isn't there a sense in which uh Cornish people

Presenter1:22

Are born outcasts and therefore should welcome being on a desert. No, you see, you misunderstand the situation. You see, we Cornish are born in the centre of the civilized world. There's just enough people around to be pleasant. It's when you get up in these great urban areas where you get fed up with people. The Cornish have got the balance just right. There's enough people there to make life enjoyable, but there's also enough space that occasionally you can wander off and be with yourself. But you do regard yourself, don't you, as being part of a special tribe? Well, I mean, that's not regarding. That's a fact.

David Penhaligon1:24

Hello you see

Presenter1:48

Well, could you define for me what this tribe is about? Well, the Cornish are one of the Celtic origins of this country. There was a language, Penhalligan, is actually part of the Cornish language. It means head of the Willow Valley. Nobody much speaks it now, but there is a sort of separateness and an identity of Cornish, which we feel and understand, but are not always able to express very clearly, as is so many of these differences. You come from Yorkshire, so I suspect you know what I'm referring to. Assume I'm interested in international. Well, there is a pride of being Cornish and a sort of independence. I'll give you an example.

Speaker 41:49

Uh

David Penhaligon2:15

Well there is a

Presenter2:19

My wonderful father, whenever he filled up one of these little forms you fill up when you go into a hotel, never put down that he was English. Never regarded himself as English. He put down Cornish, he put down British. What about music as part of the culture in Cornwall? It's very strong, isn't it? It's very strong. It missed me, I have to confess, but it's very strong. My parliamentary constituency has got, I think it's four Class I bands. It's very strong. It tends to be in the mining areas of Cornwall, either the current ones or the historic ones. And bands, while we've nearly got them, choirs, we've nearly got them coming out of our ears. So there is this great tradition, and the Cornish do love to come together and have a bit of a blah, as they put it, or have a good sing.

David Penhaligon2:28

Really?

David Penhaligon2:38

Did it?

Speaker 42:38

Uh

David Penhaligon2:38

Yeah.

Presenter3:01

Let's have a first choice of record.

Presenter3:03

Well, my first choice is suitable for my part of her. It's Alan Opie. He's the singer who I went to school with, who's now uh in opera and making a good living out of it. He's singing Twenty Thousand Cornishmen Shall Know the Reason Why, Trelawney.

Speaker 43:17

Uh

Speaker 43:19

The Shout for Bell!

Speaker 43:22

His twenty thousand coin he spent will know the reason more.

Speaker 43:30

And when we come to learn to know our heads and sight to you, come aforth, come aforth, ye come on!

Speaker 43:52

Yeah.

Speaker 43:52

Uh

Presenter4:15

Thus Trelawney sung by Alanope with the Clamax Mill Choir and the Camburn Town Band.

Presenter4:20

David, let's spend a bit of time in Cornwall. You were born uh D-Day the sixth of june, nineteen forty four. A rather significant day. What's a magnificent day to be born on. My mother was the only person in the nation who had her thoughts on um something other than the Great War. There's a lovely family story, the truth of which I'm no longer absolutely certain about, but it's said to be true.

David Penhaligon4:28

Uh

Presenter4:38

Is that my dear mother wished to call me Montgomery as a result of this coincidence?

Presenter4:42

Whereas my dear father wished to call me David. And I've always said that the fact that my father won this battle was my first piece of political luck and that

Presenter4:50

There are some difficulties in getting Penaligan on a window sticker, but to get Montgomery Penaligan on a window sticker, I do believe, would have been terminal. Whether this is true or not, I don't know, but the family's told the story so many times that nobody's now certain now. It's a wonderful name of Montgomery Penaligan. It's superb. But what about your parents? You're obviously very fond of your father. They were born in Cornwall. My father had a small business. He used to run a.

Presenter5:12

A garage and a caravan site which had quite a lot of influence on my life.

Presenter5:15

Typical Cornishman, uh, brought up on a farm, went over to the garage trade in about the nineteen twenties, and then developed the caravanside after that. Why do you say the caravanside had a significant effect on your life? In what way?

Presenter5:26

Well, I was brought up on the caravan site in effect, and it was a weekly renting caravan site, not a residential one. Such is the nature of such institutions that they tend to attract quite a heavy, drifting population. We had two, for example, on the caravan site that were executed for murder. I was the star defense witness. And if my father had been in any other business in Toro, I would have probably lived up the rather prosperous end of the town, as did the rest of the business people. Whereas I didn't. I lived in what probably was the poorest community within the town, and they were my friends. They were the people I spoke to. And made me very aware of a whole series of problems that people faced that weren't always solved by that standard middle-class attitude. Well, they should pull themselves together and sort themselves out. And I think it might well have been one of the ingredients that started me getting interested in this crazy business of politics. In what circumstance were you the the witness in um in a murder trial? Well, the two men were charged with murdering uh a farmer at Constantine, and uh there's not much doubt they did it. One of those charged defense in essence was that at the time he'd had a fit. And the only people he could find that uh had seen him have a fit.

Presenter6:29

were the um women they were living with and myself.

Presenter6:33

And I went to the court, and Judy gave witness to the effect of what I'd seen.

Presenter6:38

And I've often wondered if I gave precisely the same evidence as David Penaligan, chartered engineer, 42 years of age, member of parliament, as opposed to David Penaligan, 18-year-old fitter-interner-apprentice. I've often wondered whether it would have made more impression, because after I gave my evidence, which is quite clearly key to it all, a series of these eminent psychiatrists came in and medics. The first one took an hour to say he didn't know. The second one took about three-quarters of an hour to say, well, he thinks he could have done. And the third one took about four minutes to say, God, he's there, when you are on.

Presenter7:09

And um quite clearly the third one was believed. You remember these things.

Presenter7:14

Another choice of record, please, David. Well, this is Gilbert and Sullivan, really, and it could have been anything, because I just like Gilbert and Sullivan, but I thought, given my background, we would um pick the song from all of Gilbert and Sullivan, which refers to everybody being born little conservatives or little liberals.

Speaker 47:30

Let's rejoice with love, falla, ha la la, la la la, that nature always does contrive, that every boy and every gal that's born into the humble line is either a little laboral or else a little horn silver time. Falla la, falla la, is either a little

David Penhaligon8:04

I'm a little bit more.

Speaker 48:07

Moral or else only conservatives.

Presenter8:19

And that was Owen Brannigan as Private Willis in the sentry song from Gilbert and Sullivan's Isle Anthea. David, let's talk a little bit about your school. I mean, how were you academically? Were you any good? Were you a bright boy? Well, tolerable, I think. I had a tremendous amount of illness when I was young and used to miss whole terms at school. And this didn't help a great deal. But I qualified as a chartered engineer in the end, so I must have been able to scratch through, basically. Did you always want to be an engineer? I think, again, it's a reflection of one's background. I was always the one amongst my contemporaries that could make things work. I mean, I was always the one that could put the bicycle wheel on. And it was not because I... perhaps because of any inherent ability but just because it was there and I was brought up with it and it was around I just learned how to do it. It's always fascinated me as engineering. I think the single thing that's questioned that's fascinated me more than any other in my lifetime is I always want to know why.

Presenter9:09

I can remember when I was young and we used to read the newspapers. The sort of newspapers that was normally in our household, they would just tell you the Hindus were knocking the socks out of the other half. And I wanted to know why they were doing it. And that got me to reading fairly heavy papers. Now, this is quite an interesting question in engineering. I used to run a research and development department. And if you really know why something's not functioning, or why it's functioning as well as it is, then you're in a very strong position for making some modification to it. So that sort of curiosity that I've had through politics is actually a similar curiosity. It gives you strength to do engineering. What about your first job? What was that? Because you left school at 16, didn't you? Well, I left school at 16. I was then very lucky, in fact, and I got this peculiar apprenticeship with this company, who then sent me back to school virtually full-time for five years. So I've done a Fitted and Turner apprenticeship, but I also, in effect, have professionally qualified. And I work for a company called Holmans at Camborne. Indeed, the first record we play was the Climax Choir. Greater loyalty and that for a Holmans man cannot be had because Climax was the other half of the Holmans company. And I did the apprenticeship and thoroughly enjoyed my time there. We used to make rock drills. And if you want to know anything about primary stress waves going down steel, then I'm your man. Sadly, nobody does want to know. No, it's another program, perhaps. But what I'm trying to find out now is when this inclination, when the ambition to become a politician first occurred. I mean, here you are, trained as an engineer. I mean, at what moment in your life do you decide that you want to be a politician?

David Penhaligon10:24

Sadly, nobody does want to know.

Presenter10:40

I don't think I ever did in that way. I mean, it's a bit of a joke, I know, but

Presenter10:45

I I've said it before, if you want to get into power, you don't join the Liberal Party. Um and the seat for which I was adopted, I started off, you know, seventeen thousand behind. I just took the view that, um

Presenter10:57

Britain with a stronger strand of liberalism, it was a good thing, and I played my role in that. And somehow or other, I landed up in this great madhouse here at Westminster. I've always said that I only got elected because I was too naive to realize it was impossible. And second to that, and this is actually true, nobody believes it, but it's actually true, I was duly declared the Member of Parliament for Toro and then rang up my party headquarters for the first time in my life, I think that was one of the secrets of my success, and asked them where it was because I'd never been to the building and never seen it. On the other hand, I wouldn't like you to think it was casual, because you could not have worked harder than I did. And my wife, who helped me enormously in this, and a friend called Malcolm Brown, I mean, that was the sort of team that came together to make it all possible. But in an odd and peculiar way, it was never funded, never driven by an ambition to be a member of parliament, etc.

Presenter11:45

Let's have another choice of record.

Presenter11:46

Truro, it's called. It's one of Charles Wesley's famous tunes. I pick it because there's no man that's had a greater influence on mightier county than Charles Wesley.

Speaker 411:56

There is home, hello, is the heart of his speech and soul.

Speaker 412:05

And give the voices shall go there.

Speaker 412:11

And we bless and sing for his name.

Speaker 412:19

See the love wherever he reigns.

Presenter12:46

That was the hymn Jesus Shall Reign sung by mass choirs from Cornwall, of course. The hymn, of course, David, as you pointed out, written by Charles Wesley. You said had a great influence on your county. Did he have a personal influence on you? I'm not a Methodist myself. Historically, of course, Cornwall was the world's center of Methodism. I believe it was stronger there than anywhere else in the world. And much of what was taught and believed and felt then has, in fact, ran through. There's a slight puritanical streak in some of the Cornish.

Presenter13:17

Give you an example that I can't explain. I don't drink, um, although I have claimed.

Presenter13:22

To be the only teetotal member of the Church of England in Cornwall. As somebody once pointed out to me, there isn't much point being Church of England if you're teetotal. Although the Methodists don't put that anymore. But his influence was enormous. And there's more Methodism in liberalism than probably any other recent strand. Yes, and so that that tradition of liberalism too was why you chose the Liberal Party, was it? Well that and a number of other reasons. I worked in in a big factory, employed um several thousand people. My socialist friends used to say that it ought to be nationalized and I used to say, God, if it's run by London it will make fortunes, leave alone the profits it's making. And I took the view that there was nothing wrong with my company making a profit, that giving some of it to David Penaligan wouldn't put right.

David Penhaligon13:42

Well

Presenter14:01

And I don't see why people laugh when you say that. People who work for enterprises give their skills, give their energies, whatever they are, whether they be PhD, whether they be an ability to sweep a floor. And yet it is generally considered irrational in this nation that if you suggest they should have a right to some of the profits of their labour, that is thought in some way to be a revolutionary concept. But I think it is revolutionary. I think it's the one we've got to move towards. It was what the Liberal Party was arguing all those years ago still does. And I think that probably singularly was one of the issues that attracted me to it. How do you start your political career? You talked a bit about Truro, but that was in fact, that was the start of your career in the House. But before that... Well, I joined in Truro, of course, in 1964. I remember one fateful Saturday saying to my girlfriend, who is now my marvellous wife, I'm going to help at the election. She said, which party?

David Penhaligon14:41

Well that I joined

David Penhaligon14:42

Yeah.

Presenter14:52

So I said the Liberals. Well, that's good, she said. I support the Liberals. And we paddled into the campaign that was going on in 1964 and started to help. And I just got involved more and more from there. My first parliamentary experience was running for Parliament in South Devon, in Tottenham, which was probably a basic mistake for a Corishman in any case. It was actually a good experience, and it taught me a lot. It was 100 miles from home, in which case, if it all went wrong, you could sneak off back home and nobody would be aware of the tragedy that took place. I saved my deposit, which in 1970 was a bit of a miracle for a Liberal candidate anyway. Although I believe I also hold the record for the lowest ever Liberal poll, actually. But that was in England, you see. What could you expect?

Presenter15:34

Another choice of record, please do. Scott Joblin. I've chosen this purely and selfishly just because I like it.

Presenter16:40

Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag played by Joshua Rifkin.

Presenter16:44

Truro, of course, was uh was your triumph. Uh that was well how many years ago now? Twelve years ago. Twelve years ago. That's right. And you've ta already talked about uh how you've sort of got things moving there in a very enthusiastic way.

David Penhaligon16:49

Oh yeah.

Presenter16:56

W was this enthusiasm shared by your family? I mean, you you came from a non-political family. It was an enormous shock. Um I still believe my mother's hoping I'll take up something sensible one of these days. I think the s sheer shock of what happened is summed up.

David Penhaligon16:59

Yeah.

Speaker 417:00

Yeah.

Presenter17:08

With this little recollection.

Presenter17:10

I started off sixteen thousand behind, and in Feb 74 we were running an enormous campaign. There was leaflets, posters everywhere, we were delivering door to door. I mean, we were really on the move.

Presenter17:20

And my dear father, who would watch this in some sort of blank amazement from a distance,

Presenter17:25

um came into the room where we were printing yet another leaflet and said, here boy, I've been downtown chatting.

Presenter17:30

So I said, Well, that's nothing unusual, father. Now it is serious, boy, it is serious. So I said, Well, what's the trouble, father?

Presenter17:36

He said, they think you're going to get in. What the hell are you going to do? And this blind panic. And he then added, being the small businessman he is, the rather delightful line here, boy, do they get paid for it? I think he suddenly thought that I was about to land back in his lap for the next 10 or 15 years. The honest truth at the time was I said, yes, they do, but I don't know how much. And I think that sums up the surprise of it. I mean, we'd been, the Liberals in Toro had been bottom of the poll every election since 1931. Always polled quite respectably. But we were third and 16,000 behind, and you just don't win seats from 16,000 behind a general election. Actually enough, we didn't win. I lost in February 2,500, but managed to pick it up in October.

Presenter18:17

What about when you got to the house then? I mean, did you have any preset notions about what it was going to be like before you came up to London, to the big city, to Parliament? In many ways, no. I had things I wanted to say. I mean, I had views on industry and views on Cornwall and views on this and that. So I had something to say, and in a peculiar way, I think that's what's important when you arrive at Westminster. If you'd asked me what the difference was between a second and a third reading in a committee stage at that time, I think I would have gone dumb, which is not one of my natural inclinations. The mechanisms of it, I didn't understand at all. My education was engineering, not history or British Constitution. But I assumed there would be a system which one could exploit. And I remember sitting down there. Two things I remember. First, I was looking across and seeing Harold Wilson for the first time in my life, because he was then Prime Minister. And he was about a foot shorter than I imagined him to be. That was the first thing. The second thing I remember looking around and seeing all these national political figures and wondering what the devil David Ponelligan was doing here. And then not long after that, thinking, hang on, boy, I got elected as well as they did, so let's get stuck in.

Presenter19:18

Another choice of record, please, David. One of my favorites, uh favorite of youth still maintained, Johnny Cash. It's uh one piece at a time, which is slightly is an engineering song. It's all about how he steals a motor car from his factory one piece at a time.

Speaker 319:31

So we drove up town just to get the tags and I headed to right on down main track. I could hear everybody laughing for blocks around.

Speaker 319:40

But up there at the courthouse they didn't laugh cause to type it up it took the whole staff and when they got through the title weighed sixty pounds

Speaker 319:49

I got it one piece at a time, and it didn't cost me a dime. You'll know it's me when I come through your town.

Speaker 319:59

I'm gonna ride around and stop

Presenter20:00

Uh

Presenter20:02

Johnny cash on one piece at a time.

Presenter20:05

David, we we're now in the house and you've you've s said how you kind of coped with the awe and the majesty of the occasion. But I imagine there are s s some MPs who never actually get over the the first trauma of going there. We're overawed totally and forever by it. Well there are indeed. I mean there's some that speak once a year and it's a major event and you can see them when they speak. They're actually stood in the house shaking. There's one or two MPs that are just let go. Nobody challenges them or interrupts because you can see that there's an almost everything. I think oddly enough one of the advantages I had in early days is because I was a member of a small parliamentary party. If one had something go wrong and on one or two occasions I have to confess I did there was great pressure from one's associate and colleagues next week to go in and say something else because if you didn't.

David Penhaligon20:24

M

Presenter20:47

There was nobody else to say it. Whereas if you were one of, you know, three hundred and ninety two Tory MPs, it is actually quite possible to just sort of slink away and do nothing, really.

David Penhaligon20:51

See it.

Presenter20:56

But you're an an MP that's it's very much associated in the public eye with a certain specific area in in in Britain.

David Penhaligon21:01

Members are

Presenter21:02

You are regionally identified in that in that sense. How difficult is it for you to maintain that interest, that care for where you come from when you get sucked into the general moral of politics in London?

David Penhaligon21:04

Yeah.

Presenter21:14

It's clearly in in your mind all the time. It's a background feeling. When you're discussing politics, you're thinking, how will this affect my area? On the whole, my sorts of area, you know, are desperately underrepresented in Parliament in that very few people have a feel for them. And it's not unique to Cornwall, what I'm saying now. It's mid-Wales, borders of Scotland. There's quite a lot of areas in Britain that are of a similar economic base. So to have a few people in there that actually just know what the area feels, as opposed to having to do some ghastly opinion poll to find out, might not be a disadvantage. But of course, what you're implying is right, is that you have to look at the bigger issues beyond that as well. And as is usual with many decision-making processes, it's a bit of this and a bit of that.

Presenter21:55

Also too, I suppose, it's it's a rather sort of rarified atmosphere, the one that you work in, isn't it? I mean it's it's not like Trevisco or the famous Trevisco that you've used. I wrote that. One wonderful night when my friend John Pardo held the Liberal seat next door to mine.

David Penhaligon22:04

I remember that.

Presenter22:10

Um it was quarter to four in the morning.

Presenter22:12

I was sat on the bench and we were discussing the Scotland Bill. Now this is of great significance to Cornwall. And John came in at about half past three in the morning and said, when's the amendment? I said, which one, John? He said, you know, that one, ZZ, ZZ, ZZ. Oh, I said, about 15 minutes of vote. Right, he said. I'll hang on and wait for that. Oh, I said, yes, John, it's desperately important. There won't be a person in Cornwall tomorrow morning that won't turn the radio on at eight o'clock to find out how you and I voted. I wouldn't like to use the exact words, he replied. But anyway, he went straight home. And I think there is a danger of being a member of parliament, is that you get involved in these detailed debates about some piece of legislation which are interesting to you, perhaps in an intellectual way or some other way, and you get desperately involved with them. And yet at home, I mean, who in Cornwall is interested in amendment ZZZZZZ to the Scotland Bill? And I think you've got to be very careful not to get too sucked into it. It's clearly there and a part of it, and you've got to take it into account. But you could become overwhelmed by it all.

Presenter23:11

No choice to record, please David.

Presenter23:13

Variations Andrew Lloyd Webber

Presenter23:45

That was part of variations by Andrew Lloyd Webber played there by his brother, Julian.

Presenter23:51

David, can I talk to you a little bit about political heroes of yours? I mean, you've you've got this rather cool and humorous eye, and you praise your colleagues within Parliament. Of the present lot who are sitting there, who are the ones who you let me ask you first of all who you like particularly you admire particularly. We're in the House of Commons at the moment.

Presenter24:07

That's a difficult question, really. I got to know them too well. I used to admire them more before I got elected than I do now, you know. Within my own alliance, Roy Jenkins, I think, is a man of great substance and character. In a funny, perverted, upside-down way, I've got a sneaking admiration of Norman Teppit. I'm appalled by nearly everything he says or does. But there's something about the man in terms of vigour. And I suppose much the same can be said for the current Prime Minister. And what about I won't ask you to name specific names, but the kind of politician you dislike most of all.

Presenter24:38

Oh, the ones I dislike most in Parliament are the ones that are there on a free ride. I mean, I see a number of members there, accepting every trip all over the place, accepting money from here and there. And I realize they're not there, actually, for the people that sent them there at all. And if some of their constituents knew, I can tell you there would be considerable mini-revolution take place in this country. But there's a bit of a conspiracy of silence of Westminster about some of the oddities that go on.

Presenter25:06

And what about political heroes from the past? Well, they're always easier to analyse. Lloyd George is, without any doubt, my hero. I suppose it was partly the fact that he was from a remote part of Britain as well. Had an accent throughout his entire life. But his vigour and his energy and the fact that he managed to get things done and formed the modern Liberal Party, the whole sort of philosophy that the state has a responsibility to the disadvantaged. He introduced pensions and the whole social security system as we know it now. I think he was one of this nation's all-time great politicians. And much of what he had to say has stood the test of time in that it is still credible and viable and arguable for.

David Penhaligon25:07

Uh well that

Presenter25:44

Let's have another choice of record please do. What else could we have after that other than the theme from the Lloyd George series?

Presenter26:21

There was Ennio Morricone's key mai. You actually give every impression of enjoying what you do, no matter what you do. Would that be right? Oh, yes.

Presenter26:30

To date, I've never gone to work dreading that thought or wondering when I'm going to escape. And who can be luckier, to be honest, than to be paid fairly well, which MPs are, for pursuing their hobby? Because that's what politics is. What about the assessment that people have made of you? This one that I quoted: a reforming radical oft performing as a Cornish comic. Is the Cornish comic a mask for something altogether more serious? I've got a Cornish accent, so I'm told. And there's no doubt it has a value. I do believe.

Speaker 426:53

Yeah.

Presenter26:59

Quite seriously, if you can think of an amusing way of making a serious point.

Presenter27:03

You can make it far more effectively in that manner than you can if you make it flat. I think um one of the problems politicians have in Britain is that people never listen to what they're saying. They're talking away, but nobody's ever listening. And I think some of that is not because there's a lack of merit in what they're um saying, but they present it in such a flat, boring way that the good sane British public thinks um wonder what's on the other channel.

Presenter27:26

Another choice of record, please name it. Final choice. Well, it's um raw, naked, rock n'roll, which is still my favorite music. This is Eddie Cochrane singing something else.

Speaker 327:40

Uh

Speaker 427:40

Look at him!

Speaker 427:42

What's the whole is?

Speaker 427:45

Never thought I knew this before.

Speaker 427:47

But here I am, a knocking on the door. My car's out front, and it's all mine. Just a 41 foot, not a 59. My god, that girl, and I'm a thinking to myself, she's sure fine looking, man. Wow, she's something else.

Presenter28:06

That was Eddie Cochrane and something else. David, you've now arrived on your desert island. You still begin the pro and you weren't going to enjoy this too much. Perhaps for 24 hours. 24 hours will be about top back then, would it? All right, then, but you've got to decide now. Of all the records that you've had, your eight, your choice of eight, imagine that a tidal wave biffs away seven, and you're left with one. Which one would it be? Oh, it'd be Scott Jotlin. Would it? I played it about a million times already. I think I could manage another half a million. Although, how it is possible all these records to get lost, and I still got my record player, you've never explained on this programme. Don't get it too technical, please. And then what about the book? Because you assume that you've got the works of Shakespeare in the Bible.

David Penhaligon28:42

Oh Bible.

Presenter28:42

What do you got? Well an almanac of wisdoms if I could get away with it. If not, if I had to pick a specific year, one when Somerset was doing well and Yorkshire badly.

David Penhaligon28:43

Hold on.

Presenter28:52

Yes. And then what about the uh luxury object? Well, I wish to cheat a little bit here if I can get away with it. What I really want is thirty foot of inch by quarter high carbon steel, because you give me that on an island and I could just about make anything. Because without any debt at all, I would be obsessed by the thought. So either making life more comfortable while I was there, or trying to get off.

Presenter29:12

Definitely. Thank you very much indeed.

David Penhaligon29:21

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