- I'm going to work in Woolworths.
- When I grow up I want to be an astronaut.
- When I get married I'd like to have 2 children.
- My hearts desire is to see my Daddy.
- I don't want to answer that.
- This is no ordinary outing at the zoo,
it's a very special occasion.
We've brought these children together for the
very first time.
They're like any other children except
that they come from startlingly different backgrounds.
- Stop it at once.
- We've brought these children together
because we wanted a glimpse of England in the year 2000.
The shop steward and the executive
of the year 2000 are now 7 years old.
- In 1964 WORLD IN ACTION made 7 Up.
We have been back to film these children every 7 years.
They are now 35.
- Give me a child until he is 7
and I will give you the man.
- Is it important to fight, yes.
I want to be a jockey when I grow up,
yeah I want to be a jockey when I grow up.
- At 14 Tony was already an apprentice
at Tommy Gosling's racing stables in Epsom.
He left school at 15.
- This is a photo finish of when I rode at Newbury.
I'm the one with the white cap.
I was beaten a length and a half a third
and had a photo finish.
So I took it out of the box and kept it as a souvenir.
My greatest fulfilment in life, when I rode at Kempton
in the same race as Lester Piggott.
I was a naive wet behind the ears apprentice.
All my years from 7, all my ambitions fulfilled
in one moment and I eventually finished last.
Tailed off obviously but it
didn't make any difference to me.
Just to be part of it, be with the man himself.
Couldn't buy it, that was the proudest day of my whole life.
- Tony's now 34.
At weekends he takes his girls to a stables
where the family keeps a couple of ponies.
What's it mean to you when you see the girls on a horse?
- There are times you look back and you look at them
and you see yourself in them all the time.
Wait come here.
- Got down first didn't I.
- Yeah.
When I was a kid right,
no one ever ever showed me how to ride a horse.
I had to go out and do it myself.
Just walk him, hold them legs nice and properly.
When I see them riding I sort of like
"Oh I taught them that"
and I see them doing this and I show them in another way.
Then once they learn it I sort of like pat
them on their bum
sort of put them on automatic pilot you know
and they're on their own.
But that's what life's all about isn't it?
Giving your kids all the opportunities
that give them the benefits that you never had.
Don't be afraid, never be afraid, they know.
Horses were my whole life, flesh, blood, in my veins,
it was you know all the smell everything.
Princess Anne to her horses and Lester Piggott
to his that's how I felt.
- And you let it go?
- I let it go.
- Sometimes on Saturday morning I go to the pictures.
Sometimes with my friend and sometimes with him.
- You don't.
- I do.
- She don't, I don't ever see you.
You go to a different pictures.
- Have you got a girlfriend?
- No.
- Would you like to have a girlfriend?
- No.
You understand the Four F's, Find them,
Feed them and Forget them.
The other F I'll let you use your own discrimination.
I mean, this one, I tried to do the Three Fs
but I couldn't forget her.
- I used to work in a pub just on a Friday night.
Barmaids, barmaiding and from there one night
I went to a discotheque.
He was in the pub earlier on
and that afterwards we went to a discotheque
and Tony was down there and I just,
from there I just that was it.
Couldn't get rid of him.
- We have our ups and downs, no more than anyone else.
- I think you got to work at a marriage.
I think all marriages go through stages,
you can't stand each other, you go through,
I think, oh God, I hate him I wish he'd get out.
I do and I'm sure he does about me.
- I been in positions you know and it's hard to say
in front of Debbie but it's true, it's tempting,
you take the bait.
You know I go on holiday once a year with the boys type
of thing to Spain, Magaluf and we have a golf holiday.
All against Debbie's will but it's true,
I get in situations out there that you,
life is for the living.
And I come back, "Oh I know what you've been doing out
"there, you've been meeting all them birds",
and whatever and they look at you as if to say
"I know, and I don't want to know".
That's how it is.
- Who's to say in another 10 years me
and him might have split up?
- Quite possible.
- You know, you don't know.
- If you were to break up
what do you think it would be over?
- Yeah, I think it's be the other party.
It wouldn't be for the kids cause the kids they're
everything, without anything prior to that.
Isn't it, I mean it'd break my heart.
Knowing that another man could come in here
and bring my kids up.
There's only one ambition really, I want a baby son
and if I see my baby son
then I'll see my ambition fulfilled.
No one knows that, only you now.
- Tony and Debbie had a son, Nicky,
who is now 13.
They have 2 daughters, Jody and Perry
and the family lives in North London.
- Now listen, on Saturday Tottenham have got the Arsenal.
- One, I was expecting on 28 UP wasn't I when you were
filmed that but I lost that baby.
I didn't feel that I could have any more.
I really didn't want any more.
But then anyway I did and I had Perry.
They are naughty, very naughty.
They're the naughtiest kids I know.
Nicky's like me, he's more placid but Jody's like
how he was when he was 7.
I do discipline them, you know, I smack them,
I put them in their rooms, I take things off of them.
I do it, I discipline them and he undoes it
so I'm fighting twice with them, it makes it harder for me
because he's too soft with them.
- Why do you think you're too soft with them?
- Cause I love them so much.
- Do you bring them up the way
that you were brought up?
- The upbringing I had I saw more dinner times
than dinners without any questions
and I did have my brothers clothes on my back for
you know hand me downs.
It's never done me no harm.
- I wouldn't have got away with my parents
what my kids get away with me.
- Yeah but in saying that you do
give them everything possible.
All these designer clothes type of thing,
the Naff gear and Reebok trainers now my Nicky
plays football and she'll say "Oh Nicky wants some trainers
"have you got £70"?
and I'll say "What £70 for a pair of trainers,
"hold on there's a stall around there,
"same quality trainers for £24 or something".
She'll go "£24, oh no" she'll say
"He can't go to school wearing that rubbish".
She'll give them everything, got an old bike,
wants a chain putting on and a
few nuts tightening or whatever.
"Oh can't have that bike, get a new one"
then in the next Christmas comes up.
- Only cause you don't put the chain and bolts on.
- Oh, I'm not having that one.
- What will you do if you don't
make it as a jockey?
- I don't know, if I know I couldn't be one
I'd get out of the game.
- What do you think you would do then?
- Learn taxis.
- At 21 Tony was on the knowledge learning
to be a London Cabbie.
- If there's any person who thinks I can't be
a Cabbie then they're wrong.
I'm going to get that badge and I'm going
to put it right in their face.
Just to tell them how wrong they can be
and how underestimated I am.
- At 28 he had his own cab.
- Surprising who you pick up you see.
I once met Kojak I picked him up and Warren Mitchell,
Alf Garnett you know.
Debbie's working in the day so Debbie'll be
on her way home by 4 o'clock, the kids'll be
coming home for tea.
Debbie'll stop the cab outside,
come in and cook the dinner.
Then I'll sit down with the kids till about 7 whatever,
then I'll start the cab up because we work the same cab
and I'll go to work till about 1 until it goes again.
She's got a great mind.
She does the knowledge which is less than 2 years.
For a woman with 3 kids, the pressures,
running a family that's remarkable.
- You get a lot of resentment still from other cab drivers.
Some of them they just give you abuse,
some of them just sit there
shaking their heads when they see you.
I get told to go home and do the dishes or go home
and do your husband's dinner.
I went to a Knowledge School and there I met other girls
doing the Knowledge and we became quite friendly,
we meet on a certain rank at Knightsbridge
and we go and have a cup of tea we have a look around
Harrods, get a sandwich, use Harrod's loos.
Have a little look around, spray the perfumes and lipsticks.
- Does he do his fair share of the housework?
- No, he doesn't do a thing.
He doesn't even bring a cup from one room
to the other I do everything.
- Sounds awful don't it?
- Terrible.
- I'm not chauvinistic, don't get me wrong you know,
it's not a question of that.
I've a very luxurious life indoors right?
And I'm not proud to say it or ashamed to say it
I'm just the way I am.
I mean I work as hard as I can outside
and when I close that door the feet go up
and I feel I deserve a rest.
- Would everybody please sit round now
and get on with their work.
I don't want to see any backs to me.
Shouldn't be anybody turning around.
Tony do you hear as well?
Get on with your work in front.
Tony, don't turn round again.
- So what advantages do you think you've had
over some of the other people that we filmed?
- Academically they've probably had more advantages
over me owing to the fact they've had prep schools
at a very early age you know.
They've benefited by it which you know it tells obviously
in this film but as far as you know the stability
and the background you know with their parents
they've missed out on that.
It was February the 9th exactly 10 minutes past 9.
Mothers having her last, well at the time we never knew,
her last breath, and she just died
with me holding her hand
and it was the worst moment of my life.
With respect to Debbie, she was and still is
the best girl in the world.
I'm sorry but Eastenders they're all close to their mums
and you know like everyone else wherever
you come from but my mom and I,
I've made it clear from when we done 21.
I just loved her, that's why.
That's what I think isn't it.
- I've never met anyone like his mum in my life.
I doubt I ever will.
She was a lovely lady, she was a friend to me
she wasn't a mother in law and we used
to go everywhere together me and his mum.
- I know the old man from the time of his life
afterwards he died there and then
but he walked around until September this year.
- When you buried him what
did you put in his coffin?
- I put 3 cards and I put crown and anchor dice,
oh and a betting slip and a pen.
Because that was my dads whole life.
I'm at the graveside, I'm talking to her,
I've got all images running through my mind saying like
"Tony go downstairs get me five weights you know,
"and one and a penny" and I used to go in the shop.
She used to throw the cotton in a hair curler
over the landing and I used to tie the cigarettes
on this bit of cotton and she used to pull them up
and you'd see her in the end,
"Thanks Tone see you after school be good".
And that's the way it was, and all little things like that.
Mother having a drink in the pub, singing, don't care
a monkeys she used to say, don't care about nothing.
The poshies, "Oh yes, oh yes, oh yes".
They're nuts, just have to touch them.
Yeah well they can get what they want can't they?
If you've got to work for it and it's them, they can just
ask for money and they get it.
They can buy what they want.
I'm not a politician so let them worry
about whats coming for the next day.
All I understand is dogs, prices, girls, knowledge,
roads, streets, squares and mum and dad and love.
That's all I understand, that's all I want to understand.
- How long are you going to be a cab driver,
is this what you want to do for the rest of your life?
- Well at the moment, I'm very happy in driving a cab
but I always considered owning our own pub so obviously
I think with two or three years, once I get finally,
financially straightened out I'm going to have a go
at being a publican.
We did eventually get a pub about 18 months after wasn't it?
- Yeah.
- And we went in partnership with my brother in law
and I saw the pub going in one direction,
he saw it going in another one and after
about eight months or a year wasn't it?
We decided to call it a day.
Next time it's hard work out there.
- You're not reaching me yet.
- At 28 Tony was taking acting lessons.
- Be bigger, dominate me.
- Son, son it's a big world out there
and obviously I'm not.
I can't get into it Brian.
- All right, all right.
- Pardon the expression but could you do my inside leg.
- He now works as an extra.
- I'll have a go at anything, especially acting,
but talent, who am I to say?
I'm not going to say I haven't but then again
who's to stay anyone has?
I promise you, it's just the job, no more no less.
All that big ideas for stardom probably happened
14 years ago, I mean, but not now, don't mean nothing
believe it or not.
I don't want to change because if I change
it proves the other Tony Walker was all fake.
I know, and I've always said it, there's never ever a thing
in my life I've never set out to do
that I've never achieved.
I wanted to be a jockey thank God,
I rode in a race with Lester Piggott and I did it.
I wanted to be in the film game, I got in it.
Working with Stephen Spielberg for 2 weeks
on one of his films.
I made it happen on my terms
and no one can say "I helped him"
and I'm a lot stronger in that respect.
- But you didn't pull it off.
You didn't pull a jockey off, you haven't made it
as an actor, you didn't pull off the pub.
- Well, it's better to be a has been than a
never was wasn't it?
My ambitions have gone out the window now
cause I'm running a family, I'm playing a role now.
That is my role in life I feel, but in saying
that coming to the age of 34 I've done everything
what I wanted to do.
I've got no regrets other than not making it as a jockey,
that is my only regret but we all live on dreams sometimes
If they don't come off unlucky, you go again some time.
- Tell me do you have any boyfriends Suzi?
- Erm, yes.
- Tell me about them.
- Well he lives up in Scotland and he's I think he's 13
and I'm rather lonely up there because he usually goes
to school but we used to play till about half past 6
when he comes home from school, then we go in
and then he goes home to do his homework.
- Have you got any boyfriends Suzi?
- What is your attitude towards marriage for yourself?
- Well, I don't know, I haven't given it a lot
of thought cause I'm very very cynical about it.
But then you get a certain amount of faith resorted in it
when I mean, I've got friends and their parents
are happily married and so it does put faith back
into you but me myself I'm very cynical about it.
- When I last saw you at 21 you were nervous
you were chain smoking you were uptight
and now you seem happy, whats happened to you
over these last 7 years?
- I suppose Rupert, I'll give you some credit.
- I'm now chain smoking.
- I think you can't just walk through marriage
and think once you get married it's all going
to be roses and everything for ever you know you have,
well everybody has had their rows but we've never yet
had a row that we haven't managed to sort out
and I reckon really we've got a pretty,
pretty good marriage.
When I get married I'd like to have 2 children.
I'm not very children minded at the moment
I don't know if I ever will be.
- What do you think about them?
- Well I don't like babies.
- What was the biggest shocks to you
when you suddenly were confronted with a small baby
that you had to be responsible for?
- Panic set in I think.
That I wasn't going to be able to cope.
- Is it everything you wanted?
- For the moment yes, I mean I don't think I'll have
any more for the reason that I will get pleasure
out of these two but I can't see me going on and on and on.
- Mummy.
- Yes.
- Laura wants you.
- Very little has changed.
My life is probably very much the same as it was then.
I've had another baby, we've moved house,
and that's about all.
Thomas is at a prep school now he's a day boy
which he enjoys.
Oliver's at school
and Laura's just started this week.
- Is discipline important?
- Yes, it must be, I wouldn't want to bring up
3 unruly rude children.
I'd hate people to look at my children and think ugh,
they don't want to have them for the day cause
they're so badly behaved and rude
but then you know some days you can spend you whole day
just shouting at them because they're behaving so badly.
- Would you like having a nanny
to look after them or do you want to look after them?
- No I want a nanny to look after them.
We didn't have a third child because
we desperately wanted to have a daughter.
I mean you know, there's no point doing that,
but it was lovely when she was a girl
because I feel the boys will go off with Rupert fishing
and stuff and I shall be left on my own
so it'll be nice to have a girl around the place.
Oliver's a very volatile child it's him
and I that have the problems.
Right from the minute
he was born he screamed day and night
and he's never got any better.
He's got learning difficulties, dyslexia may come into it,
we don't know yet.
I think he would benefit from being at a school
where he's where he can cope better.
- As a teenager, Suzi spent her holidays
on her fathers estate in Scotland.
What sort of things do you do?
- Ride, swim, play tennis, ping pong.
I might play croquet, things like that.
- What about the social life, whats that?
- What in Perthshire?
- Yes.
- Mm, quite fun.
I came to London when I left school after Paris
and at the moment I could never live in the country.
I'm happy down here I mean the country's nice for 4 days
to go for long healthy walks but I mean
I could never live up there now.
- This is a wonderful atmosphere
to bring up children.
Do you think in some way it might be
too secluded and safe for them?
- It could be.
That's something that slightly frightens me
that it is it's a very cosseted life that they have here
and they've got to hit the world at some point.
I just hope that I can help them cope with it.
It is the most carefree time of your life.
I'm not saying it is for all children.
Well any child going through their parents splitting up
aged 14 you're at a very vulnerable age and it does cut
you up but you know, you get over it.
There's no point them staying together for me
because it was worse I mean the rows, it's worse.
If two people can't live together
there's no point making yourself.
I hope by Rupert and I giving them a close family unit
that they'll keep their heads and won't feel
that they're slightly lost like I did.
Where I wasted time was in my middle late teens
and I think at that stage I didn't care.
I just let those years go really, I drifted
and it's too late now to look back.
When I leave school I'm down for Heathfield
and Southover Manor and then maybe I may want
to go to a University but I don't know which one yet.
I'd like to do maybe shorthand typing
or something like that.
I left school when I was 16, went to Paris
went to secretarial college and got a job.
- What made you decide
to leave school and go to Paris?
- I just wasn't interested in school
and just wanted to get away.
- I was a partner in a quite a big law firm
and I resigned from that set up my own company.
I tend to specialise in refurbishing old buildings
and converting them into offices.
- Well if Rupert's still got his property company
in this present economic climate, I'd like to get
more involved with that.
It was a very difficult time when Rupert
was deciding to leave.
He's got a lot of responsibilities
with all of us and it's not easy
just starting off on your own.
- Do you ever worry that the roof might
fall in and you'll be out of this and whatever?
- Yes, it crosses my mind.
Last year, it's quite,
it's crossed my mind quite hard that we might,
you know we could lose this if things don't pick up.
- When she was 28 Suzy's father had just died.
- It's very hard to describe to somebody
how you just take the loss.
It is terribly hard, even now I still can't believe
my fathers not here.
It's still sinking in I think.
The death of one of your close family is probably
something you don't ever get over
and it's a different kind of problem than anything else.
- Tell me about your mum.
- She was diagnosed before Christmas as having lung cancer
but she's strong, she's tough
and hopefully she'll pull her way of it.
She's just had a horrendous operation, she's still in
hospital now in a lot of pain.
You see someone in pain like
that it's especially someone that you love
and care for, it's it's very hard.
Somehow I think when you're faced with it you
just find inner strength.
I think you think beforehand something awful
you can't cope with it but somehow when it's there
you just get on.
Someone somehow gives you inner strength to cope with it.
- What do you think about making this programme?
- I just think it's ridiculous,
I don't see any point in doing it.
The first year or two after 28 UP came out
you know I'd meet people, or people in shops
would ask me whether I was the girl that did the programme
and that's quite hard because it's churning up
all happy memories, sad memories,
and it all comes flooding back, parts
that I'd rather forget and it's all
there for people to see.
Although most people are quite nice about it you get
the odd one who's fairly rude and I just think they're
lucky then they didn't have to have it done to them.
I've had a very privileged life compared to some people.
I've never really had to struggle to make my way
but I don't think I've taken for granted
what I've had either.
This may sound very arrogant
but you can't if I let it worry me I mean I'd worry
myself to death, I can't change what I was born into.
- Well, going to Africa and try and teach people
who are not civilised to be more or less good.
No I don't want to be a missionary because I just can't talk
about it to people.
I am interested in it myself
but I wouldn't be very good at it at all.
- So is this your missionary dream come true?
- Well not exactly, I'm a teacher now in London
and I've had the opportunity to come here for a term
and it just so happens the school I am in has great links
with this part of the world and you know I've come here
to find out about the background of many of the boys
that I teach back in London.
- At 35 Bruce is working in Sylhet,
a town in the north east corner of Bangladesh.
- Well I'm earning my keep by teaching maths
and helping the teachers here,
helping them design courses of study.
I'm also teaching them English, they've all got quite good
English but practising and improving their English
and then I've also got the chance to learn a bit of Bangla
which is very difficult and I'm not doing very well at all.
- Bangladesh, Bangladesh, Bangladesh.
- Bangladesh.
- Mango.
- Ahm.
- Vasto, Vastos, vastat, vastons, vastones, vastat.
- Yeah speak up.
- At 7 Bruce was at a pre-preparatory
boarding school, at 14 St Paul's school in London.
- They don't sort of enforce being upper class
and things like that at St Paul's.
They suggest that you don't have long hair
and they do get it cut if.
They teach you to be reasonably well mannered
but not to sniff on the poorer people.
- At 21 he was in his
last year at Oxford reading maths.
- You can show that this is irreducible
then you do a transformation on this polynomial,
x equal to t plus two.
- Good, that's a nice way of doing it, particularly using
Einstein down here.
His test is very powerful.
- I won't carry on with mathematics,
I don't think I'll be a teacher.
Chris Soarabe.
- Yes sir.
- At 28 he was teaching,
immigrant children in East London.
- And to here, 25.
Now it cost you 24, now you're not going to.
- It's so different from your own education
where you're teaching now, why?
- General education is better for society I think.
Public schools are divisive,
that's with no statement about my education.
My education was academically excellent
and I was very grateful for it.
I think there is a class society
and I think public schools may help its continuance.
- At 35 in Sylhet
he is teaching the older students.
- I see education as a key to it all I mean once
your population becomes educated it can think for itself
a lot more and create wealth and create opportunities.
Good, because you've got to get an x squared.
Now when we come to the village we're
definitely going to go swimming.
- What do you like about Sylhet?
- Well I think mainly the people and their hospitality.
A couple of weeks ago I went on a visit to a family
with a teacher from this school.
They lived in a one room flat but we were immediately
invited in and we sat around having food with them
and that's what hospitality means.
If I was back in England and I turned up
say at a friends an hour before
lunch with three people they'd never met they'd say
well lets go down the pub or something.
I didn't agree with the Conservatives
about what they were doing with the black people,
you know, racial policy.
Everybody has the capacity to be racist wherever
you are in the world.
I think it's a natural human condition to be afraid
of something that's slightly different to you I think
that that's the basis of it.
I mean I know academically it's defined
as prejudice plus power.
When you've got the power to do something
about it you can turn it into something very damaging
to the person who's receiving it.
I think if you recognise that as an emotional condition
maybe you can use your intellect to check yourself.
- Has a country like this got any future?
- I think it needs an awful lot of help.
The amount of general poverty I think is growing.
You see so many children working I mean it used to be
a rich area 200 years ago and more people would call it
the Pearl of the Bay of Bengal.
People wondered at it and it's not that now
and that's not unconnected with the British rule here.
Basically we don't care that many countries
are incredibly poor, we simply don't care I mean we do
raise money for charity and so on, which is excellent,
but it's simply not good enough at the end of the day.
Well my girlfriend is in Africa and I don't think
I'll have another chance of seeing her again.
- Have you got any girlfriends?
- No, no not yet, I'm sure it will come but not yet.
I mean I do think a lot of people think too much about it.
- What happened when you burnt your fingers?
- Erm, I'd rather not talk about it.
Well no, I don't really mean that I mean I don't mean
that I don't want to talk about it just
that I'd need quite a long time to think about it.
I think I'd very much like to become involved
in a family life.
My own family for a start.
It's a need that I feel I ought to fulfil
and would like to fulfil and would do it well.
Yes I haven't got married or whatever and I suppose
that would've been something which I hoped would happen,
you know I suppose lots of reasons really,
I don't suppose I've met the right person.
Well about 10 minutes.
I mean you just read out an article.
I'm still a bit shy and awkward, still have a bit
of growing up to do sometimes,
I think I'm a little bit immature sometimes.
I can have quite sort of teenage like crushes
on people and I can see myself falling into it
and know exactly whats happening but sort of unable
to do anything about it.
I've had affairs, sometimes they've ended
quite naturally with goodwill on both sides.
Maybe I just haven't met the right person.
- Well you're getting on a bit aren't you worried?
- Well not particularly, I'm always optimistic.
Who knows who I might meet tomorrow but I think
that's the trouble with reserve.
You're not rejected but you never know what might have been.
But I'm getting better you know, year by year.
I think we all grow up.
- What are the qualities
in a woman that you look for?
- Well, somebody I get on with I suppose not particularly
attractive or whatever, I don't want this to turn
into a sort of a dating agency video.
My hearts desire is to see my Daddy who is 6,000 miles away.
He died about three years ago.
He was 72 I mean we did
drift apart because he was in Rhodesia, Zimbabwe
as it now is, he did come back to England
and retire and I did used to go up to Yorkshire and see him.
Not as often as I should've done, I mean I'm sure
he had a fond feeling for me and I'd have liked
to have returned that in some way.
- Do you miss him?
- Well I'd like to have been able to miss him,
I'd like to have got closer to be able to miss him.
I regret that chance of not getting closer at that time.
You always need people to care for you because
if you disappoint yourself by acting badly
in a particular way you tend most to hurt the people
who love you and where would we be without
having people to love you.
- At 28 Bruce was living in a council flat
in East London, he's now in primitive lodgings
in the middle of Sylhet.
- Is money important to you?
- Well not really, I have enough to live on.
I don't know whether teachers deserve more money.
My gripe's has never been about money, it's always been
about horrid conditions of work.
I find it horrible that people care so much about money.
There are many more finer things in life than that.
You know, people who bought the shares
in the privatisation issues just to make quick money.
I just thought well, what are you about in life?
Is that it?
You know, I didn't want any part in that.
- This film is about opportunity,
do you think you've made the most of your opportunities?
- My opportunity was to do what I wanted
and what I found fulfilling.
And I had a great variety because of my background, yes.
I've made the most of my opportunity
because I've found something to do
that I find rewarding and that was my opportunity.
I see education as being very important you know,
which is why I'm distressed by something
which I see in Bangladesh, the young kids working
so hard they need to bring the money in for their family.
I'd say education is a right, the more they learn,
the more choices they have in life.
Life should be a rich experience.
- If we did all love Geoffrey and we all wanted
to marry him I think I know the one that he'd
like the best and that's her.
- Plenty of boyfriends but not one.
- Yeah, not one in particular.
Friends with plenty of boys you know.
- We had a teacher at school, his favourite ploy was
all you girls want to do is walk out, get married,
have babies and push a pram down the street
with a fag hanging outside your mouth.
- Women are expanding into so many different areas now
that it must be getting easier, I mean I could still
be working now and have a family if I wanted to.
The number of people in my situation, single,
not single parents as such but divorced
single parents is unbelievable.
And the people of my mum's generation,
it's still rare, very rare.
- If my mum was to contemplate leaving my dad was far,
I mean I don't even know what she would've done.
Because she never dreamed of working until the youngest one
went to school so I couldn't I couldn't imagine
where she would've gone or what she would've done.
- We haven't got that problem.
If a relationship is not working then
it's acceptable in society to bail out.
- Well I know he is hers and he loves her.
- I don't I love him.
- I don't think I'd get married too early,
I'd like to have a full life first and meet people
before you commit yourself to a family.
- Sue was 24 when she married Billy,
they had two children, William and Katherine.
- I think that to get married young there must be things
that you miss, you must miss that crucial stage
of being yourself, because the minute you get married
you're no longer a single being,
you're a partnership and that should be the idea behind it.
Go on then, you go first, turn it over
and put it back in the same place.
Just after we made the last one I had Katherine
and then she was about a year and the marriage started
to sort of dissolve around us really and we decided
to go our separate ways.
I've never sat down
and thought what was it, was it this was it that.
I just knew it wasn't working and the discussion
really was the best way of splitting up rather than
why are we splitting up?
It was really strange, I think it seemed so obvious
to both of us that it was probably easier
to do than it should've been.
I have a regular one night a week when I can go out.
It just happens to be that in this particular circle most
of them are separated or divorced.
You have common problems so sometimes it's easier
because you recognise each others problems with babysitters.
You know it's not always possible
to drop everything and go out.
I think that women want more out of life now,
that is basically why they won't put up
with a less than happy marriage.
- Are you ready for a long term relationship?
- I don't think you're ever ready
for a long term relationship either it happens to you
or it doesn't really.
I certainly wouldn't kick one
in the teeth if it crept up on me, yeah, why not?
- Did you meet enough men
before you decided who to marry?
- I've been married a year and a couple of months.
And you do think Christ what have I done?
- See I still got my kids.
- And I'm being honest about it.
And Russ thinks the same.
At times you think Christ what have I done?
- Lynn married Russ at 19,
he works for the Post Office.
They have two daughters, Sarah and Emma.
- I'm very much geared to the family unit, I mean us all.
We do things together all the time.
I mean there are times when Russ and I obviously
we like to leave it all behind
and go out just the two of us.
Now as the girls are getting older we've actually
started taking them with us.
I'll say, oh we haven't done very much
but when you look back we have.
It might only just be playing games or going swimming
or going for a walk we're doing it together.
- If you think that getting married
as far as we're concerned
is a case of going to work, coming home,
cook tea for hubby, going to bed, getting up,
going to work you're totally mistaken.
- Jackie married Mick when she was 19.
- I'm not sure I would recommend it.
I think if but again you're generalising,
I would say on average 19 is probably too young.
We decided ourselves, I mean just between the two of us,
we knew it wasn't going any further we both knew
I think at the end of the day we would be happier
leading our own lives.
Whether that involved other people, you know was to be seen.
But no, you've got to bear in mind we had no children
to worry about so really the only people
that were getting hurt by us was us.
- If I could have 2 girls and 2 boys.
- And what about you Jackie?
- My mom, cause she got five girls she has
seven years bad luck,
that's why she's got five girls.
I'd like to be able to have a happy family,
I mean I know it's not possible to be happy all the time
but as much of the time that was possible.
Go through there, that's the nursery, hah hah.
- Got any plans?
- Do me a favour?
- At 21 Jackie had moved into a new house.
By the time she was 28 she had decided not to have children.
- Basically I would say because I'm far too selfish
and I enjoy doing what I want when I want and how I want
and certainly at the moment I can't see any way around that.
That's not to say that's a forever decision.
This one on, here we go, oh yeah, yes.
I had a brief but very sweet relationship,
the result of which was Charlie.
Cor blimey, Charlie, you're supposed to clean your teeth,
not eating the brush.
It's the best thing that could've happened to me
and I would never have believed I could've
enjoyed a child as much as I enjoy him.
I actually sat down and sort of thought
about should I have him or not.
I thought about what I was going to do if I did have him.
How I was going to keep him.
But it comes back to the same old story, the family.
My fathers only comment to me was it is your decision,
you tell me what you want to do
and then we'll take it from there.
And they've totally rallied around me.
Anybody that wanted to know just got told I was pregnant
I wasn't with the father, end of story.
People that know me know the full story
and that's all that matters to me.
And Charlie will know when he gets older.
- When I got married the primary reason was
because I wanted to have a child,
the two to me went together.
- Why did you have a child out
of a marriage that wasn't working?
- Because I wanted to have more than one child
and it was a thing about being an only child myself.
I was always jealous of other children that had brothers
and sisters when I was growing up and I didn't want
to have more than one child with two different fathers.
I think that brother and sister should have the
same mother and the same father, that is my ideal.
I would hate to think it was tough on the kids.
William used to say why isn't daddy living here any more
and I would say to him, well you know how you
and Katherine argue and get on each others nerves,
well that's how daddy and I are we just find
that we're happier if were not living in the same house.
- I'm going to work in Woolworths.
- At 21 Lynn was working in a mobile library
in Tower Hamlets in East London.
- I've not stamped yours, Sleeping Beauty.
Teaching children the beauty of books
and watching their faces as books unfold
to them is just fantastic.
To work with children of that age you've got
to love them and I love children.
The last 10 years of government have actually
in my opinion brought this country
much much further downhill.
We have lost an awful lot of our National Health Service,
an awful lot of our education system.
I'm actually on the governing body of two schools
and I want the best for those kids
that the system can provide.
And if the systems not good enough,
then we better the system.
What would you do if you had lots of money,
about two pounds?
- I would buy myself a house a new house,
you know, one that's all nice and comfy.
- Do you get depressed by money problems?
- No, why, why should you?
If you can manage on what you've got.
- It's easy to get depressed over money.
- It's so easy to but why should you?
- When we've reached the 18th day of the month
and my mortgage is due on the 20th
and there's nowhere near enough money in there
I get depressed about it obviously.
What money?
- It was hard first of all when I gave up work
from having a fairly high salary to nothing was hard but
you get used to whatever your circumstances are,
you live in them, you get used to them
and you cope, everybody does.
- Sue now works part-time for a Building Society.
- Everything's changed for me cause I'm now
supporting myself a lot more than I was a year ago.
- How did you feel
about living off Social Security?
- I hated it, really hated it.
Perhaps it's old fashioned values, I mean,
Mom and Dad have certainly never been in that situation
but then my mom and dad have never been single parents
either so you have to do what's
best for you and the children.
- Thanks very much.
- Bye. - Bye.
- I took a year off when I had Charlie
and the state kept me for that year
but I went back to work and although
to be honest at the time I pay everything out I'm not
that much better off but I feel better.
You take it from there, can I get through this week
or can I get through this month?
Can I get Charlie the things he needs?
Somewhere along the line you get the money you need
for whatever you need and as it goes at the moment we're
working and were trying to keep our families as best we can.
♪If I said that I love you. ♪
- Why is it that you three
haven't changed so much do you think?
- Perhaps we haven't grown up.
- We've all had a stable background
with stable relationships all the way through.
- The same people are there now that were there then.
- She initially went into hospital
for an exploratory operation, they found out she had
cancer although at that stage we didn't know how bad it was.
She was ill at the time, they started chemotherapy
and radiation treatment and she was just so bad.
Mom badly wanted to come back to the family
and the family needed her here.
She then spent nine months of hell
I wouldn't have wished on anybody.
- She sat down on the settee and she died, just like that.
And we were up in Norfolk with my in-laws at the time.
And so all we got was a phone call from Dad
to say that mom had died.
- And how did you deal with it?
- I'm still dealing with it now.
But then although she's not with us in body
she's still with us in spirit.
She was a great friend to me as well as a mom,
probably the best friend I'll ever have.
And as you see it still makes me
very emotional now, it's only 2 years.
To some it's probably seems oh it's a long time
but it's not very long.
- The poor, if you don't help them
they probably die soon wouldn't they.
- Some people are just born into
rich families and they're lucky.
- I don't see why they should have the luck when people
have worked all their lives and haven't got half as much
as what they have.
It just don't seem fair.
We only had a limited choice any way, truth be told.
We didn't have the choice of education
because they couldn't have afforded it anyway so we
just went to the school we wanted to go to
and we made the best of it when we were there.
That is something perhaps when it comes to our children
that we would say why not go further?
- All I am interested in and probably the same as
the other two is what is good for me,
what is good for my son and that's it.
I don't sit there envying maybe what Suzi could do for her
children that I can't do for mine.
Yes, I'd love the money to be able to put him all round
the world, I'd love to be able to do that
but I haven't got it.
And at the end of the day I'm going to do what I can.
At this precise moment in time is probably one
of the best times of my life.
Come here, come and put your top on.
I think probably because I've got Charlie,
he's totally transformed my life a lot of the times
I obviously pull my hair out but certainly for the better.
So yes, I'm a lot happier within myself.
People around me have noticed that.
So it's a good time for me.
Give us a cuddle.
I don't really want Charlie to be an only,
I'd love him to have brothers and sisters,
but not necessarily loads of them,
just one would do actually.
I think Charlie would like that as well.
I think Charlie would love it.
- A year ago Lynn started having black outs,
she took medical advice.
- They stuck all these tubes up inside me
and discovered that I'd got these veins here
that shouldn't be there.
- In your brain?
- Mm-hmm.
- And what can they do about it?
- Not a lot at the moment.
They're investigating other...
treatments but the surgeon
said that he doesn't want to operate at the moment
because the risk it's too near the optic nerve
and there's an 80% chance of hitting the optic nerve.
- So is it frightening to know
that you have this condition?
- It was for about a week but it got itself
into its own place within my system where sort of
amongst my rungs of priorities
and I overcame the fear of it,
now it doesn't worry me at all.
- We've all got little secret dreams.
I mean I loved drama at school, I loved to sing,
along with millions of others,
so I would like to have carried that further.
It was discussed at one stage, you know going
to drama school and pursuing it but I really
at the time didn't have the bottle.
Didn't want to give up work and income as a young person.
I was quite enjoying myself.
Didn't want to risk all that to follow the dream.
- So are these good times Sue?
- Not particularly no.
I've got two lovely children now
but it's just another crossroads for me now.
I don't know which way I'm going to go,
whats going to happen.
I'm on my own basically, I'm starting again.
- Are you changing?
- I'm just growing up.
I don't think you ever stop growing up the circumstances
are changing so I'm just adapting.
- When I grow up I'd like to find out all
about the moon and all that.
- At 7 Nick a farmers son was at a
one room village school in the Yorkshire Dales.
- I said I was interested in physics and chemistry well
I'm not going to do that here.
- At 14 he was going to a Yorkshire
boarding school and at 21 was reading physics at Oxford.
So what career are you going to pursue?
- It depends whether I'll be good enough to do
what I really want to do.
I would like if I can to do research.
The gap in these experiments is a temperature
comparable with that of the sun whereas
in a power reactor it would be maybe 10 times
the temperature of the sun.
- At 28 he had moved to America
and was doing nuclear research
at the University of Wisconsin.
So how's it going Rich,
tell me about the current drive.
Ok so your all looking at this thing expectantly
so maybe I'd better say something about it.
The first one is basically saying that the rate of change
of crystal momentum, it's DDT at this quantity H bar K.
That is equal to Laurent's Force.
- He is now an associate
professor at the University.
Is Madison a friendly place?
- Yes very friendly.
It's a fairly small little community and you get deer
and things running through here so it's kinda nice.
You know you notice if you walk into a shop here
or a store as they would call it,
people are much more polite to you than they are in England.
And it's not in a it's not just a matter
of being obsequious, they just try
and be reasonably friendly and smile at you.
- Do you have a girlfriend?
- I don't want to answer that,
I don't answer those kind of questions.
I thought that one would come up because when I was,
when I was doing the other one somebody said
what do you think about girls
and I said I don't answer questions like that.
Is that the reason you're asking it?
Yeah I thought so.
The best answer would be to say
that I don't answer questions like that
but you know it's what I said when I was seven
and it's still the most sensible
but I mean, what about them.
- Nick was only 17 when I first met him
and I knew he was a nice person.
I find him very attractive and he used his intelligence
in his relationship with me which is very important.
- She felt that she wasn't portrayed at all like she is
and that she felt foolish as a result of it all.
She was really taken by surprise by how she came over
and she really wasn't sure why she came over that way
but she was very unhappy with everybody involved
and so didn't want to be in that position again.
- Is she difficult?
- At times yes.
Whenever we have an argument she does have a tendency
to explode I suppose to get, no to get really miserable.
- We've only been married 4 years, anything could happen,
we could easily drift apart,
there are so many pressures on people you just.
- People saw the last film
and thought this marriage isn't going to work,
this marriage isn't going to last,
did you get that response?
- Well, it's actually such a mystery to me
what they thought they were talking about
that I really just don't relate to it at all.
I have no, I just don't why they said that,
I mean the sorts of things you were seeing was us trying
to be very honest about it.
That may have been the place
in 28 where we probably were working hardest
about really describing what things were like instead of
I was just saying I sometimes just am very dull
and neutral and show too much of myself.
Well in that I think we were just trying to be really
upfront and say this is what it's like and we're working
very hard at it and hopefully it'll work out.
If that sounds to somebody like it's in jeopardy
well that's their problem.
- The big issue for us at the moment
is how were going to manage to have kids and run 2 careers.
- In those early formative years
would you be happy
for your children to be brought up by Jackie
and Jackie not to be able to give them the full attention?
- Well it's not I mean that's putting it
in a rather strange way, - That's him, he's bringing
them up too you know. - I mean this is an area,
- It's not just me.
- I pay lip service to the idea of equal shares on this
and it remains to be seen whether I would
actually live up to my intentions.
- There are several things I think to be said here,
I don't want to be the person to be left behind
while Nick flies in and shares an adult life
with his children at college and working.
I want to be there too.
- Nick and Jackie now have a 1 year old son Adam.
- On the subject of Adam, I enjoy doing this
for the most part but I don't want the sins of the father
to be visited on the son in this case so we've sort of
decided that we want to keep him out of this
to some extent, well to some extent
essentially all together.
When I grow up I'd like to find out all
about the moon and all that.
- Where did you get all this brain power?
- All this brain power, I don't know.
This is one that we were quite proud of,
glow discharges between a couple of metal plates
where there's an ionised gas in between.
I suppose I'm very ambitious in terms of trying
to get my research to go forward.
I'm also trying to train students so that
they can actually acquire some useful skills
and can go out and just be really useful contributors
themselves and push back the frontiers of
what we're capable of doing.
They'd like to come out for a holiday
in the country when we'd like,
when I'd like to have a holiday in the town.
I've been to Leeds a couple of times
and haven't been to Manchester.
I went to London with the other programme,
when you did the first programme,
but that's the only time I've been.
In my position I don't feel that I'm letting England
down because I don't think that England particularly
wanted me there doing what I was doing.
So how can I feel that I'm betraying a country
when it doesn't want me to do what it's trained me to do?
- Do you get lonely here?
- You just tend to get stuck into your everyday routine
and you don't think about it but when you call home
then you realise how far away you are and now it seems
acute because both our families are
getting older even if you think in terms
of seeing them once every two years.
- That's not so many times.
- You're thinking only about 10 times
and that's awful when you think in those terms
you realise you really are in exile.
- Do you miss England?
- An awful lot yeah.
My parents managed to get over here a couple of times
in the last two years and Andrew my middle brother
was here about two years ago so that's
pretty good going in way that they got over here.
Christopher is the brother who is deaf as you know
and his language skills are getting better
but be certainly didn't get a flying start
from the education system that he went through
so you know he really is still getting to the point
where you know, he can't hear essentially
at all so you can't really have a conversation
with him on the phone.
He'll get on the phone and tell you
a bunch of stuff and you can understand
most of it so that's really nice.
- Is it painful for you?
- Well the thing that was emotional to think back on
was the situation when he was probably a year old
and it was really becoming clear to everybody
that despite the fact that his doctor
has originally insisted no he wasn't deaf
that it became pretty clear that he was.
And you know at the time I just desperately was
hoping it wouldn't be true, that somehow some
sort of miracle would happen and he would turn out
not to be, so but then I told myself well if he weren't then
he wouldn't be the same person and it would be wishing
that the person didn't exist so
that wasn't the appropriate way to think about it.
- Do you think you can build a life here?
- Well you know, one is trying to
but it is very difficult being in a place where
you're a long way away from all your background
and you don't have any sort of support network.
It really does, I mean you have to fend for yourself,
you keep thinking for yourself,
you're really being called on
to show pioneer spirit every now and again it seems.
It don't have this urge that you
sometimes hear people saying that I want my child
to have all the things that I didn't.
I don't look back and think I was deprived.
There were things that I had in a certain sense
as a child which were not material things
that I had but situations I was in and experiences
that most children wouldn't have growing up
on a farm and actually working on a farm
and being in a situation of being told,
clean out that calf shed really has made me
very determined to get things done
and not give up half way through something.
It develops a streak of stubbornness that can be useful now.
The trouble with me is that I tend to take the streak of
stubbornness too far I have to try and mellow out a bit.
- Have you travelled a long way since
that seven year old in his big muddy boots?
- I suppose an awful long way yes.
I mean I'm sure there's lot of the same personality
that was in there is still here.
Still easily embarrassed and confused.
I mean I think that you can see the saying give
the boy until he is seven, I'm quite prepared to accept
there's a lot in that.
If you could look at me at seven and see through the
sort of superficial things and the silly things
I was saying you could see what made the child tick,
there was probably an awful lot in
there that's here now yes.
- I read the Financial Times.
- I read the Observer and the Times.
- What do you like about it?
- Well I like, I usually look at the headlines
and then read about them, about it.
- What's the point of the programme?
- The point of the programme is to reach a comparison.
I don't think it is.
We're not necessarily typical examples.
- And I think that's what people seeing
the programme might think, falsely.
- Yes, they tend to typecast us.
- So everything we say they'll think oh
that's a typical result of the public school system.
- It's certainly true that more people know
they have more options or imagine they have.
I think in practical terms the difference
in numerical number of options isn't that great.
- But the mere knowledge creates an option in itself
so I think we do have more options
and it is undesirable but it's very difficult to correct.
- I don't think it is undesirable at all I think
whats undesirable is people who have had options
don't take best advantage of them.
When I leave this school I'm going to Collet Court
and then I will be going to Westminster Boarding school
if I pass the exam.
And then we think I'm going to Cambridge in Trinity Hall.
- John went to Westminster School
and read Law at Christchurch Oxford.
- I do believe parents have a right to educate
their children as they think fit.
And I think someone who works
on the assembly line in some of these car factories
earning huge wage could well afford to send
their children to private schools if they wanted to.
- At 21 we asked him what career he would pursue.
- Might be at the Bar.
- Doing what?
Perhaps Chancery practise?
I now have a career, I'm a barrister,
other than that life chugs along in varying degrees.
- John entered the Chancery division
of the High Court and specialises in company law.
- How wonderful, have you told Alexandra.
- When I leave school I'm going to
The Dragons School I might and mummy's
and I might go to after I might go to Charterhouse,
Marlborough and I can't remember the other places
because mummy's got so many but there's some of them.
- What about university Charles?
- I might go to Oxford.
- Charles went to Marlborough
but he didn't go to Oxford.
Instead he went to Durham University.
- I'm pleased I didn't because it's very much
a sort of set from Marlborough.
Prep school, Marlborough, Oxbridge conveyor belt.
Shoved out at the end.
- And what did Charles want to do?
- Hard to say, probably scribbling away in some basement
for some London newspaper or something.
- Charles did scribble away for an
East London newspaper and then moved onto the BBC
where he is now a producer.
He married last year.
He prefers not to be on television.
- I'm going to Charterhouse
and after that Trinity Hall, Cambridge.
- Andrew went to Charterhouse
and Cambridge where he read Law.
- I'd like to be a solicitor and also fairly successful.
- At 28 Andrew was a solicitor
in a large London firm.
What qualities do you think it needs to be successful?
- Well you have to have a legal ability in my business
obviously and you have to have a sort of bedside manner
as far as your clients are concerned.
It's no good being brilliant if you can't
communicate with your clients.
- At 35 he had become a partner
in the same company.
- Well I work in the corporate department of a large firm
of solicitors in the city that is dealing with things
like mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures,
general corporate advice,
putting deals together for clients.
- What do you think
about girl friends at your age?
- I've got one but I don't think much of her.
- I don't think I financially come from the same background,
Andrew didn't go for a haughty deb,
he went for a good Yorkshire lass
but I mean obviously he knew what he wanted.
- At 28 Andrew had married Jane.
- I suppose the most important thing that's happened is
that we've had two children one five years ago,
Alexandra and then a couple of years later Timothy.
We've also moved out from central London over to Wimbledon.
We decided we should look somewhere there was
a bit of green space so we moved out here.
- What was the biggest surprise
about having children?
- That our ideas of bringing them up may be not
necessarily coincide with each others.
- When I see the children playing together now
I realise how much fun they have together
and it's probably what I missed being an only child.
- When boys go around with girls they don't
pay attention to what they're doing.
Yes my grandmother had an accident because
a boyfriend was kissing his girlfriend in the street.
The most important thing is that I've gotten married.
- He married Claire, the daughter
of a former Ambassador to Bulgaria.
- Recently I think this charity Friends of Bulgaria
is something that's very important in my life.
I became involved in all this to channel aid to Bulgaria.
It is a great pleasure to welcome you all here
tonight on behalf of Friends of Bulgaria.
My mother in fact is from Bulgaria,
and that explains why for me Bulgaria
is an especially important place.
We decided for our inaugural event it would be a good idea
to have a concert and as I'm a barrister I'd hoped
I'd be able to get access to one of the halls
of the Inns of Court because
they are very magnificent buildings.
- It is coincidental that we met but its obvious
that the Balkan connection was a strong mutual interest.
- I think it's not a bad idea to pay for schools
because if we didn't schools would be so nasty and crowded.
- So do I think so.
And the people in the schools wouldn't.
- And the poor people would coming rushing in.
- And the man in charge of the school would get very angry
because he wouldn't be able to
- And he'd get bankrupt.
- pay all the masters if he didn't have any money.
- At 7 the boys are singing Waltzing Matilda
in Latin at their exclusive private school in London.
- An education is very important,
I mean you can never be sure of leaving your children
any worldly goods but at least you can be sure
that once you're given them a good education
that's something that no one can take away.
The important issue is drawing the distinction
between allowing people to spend the money they earn,
in other words low taxes, and also putting enough money
into the infrastructure, things like education,
health service, transport system.
And that's a very difficult balance to draw
and I'm not sure that were doing
the right thing at the moment.
I think more should be being put into that
and I think people would be prepared to pay higher taxes
to pay for that sort of thing.
- Yeah just a bit late there.
- All this talk about opportunities, something I did
slightly object to in the programme,
we were all shown at the age of seven outlining
the academic sort of career that most of us did
in fact pursue but it didn't show the sleepless nights,
the sort of pouring over our books.
All the sweat and toil
that got us to University.
It was presented as if it were part
of some indestructible birth right
that we went to all these places
and I thought that was unfair.
It didn't show having to do beastly jobs in the holidays.
If I had a son I would like to send him
to Westminster where I went.
Where I suspect the public schools
or the major public schools win over the state schools is
in the quality of the staff that they attract.
I mean certainly at my school the teachers
were absolutely first rate but on the other hand
we had very little in the way of facilities
and computers and language laboratories
that are taken for granted in many state schools.
And I think when people talk about more resources
they often mean more money being spent on these things
which in a sense are inessentials, and less money
is being spent on what really matters
which is the quality of the teachers.
- The rich children always make fun
of poor children I think.
- The acquisition of sacks and sacks of money
is not something that I set much importance by.
I'm not money minded I would say in that sense.
On the other hand it would be hypocritical
to pretend that a lot of the things that I take
for granted and my lifestyle is dependent on having
a fair amount of money but I can't say
that the acquisition of more money is one
of my main aims in life.
We now have a house in the country which takes up
a lot of our time and energies and I seem to spend
an awful lot of my time gardening furiously,
trying to tame the wilderness that we inherited there.
I'd have laughed if 10 years ago you'd have told me
that I'd spend most of my time digging herbaceous borders
but that's what I seem to do and I enjoy it.
One good thing about having quite a large house
in the country now is that I've taken up playing the piano.
I've always had a piano in London but with work
I never had time to practise and now we've got room
to house a piano in the country and I find I am now
practising quite a lot and beginning to get it back a bit.
- Certainly I can never tell the difference
between you playing and the CD playing
when I'm out of the room, you're very good.
- Well she's very diplomatic.
- Does money concern you a lot?
- I think as long as one has enough to be comfortable
that's really what one should aim for.
We took the children skiing for the first time last year,
at least Alexander, and he really enjoyed it.
- Is the family unit the most important thing
in your lives, more than your own ambition or?
- I'm not sure that I have any ambition as such now
I mean just to progress with my work and so on.
- I think ambition probably changes once
you've got children, your outlook on life is no longer
the same as it was before.
And you can still have ambitions and the fact
you want to be successful in your work
but the end result is that if you're successful
in your work then you can enjoy
your success with your children.
And hopefully with your wife as well.
- I think the more you have out of the country the more
privileges you're born with the greater your duty is.
I still feel as I did when I was 21 that it's important
for people who have had advantages to try
and put as much back and to help others less fortunate
than themselves if they can.
In England as we all know there is a perpetual debate
about the National Health Service being starved
of resources but people who go on
about the government butchering the National Health Service
I think should come over to Bulgaria
to see what being kept short of necessary supplies
and funds really does mean.
What were doing round delivering drugs firstly
that we've managed to purchase with monies
so far raised by our appeal and also at the same time,
trying to find out what it is that they really need
so that we can be sure we're getting the right things
through to the right destinations.
We've been told that in some places its impossible
to do even operations, albeit that they have
the operating theatres and they have excellent doctors,
for want of simple anaesthetics.
In other places, for instance,
the children's home at, they're even lacking
such simple things as soap and detergent.
These are things that we can supply in England
very painlessly and yet here they really
make a lot of difference.
- The Bulgaria that I have known coming back
with John has been a much more varied country
and it has been very enriching to travel
around the country with John and to have
the extra dimension of John having investigated
to a great degree his family tree down
through many generations and many centuries.
- My great great grandfather who was the
first prime minister of Bulgaria when the country
was liberated from the Turks in 1879.
Well I think everyone needs to have a feeling
that they belong somewhere.
There's a plot of land
or somewhere they hail from and their roots are.
Within the last month a new agricultural law has been
passed returning land to its former proprietors.
We think that some part at any rate of this property
will become back to us and I for one
am very excited at that prospect.
It belonged to my grandfather, his brother.
And they farmed it in the whole estate
and partnership with my great grandfather.
Looking at it with a professional eye,
I've dealt with worse than this in North Hampton.
I don't think there's anything
that couldn't be sorted out given six months or so.
And a couple house guests to stay.
- Do you think you and Claire could live here?
- Ask me that in 7 years time.
I don't think much of their accents.
- Neither do I.
- What's been the effect of being
in these films on you?
- I don't think really there has been any effect really.
From time to time I meet someone who I've never met
before who says I think I've seen you somewhere
before haven't I and I say perhaps.
I try not to talk about it.
- You've got three minuses in a day.
I must say I mainly laugh when I see myself at seven.
Obviously I said some shocking
but extremely funny things in retrospect.
It has to be said that I bitterly regret
that the headmaster of the school where I was
when I was seven pushed me forward for this series
because every seven years
a little pill of poison is injected.
- Well no.
- Well it's the truth, I dislike intensely
being on television, I refused to do this programme
last time round and I'm only doing it this time
because I see this as an opportunity
to draw the attention of viewers in this country
to the awful problems in Bulgaria in the hope
that they may wish to do something
to help the situation there.
- I don't like big boys hitting us
and the prefects sending us out for nothing.
I know I prefer to be alone really.
I find it hard to express emotion most of the time
although I'm getting on top of that more now.
Just the simple things to say to sort of Susan,
you know I love you something like that,
I mean I can tell you about it
but I really haven't been able to say it
freely to Sue you know.
- What was it that you fell in love with,
what is it about him?
- His helplessness I suppose,
it was the motherly instinct in me
to pick him up and cuddle him.
He's also very good looking I think
but he doesn't agree with me.
In the summer he's got this cute little bum in shorts.
I mean I can tell quite a few stories here
but the one that really irritates me the most is
that when we have an argument he says that's it, leave me.
And I say fine, all right I will one day.
But that's it you know after all
these years of marriage, we've been married for
what 13 years now or something
and he still say you're leaving me.
Well one day I might just pack my bags and go.
- At seven, Paul was at a
children's home in London.
Were you happy at the children's home in England?
- We didn't mind that really cause we didn't know
what was going on cause we were a bit young.
My mother and father got, well they separated originally
I think they eventually got divorced,
I went to the Boarding school for one year
and we emigrated to Australia.
My father got remarried.
- How do you get on with your step mother?
- Pretty well but like I said before I'm just not close,
I'm not really close to my father either.
- Do you have any regrets about the fact
that you weren't closer to him when you were younger?
- Yes I suppose, I mean it's all wasted time
in a way I suppose.
He was always there, I could always talk
to him but it was different.
- A lot of people that go out to Australia,
these English people, they go out without family
you know and all of a sudden Paul's come here
and he's got all this family he sort of half knew existed.
- So Paul brought Sue and his two children
Katy and Robert to visit the family for the first time.
Do you think about England much when you're in Australia?
- Only when the crickets on.
- I mean I'm in awe of everything I see
because I've always wanted to come to London,
I always thought it would be great thing to do.
And all of a sudden I'm here
and I'm having a great time and Paul and the kids are just,
I'm just dragging them along behind like come on we're off.
But no, it'd be really interesting
because I'd had lots of family.
And I know I love this sort of stuff, bit of a showpony.
- When the crunch came and we were coming over here
I didn't want to do it.
It's just something in me
that holds me back I just it's shyness
or something I'm not sure.
I'm not really good at meeting new people I guess.
- Is there any way you would want
to be a father any differently from the way
your father was to you?
- I'd like there to be more contact
close actual physical contact close.
My dad and I are exactly the same like
that we you know if we hug it's unusual.
- When we had Katy when she was born Paul said
to me oh I'm glad I've got a daughter.
He said when I'm an old man at least
she'll be able to come up
and give me a kiss and a cuddle.
- Would you like to get married Paul?
- No.
- Tell me why not.
- I don't want like them say you had a wife they,
they say you had to eat what they cooked you
and say I don't like greens, well I don't,
and say she said you have to eat what you give.
So, I don't like greens say she gives me
greens and that's it.
- Divorce was something new to me.
I figured what Paul's been through,
I mean Paul doesn't say it's very bad
but I wouldn't like that for my children.
- What keeps this marriage together?
- Learning to keep your mouth closed at times, I don't know.
- Tolerance I think, I mean we don't stew we have arguments,
big arguments like anyone else
and we have spoken about this before.
We don't tend to stew over it
for any length of time, we can be unbelievable together,
you know biting each others heads off
but we don't never go to the next day.
- This is the one thing that the shows done to us is
that it makes you analyse things a bit more you know
like maybe if the show hadn't have
been here we may have split up.
You think well we can see what we were like a long time ago
and it brings it back to you, you think well,
we had this then, often a lot of people grow apart
and can't see what they had originally.
- I don't think the show could actually hold you together.
- No, no but what it's showing you is
what you had in the past.
- In their twenties, Paul and Sue sold up,
bought an old van and travelled through Australia.
- I think it brought us closer together,
we got to know each other,
we relied on each other so much.
It gave us our own peace of mind that we could
settle down and now have a family,
that we had done something, we hadn't just been nobodies
and lived in suburbia all our lives.
We'd done something that we were proud of,
that we'd accomplished on our own.
Being together so much it was hard but then we settled down,
and must have settled down really well
because I got pregnant so something
must've been going right.
- The family settled down
in a working class suburb of Melbourne.
Are you ambitious for your children Paul?
- I said something about wanting Robert
to be a brain surgeon but that was a joke.
I mean if like if he's a brain surgeon good
and well but it'd be nice to let them go
one step up from us I think.
At the moment I'm pretty happy with Katy,
I'm not having a go at Robert but I've got fears
for Robert cause he's struggling a little bit.
He's only been at school for two years
and grade one and he's had three teachers already
say they don't know how to motivate him.
What does University mean?
- When the last show was on I said to Robert
do you think you'll go to university?
He goes well what's university?
It just floored me.
It just proves that high education
isn't a major point to us, just getting him out of
first grade was a major importance to us
and so university seems a long way off
and so we just take each year as it comes.
- I was going to be a policeman
but I thought how hard it would be to join in.
I just haven't made up my mind yet.
I was going to be a phys ed teacher
but one of the teachers told me you had
to get up into university.
- At 21 Paul as working as a junior partner
for a firm of bricklayers in Melbourne.
By 28 he'd gone out on his own as a sub-contractor
but it didn't work out.
Since then he'd had a variety of jobs in the building trade.
- Well I'm more of a trades person
than a business person you know,
I've never had any business training
and if I've got natural ability I probably haven't used it.
Where do the problems go?
I mean did I lose it because of it or did I never have it?
I think the confidence was never there,
it might run I the family sort of thing.
- I think maybe it's the lack of security maybe he felt
when he was a child, perhaps,
that's my theory, my theory alone.
I mean that's the old thing isn't it,
when one of your parents are taken away
from you you lack security.
- The monitors up in the washroom sends the nurse
out well there's no talking well I wasn't talking.
- Katy now has this saying, oh you know me I'm hopeless
and it's just Paul you know, oh you know me I can't do this.
And it's sort of like this defeatist attitude type
of thing but oh I don't know I just ignore it
and go along my merry way I suppose.
He has got better, I think as you get older
maturer you know, confidence does come to a point.
- I really went through a stage it's so stupid
because I was only a bricklayer like I failed.
Something happened with that job and I started
to maybe I did start to look at what we had
and think what do you want out of life?
What's so bad about what we got?
- Do the two of you have a dream?
- I've always wanted to move to the country.
I wouldn't mind a small property,
doesn't have to be big or flashy.
It's more relaxed style
of living, an attractive sort of lifestyle.
- We've just been together for so long we're
just sort of plod along together.
I enjoy his company and he enjoys mine most of the time.
I know that he's going to come home to me every night,
I'm going to have someone there.
He's very secure that way.
- She does put up with a lot.
I can't be that easy to live with.
I'm nice but I'm not easy to live with.
- Well we pretend we've got swords.
We make the noises of the swords fighting
and when somebody stabs us we go aargh.
If think if you're healthy and have good friends
you can get on perfectly well.
Everybody would like to be rich.
I came to London and contacted an agency for squatters
and they were able to give me an address of somebody
who was able to help people who were looking
for accommodation in the London area.
- But you've kicked against the stability.
- I don't think I ever had any stability to be quite honest.
I can't think of any time in my life when I ever did.
I don't think I've been kicking against anything
I think I've been kicking in mid air the whole of my life.
I've been moving about a bit
between difference places really, a bit unsettled
but I'm very shortly moving to live in digs.
- At 28 Neil was roaming around Britain.
We found him on the west coast of Scotland.
- If the state didn't give us
any money it would probably
just mean crime and I'm glad I don't have to steal
to keep myself alive.
If the money runs out well then for a few days
there's nowhere to go to that's all you can do,
I simply have to find the warmest shed I can find.
- At 35 he's living in a council flat
in the Shetland Islands.
- The nice thing about here is that you can cut
yourself off when you want because there are people
living around but they're pretty quiet people.
It's an environment which sustains me it's one
in which I can survive.
I still feel my real place is in the world
of the world where people are doing
what the majority of people do.
And the reason I don't feel safe is
because I think I'm getting more
and more used to this lifestyle
which eventually I shall have to give up.
- How do you manage for money these days?
- Social Security still, I wish it wasn't
but I'm afraid it is.
I've no desire to be putting
the taxes up and drawing money off people who've earned it
themselves but that's the way it is.
Well I'm going to take people to the country
and sometimes take them to the sea-side
and I'll have a big loud speaker in the motor coach
and tell them whereabouts we are and what we're going
to do and what the name of the road is and all about that.
- Neil was brought up in a Liverpool suburb,
went to a local comprehensive school
and Aberdeen University.
He dropped out after a term
and at 21 was working on a building site in London.
At 28 he was homeless.
How do people regard you here?
- Well I'm still known as an eccentric
as I have been since about the age of 16 or so.
- Do the days seem long for you?
- They can do.
- Do you have any friends anywhere?
- I've some good friends still in England.
- Neil settled down
in the Shetland Islands a couple of years ago.
- Hello Neil how are you?
- Is the community important to you?
- Yes, it has to be, this is where I live.
It's been very good to me.
People have been especially kind in many areas
and I'd like to be putting something back into it
and we'd be putting something back
into the whole of Shetland, not just into this area.
I'll take 2 pints of milk please.
- There we are Neil.
And how's the pantomime then?
- Not so bad.
- Oh that's good, no traumas?
- Not on my part but people could do
with learning their lines a bit better.
- But you're alright.
- Well I shouldn't speak too soon.
When I grow up I want to be an astronaut
but if I can't be an astronaut
I think I'll be a coach driver.
This probably linked up with the fact now
that I want to travel I mean my thoughts
haven't really changed that much
but I definitely wouldn't like to be a coach driver now.
I suppose I would, yes, well I would like to be somebody
in a position of importance, I've always thought this
but I don't think I'm the right sort of person
to carry the responsibility for whatever it is.
I've always though well I'd love to be possibly love
to be in politics or something like this
but I'd probably find that just as tedious
as all the other jobs I've done so.
What were the things I always thought I could do.
I could give lectures on erudite subjects
that I'd read all about or I could work in the theatre,
perhaps lighting or directing a show.
- And is all that lost to you?
- Does seem to be yes.
- The village pantomime 1990 Beauty and the Beast.
- Matthew Matthew
Your house sir is needing some repairs.
I think the attendance at last years pantomime
on the Saturday night was the biggest crowd
of West of Shetland folk I'd ever seen in one place.
And you know and we think they enjoyed it.
We had good receptions in other parts of Shetland as well.
We did tour one play.
I think were moving
into an age when there's going to be more stress
on the community.
When bigger policies are fairly set,
are fairly predictable, and the emphasis
is gonna fall on local organisation.
- You directed it last year
and you're not this year why is that?
- Well the specific reason is that we had
a preliminary meeting and I was, my name was not
put forward as the one they wanted so.
- Why would that be?
- Probably because I like to do things in my own way
I'm perhaps quite an authoritative director
I have my own idea of the performance
before we even start and I don't like people
to deviate from that and during the course
of production of course people come along with suggestions.
No I accept suggestions, I don't just go along
without listening to people but I know how I want the thing
and once I deviate once from that idea,
the whole thing actually falls apart.
It's not a work of art any more.
I'm not claiming that I produce marvellous works of art
but I do know what I'm aiming for.
Alas poor master, still sleeping, shall I awaken him.
I think everybody wants to be somebody
and when you can't actually be anything
in your ordinary life if you feel there's a sphere
in which you can excel then it's great.
I mean I know how much pleasure people who take photographs
get when their work is praised
and that's perhaps it's much the same thing.
- We'll just taking take a quick look at your plan
and see how it stands.
- What I have done is taken lists of all the
community halls in Shetland with their capacity.
- Neil is trying to organise
a professional touring theatre company.
- If a hall only seats 60 people it may not
be worth putting on a show there.
- I mean what was your response at the fact
that only 4 folk turned up at the.
- Disappointment, it was disappointment.
I was disappointed but I think it proves the point
that I've been trying to make that you can't just
except people to turn up for a group from outside Shetland
when they don't know what the things about.
I've had an instinctive feeling that I was a writer
since I was 16, I never really wanted to be anything else.
I would actually pay to have something published.
I think that's important I think if I could find somebody
that would recognise, there must be something
in what I've done.
I don't think it's all useless.
I probably am overvaluing it but I know how much effort
went into some of it and on that strength alone
I just can't believe it's useless.
With each successive play I don't know who I'm trying
to speak to and what I'm trying to say to them
and whether they're listening I just keep going
because that's what I feel I should be doing.
In the winter, if you live in the country,
well it's just all wet and there wouldn't be anything
for miles around and you'd get soaked if you tried
to go out and there's no shelter anywhere except
in your own house.
But in the town you can go out
on wet wintry days cause you can always find somewhere
to shelter because there's lots of places.
I don't think I've been typical of the environment
in which I lived.
What my background has given me
is a sense of just being part of a very impersonal society.
You finish the week you come home you plug
into the TV set for the weekend
and then you manage to get back to work on Monday.
And it seems to me this is just a slow path
to total brain washing and if I you have
a brain washed society then you're heading towards
doom there's no question about that.
- Well it weren't too bad last night anyway.
- It was better than it's been for a while I think.
- There was enormous reaction to you in the
previous film what do people see in you do you think?
- It's seemed that I was representing some
kind of successful escapism or somebody
who'd managed to be totally himself,
hadn't given in to pressure of society
to conform and people flooded me with letters
and people seemed to think
I could solve their personal problems.
And I was quite frightened because I knew I couldn't
but what really bothered me was people seemed
to see something in me that I hadn't been aware of myself.
All I was aware of was that I didn't have anywhere to go,
I had nothing to do I'd no money,
I felt let down by quite a lot of people.
I didn't think my life was a success
but suddenly everybody seemed to think so
but the most nagging thing was that whatever,
even if a million people had written to me
it wouldn't have made any difference to my own situation.
When I get married I don't want to have any children
because they're always doing naughty things
and making the whole house untidy.
I always told myself that I would never have children.
- Why?
- Because, because, well because children inherit
something from their parents.
And even if my wife
were the most high spirited and ordinary
and normal of people the child would still stand
a very fair chance of being not totally full
of happiness because of what he
or she would've inherited from me.
- Have you given up on women?
- Well, what how shall we say, all but you know.
I mean there's always, everybody always,
every unmarried man and every unmarried woman hopes
for somebody who will actually come along
to change their life.
But the practical reality
is the chances of my finding somebody
who would put up with me in my integrity is are few.
- What would you look for in a woman?
- Well I might look for various things
but what's probably more important is
what somebody would look for in me.
I can't offer reliability.
I mean most women looking for a husband
or a steady man wants somebody
who is reliable in some way or other.
I cannot offer that.
Because I don't know what I'm going to be like
from one day to the other and it would be foolish for me
pretending you know that I could offer something like that.
I can offer sincerity, I can offer compassion,
willingness to do my part to put my wife's interests
as high as my own, no doubt these are,
I'm sure these are important.
But I cannot say look in
10 years time I'll still be bringing in a wage in,
especially if I don't start in that situation, you know.
- Do you worry about your sanity?
- Other people sometimes worry about it.
- Like who?
- As I said, I sometimes can be found behaving
in an erratic fashion, sometimes get very frustrated,
very angry for no apparent reason.
For a reason which won't be apparent
to other people around me.
It's happened from time to time.
- Are you getting better or worse
do you think your state?
- I don't think there's any significant change in me,
I said I haven't been so depressed
since I've been in Shetland,
I suppose my basic personality is not a lot different.
- Are you having any medical treatment
for your mood changes?
- No I haven't for many years because I wouldn't like
to be dependent upon man made substances for a cure.
- Do you ever think you're going mad?
- I don't think it I know it.
I, well we're not allowed to use the word mad
but you know, I think most people are mad here
but I think it's a mad world.
I think I remember walking in London 12 years ago
and just walking through the city
and they were digging up the drains
and there were cranes knocking down buildings
and there were cars trying to get down
impossible narrow alleys and having to reverse out again
and policemen doing all kinds of things
and I thought this world is just mad you know,
this world is just mad.
Yes I'd say I believed in God.
- Are you religious?
- Well I go to church with my parents on Sundays.
I don't know even know whether I do believe in God or not.
I thought an awful lot about it actually
and I still don't know but I still led to believe
that it was absolutely certain if one was
to survive in the world one had to believe in God.
- And how's he been treating you?
- Well I said to somebody last week
that I preferred the Old Testament
to the New Testament because in the Old Testament God
is very unpredictable and that's I think how
I see him in my life.
Sometimes very benevolent,
sometimes seemingly needlessly unkind.
Well after I'd tried every remedy one could possibly
think of for my personality disorders,
I thought well I'm going to trust God
because other people have done so seemingly
with positive results.
I can't say the moment I trusted God my life was fine
and I can't say all the time
that I think I've found the answer but I can say
with some certainty that once I started believing
that there is actually a God who has something of a design
for the world, who is working in a certain way in the world.
After that some things became clearer to me,
I really can't say much more than that.
- Coloured people we don't like them very much.
- No it sounds like ghostly coloured people,
you think of a sort of purple person
with red eyes and yellow feet
and you can't really think of what they really look like.
I find it hard to believe that I was ever like that
but there's the evidence.
Probably when I was seven I just lived in a wonderful world
where everything was all sensation
and them I could be happy like this,
I could be miserable the next one.
I don't have a yearning for any past time in my life.
Perhaps in my subconscious I could recall a time
when everything was a lot happier
my teens were terribly unhappy years.
- If we come back in 7 years
how would you like us to find you?
- In a job from which I was getting satisfaction,
married, probably with children, with a good salary.
Enough to as I said before to be able
to live fairly comfortably and with friends
who I could contact when I wanted them.
- So do you think you have failed?
- Can't really judge.
- Do you feel you've failed yourself?
- Well my life isn't over.
- Can you think what you'd like
to be doing in the year 2000?
- I can think of all kinds of things I'd like to be doing.
The real question is what am I likely to be doing?
- What are you likely to be doing?
- That's a horrible question.
I tend to think most likely the answer is
I will be wandering homeless around the streets
of London but with a bit of luck that won't happen.
I always feel that somehow a good fairy has waved
a wand over me and saved me from that because
that seemed very much what the end would be for a while.
That's why I cling on here, I know how tempting it is
to escape into fantasies, to believe
that I already am a successful writer.
To believe that I've got lots of friends,
to believe that if only I had done such and such my life,
would've been different but I mean the most difficult thing
is to accept the reality, to be what we are in a situation.
That's terribly difficult.
- No not intentionally.
- I must you, I'm a moustache fellow, a beard.
- At the end of their very special day
in London after their trip to the zoo and the party.
We took our children to an adventure playground
where they could do just what they liked.
Those from the children's home set about building a house.
There's Nicholas.
And Tony.
Andrew.
And Bruce
John.
Suzi.
Jackie and her friends.
Give me a child until he is seven
and I will give you the man.
This has been a glimpse of Britain's future.