That this is the stuff of tribute on the other hand I have been around for a long time now most 50 years I suppose since I started in the business. I've been been involved in the number of very very good shows with very good people I mean this goes back to life before the baby is going to go back to the boyhood and all of them. Happy Childhood Yes On the whole it was. In Sheffield. Had that's not a good beginning. I thought of leaving your body that are put in your own sort of intro comma and you fell into the trap I did you have to go wonderful place the last was just London 50 years ago. But it was you know and I'm saying it wasn't a great big city it was a big city but it was a you know how to get strong character we had. Where we did it was nice lots of friends. My father was was a difficult man because he think partly because he had a stammer was got very constantly rather frustrated with life and hadn't really achieved very much so there wasn't a lot of money to go around and I think that was there nothing theatrical in the background my my own Betty who my mother sister had been apparently and the Liverpool red line not quite sure what you're selling tickets for or playing Medea or whatever but anyway she was she was in Liverpool rep that's all we knew. And my sister did want to go into the theatre and she wasn't really an actor but she went into stage management and all that and it didn't really work out and she went around the country came back not having made much money which reinforced my father's feeling that the theatre was pre-sleep bankrupt so what led you to think you should tread the boards. Well whatever it was you wanted to trade or trade exactly I don't know there was a part of me that was very. I could make people laugh I could perform I knew I could act I knew that very well for you but Niger but you're not love the you but nature not love me no I suppose I'm not you know you know but then I never feel that I'm doing the right thing at the right time nothing to be real love you have to love everybody around you love what you're doing however I'm saying I'm not getting into all that I I just felt there was something there that made me resist taking the normal job that my father wanted me to do and so I thought hung back when. I was school careers Masters was just careers in business or banking or advertising or something that I just held off a very very fortunately I met people very stage in my life who shared my own feelings about some comedy performance and was slightly more. Fierce a sort of. Pushy other than I was I know my behalf and got me to do things that I wouldn't have done so kind of fell into it was rather avoided falling into anything else was going to work for the big factor in that that was actually yes that was that was where I met Terry Jones and also a guy called Robert Hewson and it was Robert who suggested that rather than just telling jokes to each other we should put them together and in a half hour act as a cabaret for which we would get 30 shillings one of these big box of balls. And that was the 1st time I sort of actually sort of involved in comedy form of what we study modern history. So I like to write funny enough really Yeah well I mean I don't know about you but I know I'm now far more instant history than I was the time it was engine of a feeling. Other ways of life and now I'm well you know I'm a really good sister historian of London absolutely brilliant and I I'm writing a history books. Itself of the moment so it comes back to you but at the time it was just a way of making. Of keeping myself up for 3 years and getting where I had an enormous amount of opportunities to appear doing comedies and plays and what did you do much work I work very hard in the last sort of 2 or 3 months before the exams and I always did enough to to get my essay known time I had a very good tutor who I think he knew I wasn't the sort of the brightest intellectual in the bunch. And he was very keen on my acting and he would say work for will that piece you did the other day interplay you did that was very very good if you go I say well I haven't got it handed in tomorrow yes I'm perfectly alright so he was very indulgent of me. The mention prince of there was straight acting never a kind of was that what you intended to do it I mention pincher because I I was cast in the. Production of the birthday party right which was not it's been revived now but it was not one of printers most popular plays and it was terrific and I really enjoyed that I think was something marvelously created a real so feeling of menace about these characters and I played McCann The Irishman who just sits there comes into this house you know why he's very good what he's there for he sits there and he saw tears the newspaper strips very carefully and talks of just just a lovely lovely thing to do and I knew then I could do many so I could do you know call to see who is barely so. Well there's no evidence that I did the birthday party Sadly once I met him and I said always I'm in the birth about to say oh yes we know about your birthday party but hey have you mentioned me in other fellow parts and when did that kind of coalesce if you like. Probably on the frost reports I mean I knew Terry and I'd worked with Terry Jones on reviews. At Oxford and admit every card look at Edinburgh he'd been with the Cambridge of view so the 3 of us kind of knew each other. And John Graham was a legendary sketch writers and they wrote some of the best sketches on the Frost Report and we Terry Jones and myself were sort of very much junior writers on last report so we sort of got to know them we met them a bit there and Terry Gilliam came in to really. Came into our ken really after we did do not just your set and he was he was came of New York and said you've got these animations we put in this extraordinary children's show we did 2 series of 512540 I think it was shown so by the time we got to from 9768 we all knew each other but the actual coming together was waiting but not until early 969 when a few phone calls went out. For some reason John and Graeme decided they liked doing or just your set and what we'd be doing and felt like we should write together for something new but for parts and your career set was that you were doing what you were going to do. Not really I was I was struggling to make enough money married in 166 we had our 1st child in 68 so you know mortgages to be paid and. All the expenses of starting a family. And I never felt totally comfortable so I was working for anyone I could work for whether it was sort of Ross Conway writing links for him or canned. Or yeah yes my mom like Roscoe Yes I like Russ convoy he's been. There later lately he was great for violin piano so we were for everyone we could waiting and hoping that there would be some sort of security debate some rather than just being a series of events and you have to sell yourself again is this something that stretches into the future. Presidents feel like that no no it didn't I mean we we felt we were taking a big risk with our lives really in 969 because the B.B.C. Took the show All right thank you very much for doing that but in a rather grudging way and they were the budget was very very low I mean it wasn't it was probably you make more money if you work for the 2 Ronnies or Marty Feldman the lead so we have to we have to just hope that somehow it would work and that you know it was working. Well we knew that was working for us that's what I mean but are you confident in the Yes Well it's very interesting those who question me we sat around the table and sketches came in and these were good good writers and Graham and John wrote brilliant stuff good stuff and we just knew as we read it this was hilarious We'd sort out the various powers but you NEVER Well certainly as far as I'm concerned you never know whether the great British public is going to. Share the same so feelings about something and also see something is to try I guess and try and also how is it going to be done you know and how are we going to get very conventional B.B.C. To deal with something so unconventional but we took heart from Spike Milligan during Q 5 news out that he was allowed to do very daft things but no really for a long long time I think it was it was well into the seventy's before I felt I feel comfortable now and safe and I will always find work I never felt that he do a bit of work here then someone sort of says oh I could do a bit of acting and 3 do a bit of acting and then it just was just just a little putting all the pieces together trying to find some sort of way forward which was a was probably around about Time Life of Brian I felt that do you look back on parts and not just fondly but I mean how do you what's your kind of sum ation of it because it's some of both now who are I look back on it with sort of very very rose tinted specs I suppose because those sessions I was talking about were around the table reading sketches that people have just written and putting them together and giving him coming up with the ideas of how to solve link them with some bizarre animation were terrific I mean that was it was great energy we were all in now 20 years but John in his forty's and we all we all sort of we all felt this energy this buzz and I have no feeling quite like that. Before. Or since that was very special and I look but they're falling Zell ever there were 4 legs outs later Yeah I know I mean the whole question of how many shows we should do we did the 1st 2 series and by the time we got to the end of the 2nd series John particularly wanted to do something on his own and felt that we had achieved all we could as a group. And we did a 3rd series which was good and funny and John was great in it and then. He went off to do Fawlty Towers and all there was there's a feeling at the time that we should stick together and we shouldn't let the side down by breaking up going off somewhere else looking back now I mean that's just the way things happen. And we've had 14 is out a suppose I'd be the one who would be accused of. Not agreeing to do The Last Vegas stage show and then the 1990 S. We all had our various independent ideas of where the series could go and that's what made it very strong me no one was stronger than the Python group together really no one outside could ever say you should do this you should do that we have to decide for ourselves and we put ourselves through fairly rigorous argument about what we should do what we should do was there a post partisan Maloney's. While I like post-partum freedom. From the I ended up being offered a chance to go around the world I know you've been a member I mean how Frank how do you know the best moment ladies how do you feel about it I do know that what a job what do you yeah I want to gay guy me sort of developed from around the world 90 days of touch and feel I was picky cut out for but gradually got comfortable with the way we were doing it and then Yes And then we did poll to poll again we weren't quite sure what the where the public ready for another one but wasn't based on as you vend story in a way but it was because good ratings the book sold well it was tremendous Memon is that. And even maintained a reputation if I may say so myself and you might blanch at this thing a very nice man. Well I mean this is try to be nice thank you Robert you're looking very splendid today look at the same eyes because you did you to fill the microphone is a lovely color No I mean that's become a bit of a flow of a bit of the beach thing I avoid I suppose I avoid confrontation among the conciliator of the group and I just I'm interested in people and I find if you want to get the best out of people and I you yes best to be friendly it's the simple as that but to say that I'm particularly nice I mean definitely the nicest man in Python was Terry Jones who was booed idea man a lovely man so you could be very careful whether you agree with this will disagree that was Michael Palin talking to me back in January. I thought. Just. I don't care. You're listening to a selection of the best bits of the rubber show from the last 12 months in the next few years one of our best loved museums here in London will be on the move back in January I met up with Sharon immense the director of the Museum of London and she took me on a tour of what will become the museum's new I can't believe it is too many of you listening who haven't been to the Museum of London at some stage because it is a fantastic look at the city we share it's it's history and it's present day but it's moving if you have been and I'm sure most of you have your night is currently in a rather strange sight sort of stuck in the middle of a roundabout just by London wall on the edges of the city right near the Barbican. It's an unusual annoyed and difficult site for all sorts of reasons in the museum is always felt rather hen DEAN Well there would be handy no longer because they're moving out they're moving to a brand new site except it's not a new so of course it's an old site it's part of Smithfield market if you look at Smithfield Market from the west so it's in front of you to the left of you is the functioning market that is still there and is still going strong thankfully and is still brilliant and is still a great place to buy meat north of that lot to the right of that is what's known as the the the general goods market I believe and that's been sitting derelict for ages it was going to be knocked down and replaced with a with some offices and luxury flats but thankfully I'm going to happen we won what I think is a real victory in this one prison state it's going to be taken over by the Museum of London which means that we'll get to use it and see it and share it so we thought we'd go down and take a look at the place as it currently is this is before the work has started to actually turn into the Museum of London so the person the reason I listed London and today Sharon took us down there and gave us a guided tour I'm standing outside Smithfield market it's the middle of the afternoon so you'd expect it to be fairly quiet but this has been quiet for a very long time this is the bit right on the frying invert the old Victorian market it's called and it's been closed for ages they were going to knock it all down but it's going to have a very new lease of life I'm glad to say I'm going to come in here and find out more. Or a very large gate into well. As you come in you suddenly start to see the metallic Victorian splendor of the old it's these includes an incredible roof I mean it's almost like a sort of a metal cathedral mean it's incredible and it's going to have an incredible new life as the Museum of London. Is there this morning. I've come here to meet the director of the Museum of London his new home this is going to be and I'm told she's at the top of this staircase and indeed dishy he's sharing. I. So. Explain where we are all OK fair we're. A loft in what's called the general market said this was the last of 3 big market places that was built by the Victorian architect Horace Jones and he was the architect who built tower bridge are well and very quickly this general market became a meat market as that became the most profitable food item which was highly in demand what do you intend to do with it OK I said this is going to be our new home the new Museum of London so we've got to basements West poultry after new what wonderful names the general market the basement of the poultry markets on I like to call the chicken wing. And this will comprise of the new museum you will enter into the galleries through a big circular stair case in the basement so this is sort of the turbine the whole of the museum in London I mean you know comparing it to the Tate Modern for example absolutely unlike Tate Modern where taking a building that had a previous use bar very differently to Tate is that we are really interested in what this building was used for previously it's part of the story of London. So we really need to bring that down because unlike summer us together we're going to take you now I'm going to take you to where the central staircase will be OK. Just seen that done seeming human have a route here that's incredible So this is a huge dome and in their fifty's there was a fire and the original roof was burnt away it was like it's concrete but it's not a Tolo errantly it was. Fiberglass really really. Uncertain all idea of course to clean it all up we might lift it bring more light and under here the dome gate is this wonderful kind of central point under which we could go into the gallery So is this going to be where your big staircase is yes right here and all vision for this place is to be somewhere which is all about contemporary London we are a museum about the history and development and present day life of London there must be people who remember this place as a working functioning I mean I was quite a while ago but it must be people who work today absolutely and many of the families who have market stores in the meat market which still is open and thriving know the history here and some of them are related to have families that are related to the people who originally were here I mean I suckled here from Camden Town and I know that I was cycling along the river the route of the fleet river that must be somewhere here is where it is it runs all the way down Farrington Yes And one of the things that I really want to understand this could we have views into the fly out through our base aren't we then out into the faces some metres below and it was wonderful Victorian engineering by Basle jet but before this was here before the Victorian market was here this was. Like an open sewer animals were killed here slow to Tiffany and then the blood and guts would flow into the fleet it was rolls it is nothing really disgusting so the Victorians with their kind of amazing ambition built this whole market complex above the fleece in the land flows down in a gradient to wards Farrington where you talked about having I mean because on a 6 she spoke of having a railway running 3 Yeah come on let's go and I followed. So we just down the ramp. And this train just come by. And we're back with a Thameslink we've got this fantastic opportunity to be a museum that the train will run through so I won't be able to go to work or to do whatever they're doing and run through a museum. I mean this is what we're going into the catacombs of something I mean it's kind of big Victorian overengineered cheese what we have here yet is the city corporation of London's salt store Wow So is this what they use when the when it's snowing and when the that's right when it's snowing you know we have those really cold winters Yeah well this is the old deployed to stop prevent us from slipping over but that obviously moving it now because it takes about 2 years for the South in this brickwork to leach out and this will be the place for the facts and objects and we've got $6000000.00 of them and the whole of Smithfield was a place where outside of the city was dangerous and kind of naughty things happened you know riots happened here the peasants revolt. It was a place of execution. William Wallace thanks. I'm. Just by the Scottish. Not know. It's it's a place where we just want to it's a place where like mountains were probably just a martyr's what it was you know it was the equal burning on the side it was a place of jalouse thing and the great big St Bartholomew's for one of the big European clubs happened here as well it's an incredible project trying to stop the techno project. You had lines this out to 15 year old boy is charged with murdering a 25 year old in Tottenham will appear at Westminster court on Boxing Day The teenagers are also charged with robbing Willa Mendez a Portuguese national in Albert place early on Saturday Border Force officials and life boats have intercepted 2 vessels carrying migrants off the Kent coast this morning 2 people were found in a rowing boat about 8 miles off Dover the 1st boat stopped early this morning was carrying 13 people all without a life jacket teams of rescue workers in Indonesia are going from believed to village sifting through the daybreak looking for survivors 4 days after a tsunami struck parts of Java and Sumatra 430 people are confirmed dead Buckingham Palace has confirmed the Prince Philip did not attend today's Christmas church service at Sandringham but has stressed he's in perfectly good health the Duchess of Cornwall wasn't there either due to heavy cold London's weather bearable cloud or mantis afternoon but some bright or sunny spells are next update at warm filled up the Boxing Day on B.B.C. Radio London ready Mr Crimmins what Bernard Cribbins introduces his choice of from B.B.C. Radio London. You're listening to a selection of the best bits of the show from the last 12 months in February I had a visit from a very familiar voice on it and I'm going to try to check from a compilation it's a 4 CD compilation called Soul woman 80 Thomas classics from the queens of soul and the Queen's include all just this is just a quick run through Aretha Franklin Diana Ross Chaka calm Frida pine I'm a frank and Dusty Springfield Anea biker Whitney Houston Dionne Warwick Martha Reeves Mary Wells Malina shore Randy cool for me it's Nilsson many reports and Nina Simone and this one. Our very own Misha Paris now and it's. Coming in minutes. Through money. Good because it means it still sounds fresh and that some of those sounds very current and Yankee you call it can't be that long ago I'm telling you this year is 30 years and I'm thinking to myself goodness the time is just gone and shocking Well the song was by Misha parse of course and we're hearing Misha piracy 30 years ago I mean up ought to some that when you were following a valid theory if you have great you know great yeah but I mean. Where has to tell of God I don't know I mean you know the thing is it just pulses you by and then you sit down and you think it's all luck a dream isn't a feels like a dream was it doesn't feel that longer to me you know but it did happen quite quickly everything was quite fine you were quite young but until I was sorry I was a teenager that you know right now and happen so quick literally I signed and it just went back back that there wasn't even time to cheat or all just happened did you did you enjoy It was a challenge or even enjoy it yeah there WALLACE I mean you know I Then I went to America then I blew up in the States and then I had to leave then and toll him out when you talk you know you just need to come back to London it's just too big it's huge so I was there for like 3 years for the last time and. Lots of men and everything all the shows and stuff like that was great it was fabulous but what it was a show is that you've got a very long career because you're still doing it and still doing fantastically well and 6 o'clock you know Russell stuff yeah how hard is it to know you know that only break for comes when you're young and you're in a can it's one new and exciting Well what is it to sustain that even the interesting thing is I've been pretty lucky because I've done other things you know ever it's T.V. Present in T.V. All doing. Radio No it is human place but. Do you know I had a radio to shuffle out 5 years not that was fabulous That was great and then I had one not to wear and I've never written a book and I'm on my 2nd book now but. I think when you come back for me when I come back to singing it's like a joy because if I just did that all the time with nothing else I'd probably be a little bit down and sick of it but every time I go to make a record I gave cites again because we were talking about great British female vocalists and have been a few you know dust the yeah you have to put right out that oh yeah I am a day USA I'm testing we've got some really great you know I mean there's just been you know the U.K. Is is famous for creating great talent a couple of hours that Dusty had a very troubled life I mean clearly you know when I was sadly will happen then yeah how much of a pitfall is that do you think well this is what I'm writing about now yeah my new book I'm writing now is really about all female singers and why we go through school watched Al I should be finished with that by summer time but it could be this year everything is about females you know this is interior of the vote and everything else and then there's this wonderful CD soul of a woman which I'm sorry that from I mean yes and you're in some very good company I mean really good company you know you've got a shocker on there you've Cora Retha Franklin and all the great females are on the end yes they've all been told it's seems I think what I'm getting to the crux of it seems to be that because we're the naturism we're the ones that usually bring up the children it's always challenging when we have Koreans. Both probably afraid that in many ways we want singers to to give us this so we want them to put it out there yeah that's a painful and difficult thing to do not often not yeah I know some people over the age of all that yeah it does but it's more to do as well with trying to keep that family. Structure together which is very much the woman's job today so you're a mother in Europe why figure all of those things out well arising Yeah and then you're giving giving giving giving him by the end of it you just collapse United So if you ever felt yeah it come on top you're seeing really balance the fight is going to say that he says he just looks like I'm just a very good actress you know that you know you always talk to him but I come from a you know my my family a Jamaican yet so I'm not even I was born here my grandparents they have me they just had so many jobs and constantly you know I'm a proper working calls girls I basically you know I grew up in a household where juggling was the order of the day and that's why I always look cool it's funny because I was brought up in that kind of job is I think in a support structure is oh my gosh I swear if I didn't have my grandparents watching them juggle I definitely would be able to have done what I've done because I've got my kids you know my oldest daughter go bless her she's 26 and she's gone now and my little one is 11 and I've literally got a team of people that are in mine if I keep it together with me otherwise I couldn't do it do you do is sing one of them does the eldest one sings and she's totally walked away from it and now she's in events manager and loves doing what yes she travels all over the would you encourage it I mean to potentially take out as a career I don't courage you know people also know that so I encourage my children to do what I want to do of course I'm like that I'm a very you know a Perry have to start muses were having to you know it's not but you know I've I've learned as a mom the minute you tell your kids to do something and that's exactly what they're going to do so I'm always I'm one of those parents but that's crazy this idea to go for it and I'm one of those. In terms of hit records because you got hit records and they have periods where you dug in the way of like matzoh still do they matter less as you get older. Well the thing is for me. It always matters what ever is if it's the record holds. Now for me it's more than just the record it's other things you want your book to do well you television show it to do well you want your radio to do well for me I just want content to be powerful that's where I'm at like whatever you have of me it's going to touch your soul at some level and if that's not the case I'm not doing my job so it doesn't matter in that way but I feel nowadays most things that feel like anything so my job is always to try to make you feel something in terms of saying is that because we all watch those all we who watch those Saturday night programs are lots of people come on and sing and you know you have judges and with that I'm like I'm moving very well and they're all perfectly decent but you sort of sit and think you know I'm sorry you know you can sing you're in June in order. For the journey is what you miss the shows you don't see the journey of how it you know what it takes to get to that stage yet and what comes with it. You know it's a very very very pressured world to be in to constantly be fantastic all the time and sing that soul and be a great performer it's a lot that goes on behind it that's the part that you don't see when you see these shows which is quite dangerous so you've got a lot of people running into this industry thinking yeah I can do this and they don't realize that it's a lot more to it Oplan karaoke because. It might everyone's got to. Have a salute leave it's shocking I mean I mean we come from a time where people would tell you you really are rubbish you sound rubbish No it says that even no one 0 my coolest actually you could actually do that that's one side of us that no one's telling the truth you sound terrible and also the other shows they won't be listening to very specific Why yes yes you know if Bob Dylan went on there he wouldn't get 3 minutes to do you know what I'm trying to say it's so changed it's really changed I mean I personally tell young people now when I you know when I see them and talk to them and I often for advice I say to them get behind the industry go inside you know stop being in the front light work inside the industry. That's what we need we need more creatives in the industry we certainly don't care if women as well and resent Lou I mean it's not just you know yes it's great there are women singers but there must be women producers I'm going to read those things would be fabulous it's interesting is that there's some woman this for CD that you were talking about that you're on the 1st one on there is a wreath because you can't go beyond current current I mean everything is the one is that she had any idea she's Yes what I called the queen of soul you know she you know she she's seasoned she's done it been there and he's still there when you were growing up who were you listening to I listened mostly to gospel and the band that I grew up listening to that called the Hawkins from me and said Oh happy day you meant that you know and so I was studying them when I was 7 Well like I still wish to get one to sing in church Yeah yeah because my grandparents the Minister's right so we went to church like 6 days a week I had choir practice Bible study I mean I was just shut church but growing up it felt great to know it was much playtime outside but it was wicked You said you came from a Jamaican Family yeah it was the music home of a judgment that right there right I was this all was well known to reggae and this and the jet jazz and reggae came from my dad right get my voice from 0 my mom exactly can you guys sing that's cool an amazing voice that's what my mom bless her she's gorgeous she sounds like a screaming hyena but Dad's the one that introduced me to the jazz and all the other stuff outside of gospel and I stood by my prince records when I was a teenager and ice to hide him under the bed you know when he was you know when he was wearing his stilettos you know that I could show that our grandparents would have completely you know I mean so it was just you know I was very fortunate in my grandparents house it was mostly gospel but my aunties and uncles because sickly trained pianist and well yeah so I had all of that classical gospel and dad was jazz what that country must because I don't know if. I can family's love money to what exactly Jim Reeves said wait a 2nd yes let me just say by trimming. My grandparents it was all about Jim Reason Doonican to do about their took a direct role as it is. Often not rocking chair I mean this is a light show now you people are going to manage that to you Well that's why I are rich families and worse than if I was always. You know of only been married once and who didn't marry I married an Irishman you know I mean but it was there was a ruling between the Irish wake up screaming in the night someone is still there I mean the thing is gospel music and country music very similar it's very similar and isn't a God in there you know I'm afraid that's just you know the Celtic Caribbean it's about a god guy and. Do you still enjoy singing you so much that it already but maybe on the of it I always be there on the 1st 2 lines and then it's lift off I'm gone because you did come up and you could have put a hole to hole up yeah but I started listening to and then I go on to Bristol and just go my Instagram parasol you see everything there on Twitter and all that but I'm going on told the 11th of February for a 5 day tour and when you see there's a wonderful band over well no this is me singing Ella Fitzgerald our celebration Yeah because I've just making. This album with Guy Barca I'll try he's me 5 guys are great and I say he's producing this Ella Fitzgerald record that I'm doing and this is the tool supporting things that well yet soul things women this year is fabulous you know the meanest among things Eller album is a grower case so now you can to me now is not a valid that OK you need to write that down I don't know if she did the scene why did as I think as a whole album of it is certainly some of the stuff they really could do and I mean that is that she's You got everything right issues that could. But then Billie Holiday Billy but he was mover right. You know and Anna was an enemy is the vow she's just she's in and she was it's are is a you go where is Billy. Billy's kind of these 2 old saw because of the way that all. Emotion comes serve in that sadness and. My goodness I mean the thing with lived to move you know she you know she was clean too she didn't do any drugs that's why they never spoke about much it's more interesting isn't it I mean that's smashed I mean that's one of the other things I guess isn't about the industry I mean it you know and said you know would you let you would you do a saying well you know there's so many feet is about that sort of isn't it going in there and you know the stuff that can go wrong and what I always say to people the same thing you know your home is your rock if you've got a rock you could go off and go mad but you always come back because the rock is there the problem is when there's no Roque you've got to have an anchor and if the home at the anchor and your home is disheveled then you read in trouble so my whole thing is you know you know my children my goal but not sometimes but when I listen to music for a big snowball wheel to wheel came home didn't we yeah you want that somebody did a baby you got my way home this is what I'm you really that's why I don't say how many you know about rice and peas and curry chicken my not that is why. I'm coming right back I'm around 5 I'm covered by. A 1000 there's always an IOU not sure good sure you had to stick. Me in the can still. Hold out. Baby It's Cold Just enough to drink. A lot of convincing. You're listening to a special program for Christmas the key back at the best bits of the rubber. Shown here on B.B.C. Radio the in March this year the H.M.S. Belfast turned 80 the warship looked after by the Imperial War Museum saw service throughout the 2nd world war and the Korean War to mark the anniversary we were invited on board what is now an iconic London landmark and I met with one very special gentleman they are moment now to be joined by Donald Hunter the hunter is medals displaying proudly in front of us is a veteran who served as a radio officer on a landing ship on D.-Day on one of the the most important days in the history not just of this country but of the world and there aren't too many men left you can say that they were there on D.-Day and certainly came welcome I was going to say welcome to the ship Donald but but you know I thank you very very much for coming to join us. After you where it's a privilege to be here I never thought I would be here after all only Geurts I don't think it's because I didn't I didn't see the rebel Falstaff or after Normandy his drugs on the line take convoys on a tank up but no I had jobs but just to today I was on a empty. Pick Where was the time to pursue Meccano is trying to school and I had job was to carry all the. Transport I'm plus drivers and some infantry. Over to Normandy landing on the beaches very How old were you then how old were you on D.-Day in actual fact it's about 18 and a half Yeah scads of earth what was that book I find out when you know that I need as excitement and scare as saying Talk us excitement to be in operation but as you're young you gave. I won big so I took down the back terrified because it was an actually a wash my 1st really experience in a main dining battle never want to see a guy and I had that through the wars. So many times on the line to convoys in a city that we were witnessing the on D. Day that of the kind of historical importance of what was happening there do you think or were you just doing the job no no I was well aware I was happy as a writer because we we we will call Operation a period which was a special combined fleet Well maybe much a Navy fleet so I was actually our if I may as well and I was. Because I was trying in gunnery bother all night and the fire fighting because it was the powers that be decided that if you know one job wasn't enough for you the offices or somebody got killed and you and I have 3 job you do another job so we had a break so we were. But it's really. Really terrifying experience I wouldn't wish on anybody I mean those guns are going to be firing today I mean how will that make you feel what sort of memories were all just to just explain what was happening as a side we were going to be She's landing at landing the 50. Mechanized plus or drop it and I want to say all the transport were fully loaded with petrol. And I say that if we. Have and bought them. Regularly all the way through the operation they were put in the petrol in oil slicks until it ran off the cap an important cap on because when they come off the 1st 90 chip go on the beach you have to draw if after having a runny dry straight out of a sleeve you go off the breach you so we would like a time bomb anyway. And you were in London when you were a Londoner Yeah yeah yeah yeah. Delivering the family. Would live in the entire area how long did you serve in the Navy in total in total . Throughout the war. On Their Own I was black and I was still carried all until about the end of 946 and then when I got married I thought. I'd also because of. War finished and we were required any more you had to get a job a shoal and as I was Type one of course I went in as a technical and took my. Degree you know electronics so coming back home on a ship like this does it bring back a mixture of memories and emotion made. It for everyone else there's a lot of emotions that come to I Am i had the memory is clear of those operations on the clearer than it would be what I did yesterday because you makes a big impression you don't forget trying not to think about it because you tend to put it in the background that's why you try and deal with it and yet it's very important that we don't forget we don't know you're like yourselves and knows it it never came out he really was always so it's really in memory of those that never came back. We lost 2450 main in the operation alone. And I felt so strongly about it in the eighty's I raised body and I found later memorial ceremony where the false was just by Gene I'd be been a genie a memory of them and our own church were actually involved in India Yeah I actually brazen Bonnie for how we got some SUV Winston Churchill's grandson who was also called Winston Churchill fire for America to invite a well as I said your your proudly wearing your medals today. I thought thought it was a patient at least you know I again it's 8 I don't think as many of us left to it was so. You know so in the last interaction that's why me. Was far and over over and taken on the. Screen we were faced in the German government. Big on those far and on the trials and peril falsities was. Close on too long so we were facing full broadsides I'm window it's were quite a tube to block the B. History. Before they opened the ball ball but then we had aerial carried away which we lost contact with one of the. I and I volunteered for probably lost all my volunteers from. About the most trying 6 we're leaning out to. The area fixed they were in the bro. And I felt the blow. Over the ship and the shells whistling out of a I and I don't. I and a rig so fortunately I was. Filming for the fall in a long story short I did get co-op in the very beginning of the measure get there and boy was I glad to get they are. Almost always. With a chip just call it was rolling you know rolling hills flying about the rigging. No good place a bit if I'd known I'd never gone out there and I just say thank you for from for my generation and I hope for the generations to come for everything that you did when so many like you asked very nice He's But really what I would like to say is as Louise knows Maine they gave their lives to get fired for a freedom they were going through should be remembered we would the lucky ones we got got back but we're lucky to that that your generation did that thing. Very very lucky yeah and it's been an honor to win team so far for you for inviting me and I hope it's a it gives a lot of credence to the work of the year Belfast Turner splendid job and isn't it Donald thank you very very much. To Radio 94.9 F.M. . B.B.C. Says. This isn't. B.B.C. Radio to. London's News or one on my Duran to 15 year old Hughes charged with murdering Keane Boxer Willem Mendez will appear at Westminster court on Boxing Day The teenagers are also charged with robbing the Portuguese national in Tottenham on Saturday but he still called around 1 20 am to Albert place 2 reports of a stabbing and found a man suffering from multiple injuries he was taken by ambulance to hospital where he was pronounced dead an hour later a London academic with Jule British Iranian nationality detained for 8 months in Iran on security charges has been released for Christmas professor at an expert in computer science at Imperial College has now returned to the U.K. The news has been welcomed by Richard Radcliffe whose wife Nazanin has spent more than 2 years behind bars in Iran I think today's news is obviously positive there have been other positives recently there also been some negatives and you know I spent my time looking at the tea leaves wearing that happens and trying to read what it means for us. In Iran as well as volatile politics and the case pretty volatile these days so you know it is a bit take it day by day and keep hoping and keep pushing them here have a monstrous what happens next Border Force officials and lifeboat of intercepted migrants off the Kent coast this morning 2 people were found in a rowing boat about 8 miles off Dover another boat stopped early this morning was carrying 13.