- There's
- Look at those, cool.
- This was no
ordinary outing to the zoo.
It was a very special occasion.
It was part of a programme filmed in 1964
when we brought together a
group of seven-year-old children
from vastly different backgrounds.
We went to prep schools, primary schools,
state schools, and private schools
and picked out 14 children.
We brought them together because we wanted
a glimpse of the shop
steward and the executive
of the year 2000.
"Give me a child until he is seven,
"and I will give you the man."
These children are now 14,
halfway between childhood and manhood.
This is our interim report.
- If we did all love Jeffrey
and we all want to marry.
- Yeah.
- I think I know the one
that he'd likes best,
and that's her.
- Jackie, Lindsay, Susan.
- Plenty of boyfriends, but not one--
- Not one in particular.
You're friends with
plenty of boys, you know.
- My heart's desire is to see my daddy,
who's 6000 miles away.
- Bruce.
- You know, I've been getting on well
with my stepfather, and I like
to see my father occasionally
and he does come over from Rhodesia.
- Do you have a girlfriend?
- Nicholas
from the Yorkshire Dales.
- I don't want to answer that.
I don't answer those kind of questions.
No, I'm not answering that one.
- Suzy.
- I gave that up as a failure.
- I was gonna be a policeman,
but I've thought how hard
it would be to join in.
- Paul.
- Basketball appeals to me most,
but with this school, I'm
one of their best players
in form two, but when I get into a team,
they make me look like I can't play.
- I feel like bundling when
there's already a fight.
- I was gonna be a film star, but--
- Symon.
- Now, I'm gonna be an
electrical engineer,
which is more to reality really.
- Singing
Waltzing Matilda in Latin
at an exclusive pre-prep
school in Kensington,
we chose three boys.
Charles,
Andrew.
- I read the Financial Times.
- And John.
- I read 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.
- I like my newspaper because I got shares
and I know every day what the shares are.
- Stuff like misers like you like.
- No, but on Mondays, they don't move up,
so I don't look at it.
I made several blunders on Seven Up.
For instance, I said I
was going to Trinity Hall
instead of Trinity College.
They didn't like that too
much, nor did my father.
Also, I rather exaggerated when I said
how much I liked stocks and shares
because I don't anymore.
- How do
you think you've changed
since you were seven years old?
- Well, I mean, one grows so slowly
that one never notices honestly.
I feel the same as I felt
at seven, I may not be.
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.
- John passed
the entrance exam,
and is a weekly boarder
at Westminster School.
- When I leave school,
I'm going the Dragon School, I might,
and mummy's, and after I might go
to Charter House Marlborough.
- Charles is at Marlborough.
- When I leave this school,
I go to Broadstairs' St. Peter's Court,
then after that, I'm
going to Charterhouse.
- Andrew is at Charterhouse.
- When I leave this school,
I'm down for Heathfield
and Southover Manor.
- Suzy is at Southover Manor.
- Would everybody
please sit round now?
- For
one-third of our children,
their education was
pre-planned and paid for.
The remainder went to state schools,
and their future seemed less certain.
- I want to be a jockey when I grow up.
Yeah, I want to be a
jockey when I grow up.
- Tony is on the
way to achieving his ambition.
He spends all his free time
at Tommy Gosling's
Racing Stables at Epsom.
- My dad got on to Mr. Gosling.
Mr. Gosling told me I can come here
for every school holidays
and learn a bit more.
Next April, I'll be leaving school,
and I'll work for him for good.
- Did your parents
encourage you to do this?
- Yeah, they're pleased with
everything what I've got,
you know, going to do,
but they always has
wanted me to be a jockey.
- Why?
- Enjoyment, just to
say, "My son's a jockey,"
like, you know what I mean?
- Tony's change
from elementary school
to Secondary Modern
didn't alter his ambition,
but how about the other children?
Has a change of school changed them?
Bruce was at a pre-preparatory
boarding school in Surrey.
- And that's farmer heath
gives me nightmares.
I was about five when I went there,
and then,
I suppose I was too young
really to understand it,
and I thought it was a
bit severe at the time,
but then I just got used to it,
and didn't have sort of any impulses
to do things wrong, anything like that,
and I just got into the track of.
- We're supposed to go sideways.
- You know, of what they said
you must do and mustn't.
- Right, steady.
Let's go left foot everyone, place.
Squad pleasing.
- At St. Paul's, I like the companionship,
you know, with other boys really.
It's a bit, and you get that
much more in a boarding school.
- Well, I think boarding
makes you feel self-sufficient
and also teaches you to
be away from your parents,
and to live with people for a long time,
which you have to do in later life anyway.
- Well, I agree with
that a certain amount,
but when you board on a weekly basis,
you have the best of
both worlds, so to speak.
One sees one's parents at the weekend,
and one gets all the benefits
from an English boarding school.
- I think prep school
boarding is a bad idea
because up til about 12,
maybe it's different with other people,
but I've found you're much
more attached to your parents
once you come to about 13, 14,
you're not quite so attached to them.
- Two of our boys
who didn't have the chance
to be attached to their parents
were those brought up in a children's home
supported by charity, Symon.
- I had one dream,
and everything flew up in the air.
It all landed on my head.
- Symon stayed at
the home until last Christmas
when he returned to live with his mother.
- They say, "Where's your father, then?
"You know, when your mum's out at work,
"stay with your father."
And I just tell them, I ain't got one.
- What
effect has that had on you?
- Well, I don't think
it's had any effect on me
because what you don't
have, you don't miss,
as far as I can see.
- Also at the children's home
with Symon was Paul.
He and his family emigrated
when he was eight.
- I don't like the big boys hitting us
and the monitors up in the washroom
sends the nurse out,
and there's no talking,
but I wasn't talking today,
and Brown sent me out for nothing.
- What do
you remember of England?
- It seemed to be raining all the time.
I wouldn't stake my life on it
because I can't remember very much.
- He went to Australia
to start a new life.
- Well, I was going
to become a bank accountant,
but it's more book taking, the mess,
and that was main reason I was thinking
about becoming a panel beater.
And I don't know why now I've
stopped thinking about that.
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
that they had to get up into university.
- Were you happy
at the children's home in England?
- I mean, I didn't mind that really
because we didn't know what was going on
because I was a bit young.
- Were you happier then
than you are now?
- In a way, yeah, I was,
but then, I'm happy for being at home.
At the school, everything you wanted,
you just had it,
and everybody was your friend,
and you never knew any enemies, really,
but here, people are undecided about you.
They could be your friend one day,
and not the next.
- And then I moved up
to a comprehensive school.
I found it much bigger, of course,
and I found it hard to
settle into at first.
- From a Liverpool suburb,
returning home from the
comprehensive school,
Neil and Peter.
- I'm much more happy here
than when I first came.
You get so many different types of people.
People different sort of brains, you know,
from the very clever people
to you know, people who haven't got
much sense at all really.
Well, we pretend we've got swords,
and we make the noise
of the swords fighting,
and Lancelot he stabs
us, we go.
I've been playing since I started
at the comprehensive school
since the first year.
We play international wrestling.
- Yeah, that's only summer time, though.
- Yeah, only when we can go in the grass.
- There used to be a senior team,
but they all lost interest.
Watch this, checkmate.
- Oh, hey, gosh, it is.
How did you do that?
I guess it's a very good
idea to have competition
otherwise, you might start to relax really
and not to try hard enough.
- What do you think?
- I agree, yes, it's a good thing.
If there was no one to compete with,
you wouldn't be trying so hard.
- The three
little girls from East End
had the choice of going to a comprehensive
or a grammar school.
- I'm going to work in Woolworth's.
- Lindsay
chose the grammar school.
- Why am I using a wooden spoon, please,
to stir the saucepan?
- The noise.
- The noise, yes, we've got 16 people,
16 saucepans, we don't want the noise
from 16 people stirring with metal spoons.
- This is my first choice,
and this is where I turned up
even though some of my friends
were going to the other school.
- I didn't feel like
going to a grammar school.
I just, you know, comprehensive school,
it just seemed more friendly, you know.
At the time, yes, but now
they may be different.
- Grammar school's fantastic.
- If you say so.
- Well, we've all got our opinions.
- I like--
- What advantages
has a comprehensive school got?
- Oh, especially this school, it's new,
and they've got everything you could want.
They got equipment.
- What I enjoy about this school is,
with this school, we do
metal work and woodwork,
and the boys do cookery.
And we get our share of
everything as it were.
- It's good though,
learning metal work, innit?
- Well, in a grammar school,
I don't think you'd find many girls
that really want to do
metal work or woodwork.
- Now, see that's what I mean.
That's the difference.
- That sort of shows the
difference in the people.
- One of the
keys to the character
of the seven-year-old was how
they spent their free time.
Bruce had his school band.
- When I go home, I come in,
and mummy gives me a cup of tea,
and then I go out and play.
And when it starts to get dark.
I come in again and put on TV.
- But I don't got to go to bed til 7.
- I usually go to bed 10
o'clock or 11 o'clock.
Sometimes I go dog racing.
Of course, I like going there
for something to do at night,
so I don't really do anything at night,
only running dogs or watch
other things, watch telly.
- I don't watch very much television.
- I used to watch it a lot,
but I'm not watching it so much,
and I think it's good because lots of it
is corrupting me a bit.
- A like serials, like
Peyton Place and Crossroads,
always watch Crossroads if I can.
- For one thing, the
advertisements, you know.
I can recite about six tunes off of it,
and it just seems a
worthless thing to know.
- There's too many
things going on at school
though we do have a television,
and at the weekend, they
can be more selective,
and there's not much that I like.
- Well, I'm quite
interested in archaeology,
and we're doing a local dig at Vinscomb,
near our school.
- Being in Set One, it's very, very hard
to keep up with the leaders.
I never have a time to relax at all.
- What do
you do in an evening?
- Just go out with friends normally.
- Yeah.
- Or to clubs sometimes.
- Yeah, there aren't
many clubs around here.
It's disgusting, it really is.
You hear people talking
about it on television,
but it's really bad round in the east end.
It really is, there's hardly anything.
- There's always something to do here.
I mean, I'm never, ever bored.
- Suzy now lives in Scotland
on her father's 4000 acre estate.
- It's very, very small really
when you got one spare
room, there's my room,
there's Molly's room, it's very small.
There's a kitchen and a dining room,
the drawing room, and
really, we mostly sit,
sit when we have people in.
That's really it.
- What
sort of things do you do?
- Ride, swim, play tennis, ping pong,
I pray croquet, things like that.
- What about
the social life? What's that?
- What in Perthshire?
- Yeah.
- It's quite fun. We've
got some things going on.
- I think
your dog's got a rabbit.
What should we do?
Do you want someone to see it?
- Max, bring it here.
Oh, disgusting, that was the second one
you've given in the second week.
Oh, Max, for God's sake, leave it alone.
- Does that worry you?
- Nope, not at all.
Here I see birds and things wounded.
I don't like that, they run off,
and you never get a chance to kill them.
- Why doesn't it worry you
if things have to be killed?
- Because I've been brought up to it.
- Da, da, da, there's
not in too late there.
Quite quietly, it's very
nonchalant little theme,
you know, butter wouldn't melt its mouth,
so take it very quietly,
let it just present itself.
Half beat.
There we go.
Da, da, da, da.
- We have about 10
pianos and practise rooms,
and there are orchestras,
choral societies,
and two choirs, well, it's
a marvellous music system.
I think there's too much
competition nowadays.
There's so many good pianists,
and only very few make a great one,
and I think it must be very disparaging
if you can only get half the way.
- Are you ambitious?
- Yes.
- What for?
- Well, fame.
And power.
- What sort of power?
- Political power.
- Are you ruthless?
- Not really.
- Do you think
to have political power,
you got to be ruthless?
- Yes.
- Well,
what qualities do you need
to have political power then
if it's not ruthlessness?
- Great strength of mind.
- They'd like to come out for a holiday
in the country when I'd like
to have a holiday in the town.
- I've been to Leeds a couple of times,
and I haven't been to Manchester.
I went to London like
with the other programme
when you did the first programme,
but that's the only time I've been.
- Nicholas won a scholarship
to a Yorkshire boarding school.
- In this village, there's me,
and then the next oldest
is Andrew there, that's it.
I'm not unhappy, living on the farm,
and going to this school
and boarding there.
It's all right, I think it would be better
than living on the farm all the time.
I don't like to live at the
school all the time either.
- Do you
want to take up farming?
- No, I'm not interested in it.
I mean, I'm not, and I
said I was interested
in physics and chemistry, well
I'm not gonna do that here.
When I grow up, I'd like to find out
all about the moon and all that.
- Did your
father want to be a farmer?
- I don't think he really wanted to be,
but he got stuck with it
because my grandfather,
he certainly probably
wanted him to be a farmer,
but I don't think my father
wants me to be a farmer.
My youngest brother, the deaf one,
if he can't do anything else,
he can probably run a farm
if he can't, that's it,
but as a last resort.
- Not 'til this holidays
have I been out of Europe.
This holidays, I went to America
to stay with somebody from school.
- Have you been abroad?
- Austria.
- What was it like?
- Not bad.
- Would you like to travel?
- Nope.
- Well, I ski in Switzerland,
and I enjoy that immensely,
and we went to France this time,
and I've lived in Rhodesia.
- I enjoyed Switzerland the most I think.
I think its a very beautiful country.
We went to very interesting places.
I also enjoyed Austria, but
not to such a great extent.
- Well, I've never been abroad, but--
- No, neither have I.
- I have.
- Oh, yeah, because you
went on that cruise thingy.
- Yeah, went to Spain and
Gibraltar and Casablanca.
- Yeah, that's it.
- Yeah, that was interesting that.
- Travel doesn't really interest me much,
happy where I am.
- I've been to so many places.
Sicily, Italy, France and
Spain and Switzerland,
many times.
- Have you travelled much?
- When I was at the school,
we used to have outings,
used to go to Box Hill, places as such,
and we used to go to mystery tours,
and drive around the country,
and we went to history
museums for outings,
and geographical museums,
and science museum.
I've been to Madame Tussaud's
with my mum,
and the planetarium.
- Do you want to go abroad?
- Yeah, I'd like to go to Mallorca,
take a couple of weeks
out there from everything.
Relax meself.
- No, but I said that when
boys go round with girls
they don't pay attention
to what they're doing,
and since my grandmother has an accident
because a boyfriend was kissing
his girlfriend in the street.
- The girls never do
what the boys want them.
They always start playing with dolls
when the boys want to play
rough and tumble with them.
- It's quite true.
- Beginning to become a
bit more important, yeah.
- In what way?
- Well, they're no longer just bores
who won't play this or something.
- They're over half of the
community and they're there.
- You can begin to talk to them.
- I think they're
still bores for the most part.
- When I get married,
I'd like to have two children.
- Would
you like to have a nanny
to look after them or do
you want to look after them?
- No, I want a nanny to look after them.
- Have you
got any boyfriend, Susan?
- Well, my girlfriend is in Africa,
and I don't think I'll have another
chance of seeing her again.
And there were two in Switzerland,
which I liked at the hotel.
- Have you got a girlfriend?
- No, no not yet.
I'm sure it will come, but not yet.
- Say you had a wife.
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,
so she gives me greens.
And that's it.
No, I'd prefer to be alone, really.
I wouldn't mind living
with my brother, you know,
but otherwise, I'd prefer to live alone.
- Sometimes on Saturday, well I mean,
I go to the pictures,
sometimes with my friends,
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?
- Nope.
- Would you
like to have a girlfriend?
- Nope.
- I thought that one would come up
because when I was on the other one,
and 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 me?
- Yeah.
- Well, what do you want me to say?
I don't know what to say.
- Once Caroline Tetford said she loved me.
- What happened then?
- And I'm gonna marry her when I grow up.
- Oh, I hate her, she's
always getting bad-tempered
and cross with me.
- Is she?
- Yes, she says, "Neil Hughes,
move your desk forward."
Perhaps we're not mature enough yet
to be interested.
- See, he loves Susan
because Susan loves him.
He loves him, so Lindsay loves him.
- I don't love--
- Have
you got any boyfriends?
- That's personal isn't it?
- I don't like the way
you come out with that.
- We shan't tell you, we shan't.
- What do you think
about making this programme?
- I just think it's just ridiculous.
I don't see any fun in doing it.
- Why not?
- What's the point of people going
into people's lives and
saying why do you like this
and why don't you?
I just don't see any point in it.
- What's the point of the programme?
- Is the point of the programme
is to reach a comparison?
I don't think it is.
Because we're not
necessarily typical examples.
- And I think that's what people seeing
the programme might think.
- Yes.
- Falsely.
- I mean, they'll tend to typecast us.
- So everything we say, they'll think,
"Oh, that's a typical result
of a public school system."
- Well, in
what way aren't you typical?
- Well, I'm a bit more
reactionary than most.
- I don't know, none of the parties
really seem agree with me,
but I think if I had voted,
I'd have voted Labour.
- I'd have voted Conservative.
- I don't think I would
have voted for any of them.
- Conservatives.
- The Conservatives will do
the best for the country.
- I think they're all as
bad as each other really.
- Labour.
- I don't really know.
- I know what I wouldn't vote.
- What way?
- Labour.
- Conservative.
- Why?
- Why?
I honestly don't know, I don't know
because I don't really
know much about politics.
It doesn't interest me,
so I never really bother.
- I didn't agree with the Conservatives
about what they were doing
with the black people.
You know, racial politics.
- What do you
think about coloured people?
You said to me once that you like them,
but what do you really think about them?
- Well, they're nice, they're
just the same as us really,
but one thing that it's only
because their skin's brown
and we're white, sort of pinkish we are.
- Do you think of a purple
person with red eyes,
yellow feet?
I can't really think of
what they really look like.
- They're just the same
as me, aren't they?
- I don't know anybody who's coloured.
And I don't want to know
anybody who's coloured,
thank you very much.
I haven't got anything
against coloured people,
but it wouldn't worry
me if I never met one
until the day I died.
- Everybody's gotta get used
to knowing coloured people,
and coloured people in turn have got
to get used to being with white people
because if either side
doesn't work properly
then no side will work properly.
People just got to mix
in with everybody else.
- I don't think it's
wrong that in a country
like England that there should be places
where there are more coloured people
than the white people.
- Good old Enoch.
- Well, personally, I've got
nothing against coloured people.
I think they're the
same as everybody else,
but it seems that
there's lots of arguments
about them because as
any foreigners really
they're taking people's jobs in England.
- I don't care what colour somebody is,
unless they're blue,
and I think that would be pretty peculiar,
but we might find somebody yet.
No, I don't care about colour.
- Well, I think both
black and whites are equal
as long as they're as
well-educated as each other.
- What do you feel
about racial discrimination?
- It's rather vile.
- Why?
- Because so is any
kind of discrimination.
Of a basic nature that you can't change.
I mean if you're, I couldn't care less
whether people are discriminated against
because they're nasty
or selfish or anything,
but I mean, one can't
help one's colour, so.
- Now you're
interested in politics.
You'd like to be a politician.
What kind of things would you change?
- I wouldn't allow any strikes.
- How would you do that?
- I'd set up a tribunal
where people, workers,
could apply for better wages,
and this tribunal would
have the final word,
and if said no wage rise, no wage rise.
- It's a big problem, there's
lots of discussion I've heard.
The workers do tend to
take a few liberties
as regards to strikes.
- Who do you
think is to blame for strikes,
the workers or the management?
- Well, that's management
probably because--
- Say the workers
because we'll probably
get loads of letters
saying we'll be having
none of that.
- It seems to be iniquitous
that people should be paid when
they're not doing any work,
which is what the unions do to you.
- I'm not commenting because
Mum's been out the strike.
- Yeah, so has mine.
- It's very irresponsible
because we all want more money,
as much money as we can get,
and what would happen if
we all stopped working
just because we wanted more money.
- If they want the money,
why shouldn't they strike for it?
If you wanted a raise,
you would strike.
- Yeah, that's why they--
- But they're gonna strike for it, right,
and they're gonna get more money.
Now the school meals are going up,
so that means they're gonna strike again.
They want more money,
and it's just gonna keep
going and going and going.
- Surely by crushing strikes,
then in a way that's defeating
a small part of democracy.
- No, it's not because
they'd still have their,
they'd still be able
to ask for more money,
but they wouldn't be
able to strike for it,
which I mean--
- Yes, but they'd--
- They're so damaging.
- That's still depriving them
of their freedom to strike.
- Well, so is putting people in prison
and depriving them of
their freedom to go on
killing people and stealing from people.
- Anyway, who's going to do this
because if they do it,
they're not going to be
voted into Parliament.
So it's not worth--
- You can always decide on
your policy once you're in.
- What do
they think about each other?
And how would they act together?
To find out, we invited
them all to one big party
and joined in.
If I say that I love you
And you know it's true
If you said that you loved me
What would I do
I'd let you back if you let me
I'd choose the madness
- Yes, but they were a bit
too tough for my liking.
They hit me right in the back,
and I've still got a pain there.
- The pushing, oh yes, oh yes, oh yes.
They're nuts, just have to touch them.
- Well, I thought some of
them were rather dirty.
- What do
you think about them?
- I played with them quite naturally.
I think they were rather nice really.
- What do you
think about rich people?
- Well, not much.
- Tell me about them.
- Well, they think they can do everything
without you doing it as well,
and they think just because they're rich
and they have to have people do,
like they have to do all
their work and stuff.
- What would you do if
you had lots of money,
maybe two pounds.
- Me, I would help the poor.
- Yeah, 'cause the poor
except you don't help them,
they'll sort of die, so wouldn't they?
And every time we have a harvest festival,
we send 'em food so once these two.
No, Janet, Susan and Janet went round
giving a handout with Mr. Floyd.
- I don't think much of the accents.
- Neither do I.
- But it doesn't prevent me liking them.
Yes, and rich children always make fun
of poor children, I say.
- Yes, they say,
"Oh, look at that lovely
little sissy over there."
- Yes, and they
throw things at them.
The poor child gets scared to death.
- Do you meet here
many boys from very
different social backgrounds?
- Not really.
- Do you find
that a lack in your life?
- No.
- Why?
- I don't feel any lack anywhere.
- Do you not
feel you should be meeting
a broader sort of person
from different backgrounds?
- Not really.
- You don't
think you're missing?
- No.
I mean, there are people from so many,
I don't see what backgrounds got to do
with the people from so many,
I think it's interest that makes it worth
other people with so many
varied interests in this school
that I can't imagine having any more.
I don't really see where
background enters in.
- If everybody had the
same as everybody else,
nobody would be missing anything.
People, rich people, they
have all different things,
have everything they want
whereas poor people,
they don't have nothing,
and they know they haven't got nothing,
and so they know they're
missing something.
- What are you missing?
- I'm missing a bike and a fishing rod.
- Yeah, well, they can get
what they want, can't they?
If you've got to work
for it, if it's them,
they can just ask for money and get it,
and they can get whatever they want.
- What effect
does it have on them?
- Spoilt, like it spoils them, doesn't it?
- I think if you're going to accuse us,
of public schools of producing snobs
by mixing only a couple
of classes, upper, middle,
then comprehensive schools can be accused
of producing prods because they only mix
with lower and middle.
- But it's like saying the public schools
like Tom Brown's school days.
We do mix with people from the town.
- They can be all right.
- Yeah, but I don't like
people who are too posh.
They look down on everybody else.
- They think they're better.
- Yeah.
- I think people are much more conscious
of wanting to become snobs
because the differences that
used to separate the classes
have diminished greatly.
I mean, when one was duke, one used
to be set above everybody else,
but now, look at the Duke of.
- I think people are
becoming less class conscious
because I mean,
with for instance hippies.
You don't get the impression
that one hippie says, "I'm the big guy
"because I'm upper class and
you sort of some petty person
"because you're low class."
- Yes, and anybody can become a hippie.
- I think this is happening
throughout the country.
- They don't sort of
enforce being upper class
and things like that at St. Paul's.
You know, they suggest that
you don't have long hair,
and they do get it cut,
and they teach you to be
reasonably well-mannered,
but not to sniff on the poorer people.
- Some people are good
with money and give it
to charities and that, but some of them
just don't know what
to do with their money,
so they just spend it, waste it.
People need it.
- I think poverty for anybody.
It kind of depresses me.
- When I went to Glasgow
and I saw the Gorbals,
that rather upset me.
- Why?
- Well, to think that people
are living in that state
when we waste things everyday.
- Well, some people are
just born into rich families
and they like it.
- I don't see why they could have the luck
when people worked all their lives
and never got half as
much as what they have.
It just don't seem fair.
- No.
- I usually get about
five to six bob a week.
- And
what do you do with it?
- I save some, spend some.
- Well, I get a pound a week,
and usually during the middle of the week,
my mum takes 10 bob back,
and I save the other 10
bob as much as possible.
- Well, out of my permanent jobs,
I'm getting four dollars, 40.
- Eight shillings a week.
- What do you spend it on?
- Well, I need to spend
very little at school,
and I collect stamps, so I spend
quite a lot of that on that.
- My dad gives me about two pound a week,
and my mum gives me about 30 bob,
and my brothers give me some,
and Mr. Gosling gives me four
pound pocket money every week.
- I don't
particularly want to be rich,
but I'd like to have enough money.
- What
do you mean by enough?
- Enough to have a nice house,
and be able to send the children
to a private school if we want to.
- I mean almost everybody likes money
not for the fact that it,
well, I don't like looking at money.
It doesn't give me any pleasure like that,
but I certainly don't want to be poor,
live in a slum,
but I don't, I mean, a person
with one million pounds
is not gonna be more unhappy
than a person with two million pounds.
- Money's not everything.
- I mean, it does mean a lot to us now
with cars and new fashions
and everything, doesn't it?
Midis and that, you need money because--
- What's midis?
They're clothes, yeah, you need clothes,
but money can't buy happiness.
- Oh, no, you could
work for that yourself.
- Do you want to be rich?
- I don't mind I'd
like to stay where I am.
I don't want to be too rich
I don't want to be poor, poverty.
- What about you, Jackie?
- Just live comfortable.
- Just to have what
you want, really, no extras.
- Just as long as you've got all you need.
- Do you want to be rich?
- I wouldn't mind.
- Do you want to be rich?
- Yes, because I don't
want to be tied down
to the dullness of an everyday job,
I want to be able to have enough money
so I can indulge in the
things that might interest me,
like collecting paintings.
- No, because if you're rich,
you get bored of being rich,
same if you're poor, you
get bored of being poor.
You can't have too much of a good thing.
- I think if you're healthy
and have good friends,
you can get on perfectly well.
Everybody would like to be rich.
- Mainly, to be self-sufficient,
to feel that you don't have
to owe anything to anybody.
- I'd help people if I had the chance.
You know by say giving a
little bit of money to charity
or sponsoring things or things like that.
- I think it's wrong that
one should drive oneself
to make a lot of money because in the end,
you might have caused so many people,
might have ruined so many people
that you would be unhappy.
What's the use of a lot of
money if you're unhappy?
- You have to have it to live,
and there are problems
that you have to face,
and everything's concrete,
and it doesn't seem to be possible
for anything to be invisible
or sort of you can't see it.
I mean, people, all the
scientist have said,
we've looked up into space,
and we haven't seen God,
so there isn't a God,
and it just seems fatuous.
- Do you believe in God?
- I'm not sure whether I
really believe in God or not.
I think to myself is there a God?
I don't know, so I don't know.
- Yes, I'd say I believed in God.
- Are you religious?
- Well, I go to church
with my parents on Sundays.
- You've got to believe in something,
so God seems to be the
most logical I think.
- I wouldn't say I'm deeply religious,
but I do believe in God.
- Why?
- I mean, that's a difficult
question to answer why.
I mean, I just do.
It's an either yes or no question.
- Well, you're brought up to
believe in him, and you do.
- And you must have your
own opinion on that as well.
- But how do you know?
I don't really know if I do or not.
I don't really think about him much.
- No, you don't have that
much time to think about him.
Not when there's so much activity
taking place in school and after school.
- That's the sort of thing I'd
like to sit and think about
or talk to someone about.
- When I sit down and think,
I think I believe in God,
but if somebody just asked me, I'd say no.
I suppose it's just to be big.
- Why do you believe in God?
- Well I believe in
God because if somebody
had to make the world, this world,
then call him what
everybody else calls me,
which is God.
- You can't really tell if
there's a God or not, can you?
You haven't seen him, then you can't say.
- When you were seven,
you wanted to be a missionary.
Have you any thoughts on that?
- No I don't want to be a missionary
because I just can't
talk about it to people.
You know, I'm interested in it myself,
but I wouldn't be very good at it at all,
and I wouldn't enjoy it.
- Why
wouldn't you be good at it?
- Well, I'm just not very good at anyway,
standing up in front of
people and making a speech
or anything like that,
but I'd like to keep it private, you know.
Well, going to Africa
and try and teach people
who are not civilised
to be more or less good.
- And after that, Trinity Hall, Cambridge.
- I'm going to work in Woolworth's.
- I might go to Oxford.
- Oh, I'd just walk around
and see what I can find.
- I'm gonna be, think
I'm going to Cambridge
and Trinity Hall.
- Well, I don't I need to go to university
because I'm not gonna be a teacher.
- I don't think I want to go to university
if you want to be an astronaut.
- What does university mean?
- Where?
- When I grow up, I'd like to find out all
about the moon and all that.
- If I can't be an astronaut,
I think I'll be a coach driver.
This is probably linked up with the fact
now that I think I want to travel.
My thoughts haven't really changed,
so I would definitely would
like to be a coach driver now.
- You wanted to be
an astronaut when you were seven?
- Yeah.
- What feelings have you got
on that subject?
- Well, I've changed my
mind completely of course.
I mean, it was just the imagination
a seven-year-old has.
- I would buy meself a home,
a new nice house, you know,
but it's all nice and comfy.
I'd like to be able to
have a happy family.
I mean, I know that's
not possible to be happy
all the time, but as much of
the time that was possible.
- Just be content with what I'm doing,
and be happy with it,
and to know where I'm going,
and to remember finally what I've done.
- I'm thinking of following a legal career
with a view to ending in parliament.
- I'd like to do maybe shorthand typing
or something like that.
- Nothing too much, I just want to be
like anybody else, really,
just nothing too marvellous.
- What will you do
if you don't make it as a jockey?
- I don't know, if I
knew I couldn't be one,
I'd get out, I wouldn't bother.
- And what do
you think you would do then?
- Learn taxis, taxi driver.
- There is a danger
that you would get
married at early twenties
and have children quickly
and then be stuck at home.
Have you any thoughts on that?
- I don't really think of it much.
- No.
- I don't think I'd get married too early.
I'd like to have a full life first,
and meet people.
- Perhaps enjoy myself
before I--
- Yeah, fully commit to somebody.
- How do you
think England will change
over the next few years?
- England?
Not very much, England
is too English, sort of.
- Are you a traditionalist?
- Yes.
- In what way?
- I like tradition.
- Do you expect
to live your life in England?
- I think it's just
about the best place you
can live your life, in England.
- Why?
- I think the parliamentary
system is agreeable,
to me at least,
and that's about it, why
one's free in England,
and one has good
opportunities for everything.
We've all got much more
equal opportunities.
In those days, the people at the bottom
really had to work like blacks,
so that they could achieve something.
- But nowadays, to get kicks out of life,
you have to use synthetic means
whereas originally, earlier on,
about 40 years ago,
these things came in life
whereas with all the modern world today,
lots of these things have
been sort of stopped,
and a lot of the enjoyment of
life has been taken out of it.
- Yes, the natural enjoyment.
- Hasn't been taken out of it,
it's just people, it's still
there if you look for it.
I mean--
- But how many people can look for it?
- Everybody can look.
Everybody can pursue happiness.
- 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.
Suzy.
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.