When I was a 26-year-old news correspondent, the head of BBC news gathering, Chris Cramer, refused to let me take up a six-month attachment on the foreign affairs programme Correspondent. He said: “I think it’s too soon; you could do it later.” He’d never have said that to a man.

Losing the 1992 general election.

Spending over half my life under Tory rule.

My first business, People's Place, went bankrupt in the mid-70s.

I have a tip that can take 5 strokes off anyone's golf game. It's called an eraser.

My father was my major teacher, disciplinarian. But my mother lent a lot to me and to my life, in that, when things weren’t going right, or when my father was too tough, I had the soft feel of my mother to help me, and she did. And she a lot of the times gave me confidence that I needed to overcome some of the things that happened that weren’t so pleasant.

I have a tip that can take 5 strokes off anyone's golf game. It's called an eraser.

That’s difficult for someone to talk about themselves. If I’ve helped improve the game of golf and if I’ve helped improve people’s outlook on life and the game of golf, that would be something that I would be very happy for. I would really like to think that maybe I have left something that other people will look at and say, when people come in back of them, that they have given them the same opportunity that we had. And that means give our kids the opportunities that we’ve had through these years. And if I can do that and leave something along those lines to people, I’ll be very happy for that.

I have a tip that can take 5 strokes off anyone's golf game. It's called an eraser.

I’ve always believed the British Open is one of the greatest championships in the world. As a kid I read about Bob Jones and Walter Hagen and other Americans who had won the British Open...