Michael Winner

I’m going to be a big TV star. Big, big, big. Well, maybe not. As the saying goes in the movie world, every film is a great success until it’s released. My peak-time ITV1 show Michael Winner’s Dining Stars, one hour of me (could anything be better?), is currently much loved by those aware of it. If it flops, they won’t answer my phone calls. That’s show business. The gag is that I enter homes of real people and judge their cooking. On the way my life is contrasted with theirs. Then I come to their town or village and accost people in the street — some marvellous conversations occur — eventually arriving at the victim’s door. You’ve heard of the play The Iceman Cometh. This is The Axeman Cometh.

It’s not easy working out what to give Lord Lloyd-Webber for his 60th birthday. I mean he’s got a few bob, hasn’t he? Three ties and a shoehorn seem a bit inadequate. Particularly as his lordship flew 46 friends to Deià, a spectacularly beautiful village in Mallorca, for a weekend celebration. I decided on something really useful. A gold bus pass. So I telephoned Ruth Kelly, Secretary of State for Transport, and spoke to her principal private secretary, Anne Snelgrove. The dialogue went like this. MW: Tell me darling, do you think we could ask Ruth if I could have a gold bus pass for Andrew Lloyd Webber? Anne: Why would you want to give Andrew Lloyd Webber a gold bus pass? MW: Well, it’s his birthday, it would be a bit different.

Can anyone lend me quid or two? For the first time in my life I’m borrowing money. Mortgaging property. Scrabbling around for cash so I can live my lavish life-style. In case any of the firms I have accounts with are getting worried, please don’t. I have many, many, many millions of pounds in what is laughingly known as a rollover fund. Mine’s in Guernsey. This turns cash into shares but your money is only put on the money market so there’s no risk. Instead of interest you get extra shares. When you eventually sell you pay around 25 per cent tax because it’s reckoned you’re cashing part of the increase and part of what you originally put there.

I was very naughty when young. I stole from my schoolmates’ pockets as they played games. I stole from Woolworth’s. And probably more places. As responsibility entered my maturing soul, I tried to make amends. I advertised for those at school whom I might have made poorer and paid back many times the amount to the only one who turned up. I sent a cheque for £500 to the chairman of Woolworth’s for about £1.50 of nicking. He asked if he could put this in his staff newspaper as he got many similar donations. And in the 1960s when top tax was 98 pence in the pound, I stashed some money abroad. It all came back to the UK over 20 years ago, but I’d diddled the Revenue out of tax on the interest. I salved my conscience by leaving them millions in my will.