Dame Mary Peters, 78, is a former athlete who found fame at the 1972 Munich Olympics by winning a gold medal in the pentathlon. At three Commonwealth Games (1966-1974) she went on to win three gold medals and one silver in pentathlon and shot put.
After retiring from sport in 1974 she set up the Mary Peters Trust to help young people in Northern Ireland develop in sport.
Today she lives in Dunmurry, Northern Ireland.
How did your childhood influence your attitude towards money?
I was a war baby in Liverpool. We used to get a penny for the bus fare for school and I spent it on an Oxo cube to suck or a packet of wafers and ran the mile home.
We had second-hand clothes and toys; my parents were canny with money. My dad worked for his builder father who didn’t pay him much, so he bred rabbits.
He was also a leading violinist in the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, caddied for golfers and became...