He was married to Margaret Elise Ambler, and they have two children, Rupert Charles Starforth (who also became a lawyer in England) and Claudia Fleur Starforth Webster. Graham has since retired and is enjoying his retirement in Porto Cervo, Sardegna (SS), Italy.

He speaks English and Italian and lists as his interests music, books, travel and Italy.

Honours
Cavaliere dell’Ordine della Solidarieta (Italy)
Commendatore dell’ Ordine al Merito (Italy)

SLG: What prompted you to read and practise law?

I was one of three brothers, in fact the middle one in terms of age. My father was very keen that one of us should become a priest. My elder brother said he would do so if he could start as a Dean (I think he rather fancied his legs in gaiters!) so that put him out of the running. He subsequently went to the Bar and ended up as a Circuit Judge. My father then tried to persuade me, but I have been a total non-believer since the age of 15 and declined. The next best thing, in father’s eyes, was the law which he himself had studied for and so, faut de mieux, I decided when I went up to Oxford to read jurisprudence in which I took my degree and thereafter joined Gray’s Inn and became a barrister in 1951. I later transferred to being an English Solicitor in 1961. I was admitted to the Singapore Bar in 1956 and later was also admitted to the Hong Kong Bar and as solicitor Hong Kong, Malaya, Sabah, Sarawak (now Malaysia) and Brunei.

I have therefore never thought of doing anything else, and have never regretted my choice.

SLG: Who was your favourite judge in Singapore during your years in practice?

I think it would be invidious to pick one individual and do not propose to do so. But I will make a few general comments. The old Colonial system involved judges being appointed from the Government legal service. This meant that none of them ever had any civil law experience to speak of, their experience in the Courts for Government being almost entirely criminal. The result was that in those days, which covered my early days in Singapore, conducting a civil case in the High Court meant that Counsel had to give the judge the most elementary lessons in the relevant law and Counsel inevitably knew far more about that than the judge hearing the case. Very few indeed of the old Colonial judges were other than run of the mill. I make exceptions for the excellent succession of Chief Justices who covered my time in Singapore — there was only one who I thought was a disaster and that was largely due to his own rather arrogant personality. I will not mention his name but he was an expatriate. When Sir Alan Rose, the last expatriate Chief Justice, retired the decision was made to appoint someone from the Bar, a decision which at the time I entirely supported. Chief Justice Wee Chong Jin was the choice and an excellent choice he turned out to be. In my view, perhaps partly because I was brought up in England on the system, I think it makes for a better judge if he has had experience of practice in the various fields of law he has to deal with and generally speaking will have greater experience than counsel appearing before him. Your present Chief Justice Yong Pung How I have known for many years. He was one of the finest lawyers when he practised and subsequently achieved distinction in various fields of commerce. He also has the necessary organisational skills which have enabled him to reorganise the entire judicial system into the first class organisation which exists today. Lastly, and by no means least important, he is a man of complete integrity. You are very fortunate to have him.

SLG: Please name three lawyers whom you considered as exemplary lawyers and their attributes?

Again, this is a somewhat invidious question. You must remember that it is now nearly 30 years since I ceased practice and the vast majority of today’s practitioners will not be known to me at all. I will therefore confine myself to those who are either no longer with us or at least have ceased to practise. I would nominate Cristo Cobbett as an exemplary lawyer, a solicitor, rather than a barrister, of the old school. Unfailingly polite, a man of complete integrity, not particularly interested in money other than as a means of keeping body and soul together and an excellent Chairman of what was then the Bar Council. I would nominate also Yong Pung How, your present Chief Justice for the reasons I have quoted above, and AP Rajah, formerly of Tan Rajah and Cheah. Another man of total integrity and many skills. He served for quite a time as the Singapore High Commissioner in London and also as the Speaker of Parliament. He was a life long friend. There are of course others but you have only asked for three!

SLG: Are there facts or circumstances which shaped your life, eg war, life-threatening situations, which made you who/what you are?

I escaped World War Two — I was just 18 when it ended — and I do not think I have ever been in a life-threatening situation other than being in Bristol during endless German air raids of varying severity. I suppose that was life-threatening, but at my then age it was all rather exciting. I do not think either of those things had much effect on my future. What did shape my life was my education. My father was not a rich man. He was an English civil servant with a modest salary. He had three sons to educate and he saw to it somehow that we had the best that was then on offer. All three of us, myself and my two brothers, managed to collect scholarships to schools and Universities, in my case to Winchester College and St John’s College, Oxford, and I think it was my five years at Winchester which did more to shape my life and turn me into the person I am — at least the better parts. Those years also gave me a lifelong love of music which has been my chief relaxation and which has frequently come to my rescue when spirits were low.

SLG: What made you serve the Law Society?

I have always taken the view that if you are getting something out of life there is a corresponding duty to put something back into it. This applies to the law as much as it does to everything else. The Law Society has a lot to contribute, but the quality of its contributions inevitably depends on the quality of its members who are prepared to serve on the Council. Those who do it solely for the sake of kudos or because they think it will add to their practice — and there have been such in the past — are not the people one wants.

SLG: What significant changes or policies were made when you were serving the Law Society?

This is a difficult question to answer because of the lapse of time — it is almost exactly 30 years since I finished as President — and I do not have any records. If the faithful Mr Albuquerque who was the full time secretary — and indeed the only member of the full time staff — of the Law Society were at my side I could probably provide you with some sort of answer. The main changes I can recall at this distance in time is the method of qualification as an advocate and solicitor following the creation of the Law Faculty (of which I had the honour to be a member for a number of years) at the University of Singapore, the whole attitude towards the establishment of foreign lawyers, the abolition of the Jury system, relations between the Malaysian and the Singapore professions and relations with the Singapore Government. There must be many more which my memory has hidden in its inner recesses — one of the main problems of advancing age is the loss of one’s memory. The days when I could give you not only the name of a legal authority but the volume and page in the Law Reports where you could find them has sadly gone.

SLG: What words of advice would you give to a lawyer joining the profession now, or about to retire from practice?

I will deal with the first category first. I know too little about the profession as it exists in Singapore today to advise on the merits of joining the profession. Were this question put to me by someone who was contemplating a career in one of the big London firms of solicitors today I would give the same advice as Mr Punch once gave to those contemplating matrimony — don’t. I believe that the profession in London has become a vast money-making machine governed largely by greed, and the tight specialisation needed to succeed in the City of London leads to the most appalling working conditions. I hope that this does not apply to Singapore, in which case my advice to a young lawyer would be, quite simply, preserve your integrity at all costs, go for job satisfaction rather than large earnings, never allow yourself to be pressurised by any outside source into giving advice contrary to your own conscience and enjoy yourself — my own career in the law was the most enormous fun. To those about to retire I can only say that retirement is not an estate to be dreaded. My time in retirement, so far at any rate, has been the happiest and most relaxed I have ever had. I wish I had embarked on it rather earlier. They say that lawyers die of boredom as soon as they retire. I think that is rubbish and have remained very much alive for quite a number of years already and have every intention of enjoying quite a few more if I am permitted to do so.