John Lydon, frontman of 1970s punk band Sex Pistols, still tours with his post-punk group Public Image Ltd. 

The singer and songwriter, 69, took part in I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out Of Here in 2004, but walked out halfway through. 

He now lives in Malibu, California, and tells Dan Moore about his humble beginnings in Holloway, north London, where he owns a second home that he used to share with Nora, his wife of more than 40 years, who died in 2023 after a long struggle with dementia.

What did your parents teach you about money?

We had nothing, so they taught me nothing. My dad, John Christopher, worked on building sites, driving cranes, but never had any money. My mum, Eileen, was never in good health and suffered a lot of miscarriages. Despite us having so little, I learned that if you want to have money, like those rich people on telly, you have to work for it. 

Was money tight when you were growing up?

Yes. Our home consisted of two rooms, and we shared the outside toilet with the pub next door. I recall one time when my mum, my dad and my younger brother Jimmy and I all shared one tin of mulligatawny soup that an auntie had given us. 

The curry flavour in it was, to my young tastebuds, awful. It was inedible, so I preferred starvation. That said, I developed a liking for Brussels sprouts at a very early age because they were cheap.

You get used to poverty because it's always there. All that changed when we got our first television and saw adverts for wallpaper and floorboard coverings. That's when you know you're missing out.

Have you ever struggled to make ends meet?

There have always been problems for me having barely enough cash to get things up and running. There was a decade or so when the record companies kept me in debt.

That was hard because, at that time, which covered the 1980s, Nora's daughter's children lived with us, so we were scraping and scrimping. The situation with the record companies was one of recoupment. I wasn't allowed to earn anything unless I immediately paid it off against a debt. 

What was the best year of your financial life?

Well, it wasn't the Sex Pistols years [1975 to 1978]. Our manager, Malcolm McLaren, hated me because I think he wanted to be me. Alas, he didn't have the bottle or the talent. It caused problems, which led to me leaving the Pistols.

When I did, I had just enough money to buy a flat in Chelsea, and I used that as my asset to move forward. In 1978, I raised money for Public Image Ltd (PiL) and the band, who were without a permanent abode, all lived with me.

The best time, financially, began with I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out Of Here. I made a lot of money from that, which I gave to charities. The pay-off came afterwards when I was asked to do a Country Life butter campaign – it is what I'd call fair earnings.

Why wasn't your appearance on I'm A Celebrity fair earnings?

It wasn't hard graft. My concept of fairly earned money relates in some way to what my mum and dad called 'blood money'. This stems from a very bad accident we had, where someone died in the other car. 

It was their fault, and my mum and dad were offered a huge financial settlement, which they outright refused because they didn't earn the payout and didn't think it right to profit from another person's death. 

What has been your biggest money mistake?

The Sex Pistols! I went into it convinced I'd not earn two bob – and I was right.

What is the most expensive thing you bought for fun?

I suppose our house here in Malibu, which cost around $1million [£770,000] when we bought it in the early 1990s. It's like a railway shed, very long and all on one level. The front room alone is 60ft long.

It was an essential purchase because I knew Nora was getting ill for a long time before the last seven years of pure hell and torture for both of us. Her illness meant staircases were out of the question.

What is the one little luxury you treat yourself to?

I have a collection of London double-decker toy buses. They're just biscuit tins, but I really like them. I hate the shortbread inside, and I wish it was toffees or sweeties. 

In London, I had a collection of the Coronation Tins, but they got destroyed when Nora accidentally set fire to the kitchen after cancelling the insurance.

Lots of my records melted in the blaze, but I still have loads over there. Hopefully, I'll raise enough money on my upcoming tour to get them sent over.

If you were Chancellor, what's the first thing you would do?

I have no trust in politicians. I had hopes for [Barack] Obama, but he made a mess of things. If I had my way, I'd get rid of the lot of them and start again with a better, fairer system that carts them off to the law courts if they can't keep their promises. Only then will our votes count.

What is your number one financial priority?

Public Image Ltd. It's my pension, my investment, and I love it. We have 56 gigs lined up for 2025 and plan to take the tour around the world. It's a serious load of work.

We're not imitating our former selves, nor have we fallen into a cosy genre. We are wide open and want to absorb everything and reiterate that through a series of emotions, which some call song. No two emotions are the same, and neither should any two songs be the same.

• PiL's This Is Not The Last Tour begins in May at the Bristol O2 Academy. Tickets are available from johnlydon.com.