Laying turf on clay

Good morning,

I have had my previous lawn dug out and discovered the earth is rather clay ridden. I have decided to lay pea shingle and Rolawn top soil before turfing it, but my question is, do I need to rotavate the current Earth? If not I won't bother hiring one!

Thanks in advance!

 

Thanks for getting back to me.

It wasn't really a lawn previously, just a mound of Earth, so we got it dug out to level it off. This is what the Earth looks like now:

So, it’s just not draining. Therefore, I have been advised to lay pea shingle and Compost before laying the turf. Would you suggest something else??

 

Yes, we have had a digger in there (as we had a few tree's that needed to come down and to take the old turf up).

So, would you advise, breaking it up with a rotavator, laying the pea shingle, getting back on the rotavator and mixing the earth and pea shingle. Then going over the top with compost and then turf?

Thanks for your help with this......I'm a bit of a novice.