Her Majesty

by Robert Hardman

  Most organisations or businesses run by the same person for nearly sixty years become static, if not ossified. So why has this one been gathering momentum in the other direction ever since the Queen reached what most people would regard as retirement age? It’s not only the result of what some call the ‘Diana effect’, although officials readily concede that one important legacy of the Princess was a greater informality and a recognition of the need for ‘emotional change’. It’s also down to a more general loosening of the royal collar.

  ‘She doesn’t want to do the same old thing any more,’ says a former Private Secretary. ‘She likes shorter greeting lines and fewer of them, more young people.’

  She is smiling more these days, indulging her own interests a little more. If an awayday to the regions errs more towards horses and children than trade promotion, so be it. There is less of a beady eye on the clock – a far cry from the super-punctual Princess Elizabeth who took to prodding her mother’s Achilles tendon with an umbrella during the 1947 South African tour to keep the royal show on schedule. ‘She’s quite often late for things now, not that anyone’s complaining,’ says one veteran royal correspondent. Of course they’re not. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the aura has changed. The Queen has now acquired the status of national treasure. There is nothing contrived about this metamorphosis whatsoever. It simply began in early 2002 following the death of Princess Margaret, followed swiftly by that of the Queen Mother.

  ‘Finally,’ says a family friend, ‘she is seen as a grandmother.’ Sir John Major echoes a popular Household view: ‘At about the time the Queen Mother died, the Queen effectively became the “Mother of the Nation”.’ While the Queen Mother was alive, the Queen had been caught between the royal generations, the sensible, serious one trying to keep the younger members of the family under control while keeping a protective eye on the free-spirited mother. A delightful and good-natured sense of filial exasperation emerges from the latter stages of William Shawcross’s official biography of the Queen Mother. When the Queen installed a stairlift to assist her mother with the steps at home, she received no thanks. Instead, the Queen Mother would make a point of travelling downstairs on the contraption and walking back up. Attempts to cajole her into a golf buggy for walkabouts only worked after someone had the bright idea of painting the thing in her racing colours. Nor was there any respite from her spending. A particularly eye-watering bill from a racing trainer arrived on the Monarch’s desk with a little handwritten postscript: ‘Oh dear’.

  In the eyes of the public and the media, the Queen Mother was the living embodiment of the ‘Blitz spirit’ and she could do no wrong. Yet the same sentiments did not extend to the Queen. She was respected and admired almost universally, of course, but there was not that same sense of indulgence. The Monarch was not a twinkly-eyed old granny. She was a world leader.

  In the last few years, though, there has been an unconscious reassessment. We don’t necessarily think of the Queen as being very much older, just increasingly exceptional. ‘She doesn’t present herself as an old lady,’ observes former Lord Chancellor Jack Straw. Now that the First World War generation has disappeared and the veterans of the Second World War dwindle to a noble handful, it becomes ever more extraordinary to think that the Monarch who sits and mulls over the state of the nation with David Cameron on Wednesday evenings used to do the same with Winston Churchill. When President Sarkozy of France and Britain’s Gordon Brown neglected to invite the Queen to mark the sixty-fifth anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy, there was a public outcry. But it was not confined to Britain and it was not a row about ‘snubs’ or diplomatic niceties. It just seemed extraordinary to omit an invitation to the one surviving head of state who actually wore uniform during the Second World War.

  The Queen’s visit to Virginia in 2007 to mark the 400th anniversary of the English arriving in Jamestown generated true euphoria. To have a monarch was exciting, naturally. But that wasn’t the point. The big deal was the fact that the Queen and Prince Philip had been guests of honour at the 350th.

  Similarly, the packed United Nations Assembly which rose to its feet to salute the Queen in 2010 was not applauding her words. The main attraction was the fact that this particular speaker had already stood on the same stage to address the same organisation long before half of today’s delegates were born. Her reign not only spans twelve British prime ministers but also twelve American presidents and six popes.

  Just like her late mother before her, though, the Queen does not welcome attempts, however well meaning, to curtail her engagements.

  So, does anyone ever try to say: ‘Your Majesty, would it not be a good idea to take it easy?’ ‘We all do,’ Prince William replies with a smile. ‘We all try and sit down with her. My father and her children say it a lot to her. For the grandchildren, it’s a bit difficult for us to say, “Take it easy” when she’s so much older than us and has done so much more. We do hint at taking some things off her but she won’t have anything of it!’

  What about the word ‘retirement’? ‘I’ve never heard it,’ says the Duke of York. ‘It’s not that it is “not open for discussion”. It’s just that it’s not necessary. There’s just a great deal of concern to make sure the Queen’s programme is managed in a suitable fashion.’

  Today, people are often surprised by their own emotional response to the mere sight of the Queen. A typical example occurred as she arrived at the 2010 Wimbledon Tennis Championships after an absence of thirty-three years. ‘Oh God,’ announced a woman in the crowd, astonished by her own vulnerability, ‘I think I’m going to cry.’

  ‘I always believed that, much as she would miss her mother, the Queen would actually find life in public easier,’ says a former senior adviser. ‘In the past, you had the throne being squeezed by the dazzling young generation and the dazzling old generation. Now, the Queen has inherited the mother-of-the-nation role and William is looking like a paragon while it is Prince Charles in the middle. It’s a very tough role. And I think the Queen found it quite tough sometimes.

  ‘Of course she misses her mother every day because they talked every day, they wrote letters to each other all the time. They were a tremendous double act but it wasn’t a comfortable role for the Queen, always to be told how marvellous her mother was.’

  He sums up the Queen’s approach to the job today as follows: ‘There’s a serenity about her. But I think if you are of an age, you have a pretty old-fashioned faith, you do your best every day and say your prayers every night – well, if you’re criticised for it, you’re not going to get much better whatever you do. What’s the point of worrying?’ Ruminating on the way the Queen has reigned for more than half a century, Prince William believes that his grandmother has few grounds for regret. ‘For her, it must be a relief to know that she has furrowed her own path and that she’s done that successfully and that the decisions she’s made have turned out to be correct. You make it up a lot as you go along. So to be proven right when it’s your decision-making gives you a lot of confidence. You realise that the role you’re doing – you’re doing it well; that you’re making a difference. That’s what’s key. It’s about making a difference for the country.’

  The Queen, on the other hand, sees nothing remotely remarkable in the way she approaches her role. Having spent some time accompanying her around Nigeria during a Commonwealth tour in 2003, Jack Straw, then Foreign Secretary, could not help reflecting that the Queen was only five years younger than his own mother. At the end of one day, he remarked: ‘Ma’am, if I may say so, that was very professional.’ ‘Foreign Secretary,’ the Queen replied, ‘I should be, given how long I’ve been doing it.’

  Recent years have been very good ones for the monarchy and the build-up to the Diamond Jubilee even more so. And herein, perhaps, lies the most important factor behind this new-found serenity. All bosses or commanders thrive when their organisations are successful. And the monarchy is not just back on track and prospering. It is breaking new
ground.

  Few members of the Queen’s family or her staff had seen her as enthusiastic about a royal tour as she was in May 2011 during the first state visit ever made to the Republic of Ireland. This was a diplomatic watershed, a genuinely historic exercise in reconciliation and friendship which achieved more in four days than years of political horsetrading. No one else could have pulled it off. This was, arguably, the Queen’s most important state visit since her tour of Russia in 1994 or the day that Britannia sailed in to newly democratic South Africa in 1995. Here was a stirring reminder of the healing power of monarchy. And the Queen was visibly thrilled. It was almost as if she was saying: ‘This is the point of me.’ The fact that her hosts also included three famous racing studs on the royal schedule made it as near-perfect a state visit as one could contrive.

  ‘She was so excited about it and really looking forward to it. It was quite sweet,’ says Prince William proudly, pointing out that whereas he himself could ‘nip in’ to Ireland relatively easily, it had been off-limits to the Queen all her life. ‘Normally, with a lot of tours, there’s a certain amount of apprehension but also “I’ve done this before”. But this was like a big door opening up to her that had been locked for so long. And now she has been able to see what’s behind the door.’

  But, he says, the Queen will have derived much greater satisfaction from the bilateral successes achieved during this visit than from satisfying any personal ambitions. There were certainly plenty of personal subtexts to this tour, not least the murder of Prince Philip’s uncle, Lord Mountbatten, by the Irish Republican Army during a family holiday in County Sligo in 1979.* Yet neither the Queen nor Prince Philip made any direct reference to it. ‘It’s “personal” v “duty”. There’s a big difference,’ says Prince William. ‘As far as she was concerned, in terms of the relationship between Britain and Ireland and the Troubles, it was time to move on from that. What’s happened has happened and no one wants to cover it up. We must make sure all the right things are done and that the right people are said sorry to or vice versa. But it was not about her losing Lord Mounbatten when she was younger. It was about the bigger picture. And the bigger picture is close relations between the state of Ireland and the UK.’

  The Prince’s ready grasp of the diplomatic imperatives not only shows a wise head on young shoulders. It is another contributing factor to the Queen being, in the words of one bishop, ‘the happiest I have ever seen her’. She can now look far into the future with confidence. She is supported by the most experienced Prince of Wales in history but can also take great pride in the calibre of the next royal generation down the line.

  Only a matter of days before the Irish visit, Prince William and Catherine Middleton embarked on life together as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. Some of those at the wedding reception had never seen such an effervescent Sovereign. One describes her as ‘positively playful’. ‘She was, literally, skipping,’ says another.

  Six weeks before that wedding, Prince William travelled around the world at the invitation of the prime ministers of Australia and New Zealand. They wanted a senior royal representative to meet victims of a series of natural disasters. The five-day trip was arranged at short notice and the Prince was back on duty soon afterwards. ‘I slept for quite a bit and then I went straight back in to work,’ says the Anglesey-based RAF search and rescue pilot. ‘Then she sent me the most wonderful letter saying “Congratulations” and “Well done, you did well down there” which meant a lot to me. It’s funny but when you get a letter from her or a bit of praise, it goes a long, long way, more so than anyone else saying “Well done” to you. It’s mainly because there’s such gravitas behind those words.’

  The regal aura can certainly humble the most distinguished visitors to the Palace. Cool-headed recipients of the most illustrious decorations can be a bag of nerves in the royal presence. But it is interesting to learn that the Queen commands the same reverence among her own heirs and successors. ‘Even within the family [it happens],’ admits Prince William. ‘I say to people “she’s my grandmother to me first and then she’s the Queen.” Words that come from her, I take very personally and I really appreciate.’

  The future monarch certainly considers himself extremely lucky to have both his father and his grandmother to consult on the job that lies ahead. No trainee sovereign has ever had so much experience on which to draw. ‘My relationship with my grandmother has gone from strength to strength,’ he says. ‘As a shy younger man it could be harder to talk about weighty matters. It was: “This is my grandmother who is the Queen and these are serious historical subjects.” As I’ve got older, she’s become an even more important part of my life so it’s much easier. And obviously, with the wedding, she was a massive help.’

  The Queen, he acknowledges, was a wonderful ally as the young couple started making wedding plans – only to discover that officials had been preparing lists without asking him. ‘For instance, I came into the first meeting for the wedding, post-engagement. And I [was given] this official list of 777 names – dignitaries, governors, all sorts of people – and not one person I knew.’ The Duke, Prince William, chuckles as he recalls his own sense of helplessness in the face of this earnest if well-meaning interference. ‘They said: “These are the people we should invite.” I looked at it in absolute horror and said: “I think we should start again.”’

  It was the Queen who came to his rescue: ‘I rang her up the next day and said, “Do we need to be doing this?” And she said: “No. Start with your friends first and then go from there.” And she told me to bin the list. She made the point that there are certain times when you have to strike the right balance. And it’s advice like that which is really key when you know that she’s seen and done it before.’ The list was duly ‘binned’. And a grateful Prince William absorbed another useful lesson in striking that delicate balance between ‘personal’ and ‘duty’.

  On other wedding matters, however, he rapidly learned that there was absolutely no room for manoeuvre. ‘I wanted to decide what to wear for the wedding,’ he recalls. As a commissioned officer in all three Services and a serving member of the Royal Air Force, the Prince certainly had a few choices. Except that he did not. ‘I was given a categorical: “No, you’ll wear this”!’

  Having just appointed the Prince to the position of Colonel of the Irish Guards, his most senior military appointment – and one of her Guards regiments to boot – the Queen was quite clear that her grandson should be getting married in his Irish Guards uniform. ‘So you don’t always get what you want, put it that way,’ he laughs. ‘But I knew perfectly well that it was for the best. That “no” is a very good “no”. So you just do as you’re told!’ Besides, as a serving officer in Her Majesty’s Armed Forces, he could hardly disobey an order from the Commander-in-Chief.

  The Prince admits that there are so many things that he would like to ask the Queen about. But he is both conscious of the demands on her time and the fact that she is a great believer in learning through experience. ‘It goes back to trying to work it out for yourself,’ he explains. ‘I know that if I ask her questions, I’ll be expecting one thing and something else will happen.’ Does the Queen give him a long briefing before a big trip like his 2011 tour of Canada? ‘I prefer to do a “post-debrief” than a “pre-debrief”,’ he replies. ‘It’s a bit easier and there are no hidden expectations.’

  But he finds it immensely reassuring to know that there is such a repository of wisdom and experience to consult: ‘There’s no question you can ask and no point you can raise that she won’t already know about – and have a better opinion. She’s very up for that sort of thing. And for me, particularly, being the young bloke coming through, being able to talk to my grandmother and ask her questions and know that there’s sound advice coming back is very reassuring.’

  History has only yielded three octogenarian monarchs. By the age of eighty, neither George III nor Victoria played a particularly active role in the life of the nation. The
Queen, on the other hand, has barely amended her schedule from that of twenty years ago. Students of the Court Circular might have spotted a gentle reduction in the number of afternoon engagements; slightly shorter state visits overseas; slightly more events at Windsor Castle (home); slightly fewer at Buckingham Palace (the office). But it’s mere tinkering compared to Victoria’s withdrawal from public life or George’s decrepitude.

  Officials do not talk of the Queen winding down or cutting back on her duties. They say that she is ‘making better use of her time’. No wonder our stock image has not changed all these years. So what is the secret of her durability? The answer would seem to be a combination of health, faith and attitude – plus Prince Philip.

  Lord Charteris, one of the most colourful royal private secretaries of the twentieth century, summed it up as follows: ‘She sleeps well, she’s got very good legs and she can stand for a long time. The Queen is as strong as a yak.’ She certainly hates any suggestion of infirmity. Sailing round Scotland in the Royal Yacht in its final years, the Queen was infuriated to come down to breakfast and read newspaper rumours of a heart condition. She had been spotted attending a Harley Street clinic for a routine check-up and the press had jumped to conclusions. The next morning, Britannia was due to visit a lighthouse. A member of the entourage describes the scene: ‘There are all these camera crews there, having read about the Queen’s heart problem. We get to the lighthouse and the Queen, on her own initiative and without warning, goes whoosh – straight up to the top. When she gets to the top of the lighthouse, she waves down at the cameramen. End of story.’