QUENTIN LETTS: Poor Charles needed to learn 13 minutes of clichés
The work of change has begun,’ quacked Keir Starmer.
So Charles and Camilla donned dazzling jewels and arrived with plumed cavalry officers and Windsor greys and the Marchioness of Lansdowne, one of the ‘Queen’s companions’ (ladies of the bedchamber no longer being deemed an acceptable term).
Lady Lansdowne, handy on any netball court, pushed back two statuesque shoulders and achieved her full magnificence. The Guns of Navarone. Next time Donald Trump needs a bodyguard he should interview the Marchioness.
We had Lord Fauntleroy pageboys and heralds with purple snouts and the Yeomen of the Guard (whom I saw arrive at breakfast time in a team coach).
With the hereditary principle under bombardment – by a governing party stuffed with children of party grandees – the old establishment’s blue bloodlines gushed like the Tiber at snow-melt.
The Duke of Wellington and his Prussian duchess fluttered near the throne, she in a stuff-you-lot tiara.
King Charles III, wearing the Imperial State Crown and the Robe of State, reading the King’s Speech from the The Sovereign’s Throne in the House of Lords on Tuesday
Sir Keir Starmer (pictured) boasted he is bringing ‘a new era’ today after his King’s Speech revealed he would take control of rail, energy and the planning system
King Charles III and Queen Camilla sit on their thrones ahead of the King making his speech at the State Opening of Parliament in the House of Lords
Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak on their way to hear the speech in the House of Lords chamber today
The cast of characters included a Master of the Horse, Gold Stick in Waiting, Sword of State and a Lord Great Chamberlain, wispy-hipped Lord Carrington, who waved his billiard cue when he wanted Black Rod to go fetch the Commons. Current Black Rod? Sarah Clarke. A ringer for the Fast Show’s Rowley Birkin QC.
Sir Keir claimed ‘the era of politics as performance is over’ but the state opening was its usual parade of costumed cameos and political vanities.
The King’s principal private secretary, Clive Alderton, clutched a file of papers and glanced at his timepiece.
Sir Clive is always eager to hasten to the next engagement. Supreme Court members swaggered in bare-headed, their brains clearly too big for wigs.
The papal nuncio was stuck upstairs. Tiaras were complemented for the first time by the necklace of a new MP from Portsmouth. It said ‘Pompey Belle’. This was not strictly accurate.
With hereditary peers about to be ejected, Tony Benn’s son Viscount Stansgate sat in a plum position, taking snaps of his daughter Emily.
Blowy Blairite Charlie Falconer held court with a sextet of judges who giggled at his every bon mot. The Bishop of Hereford roasted in synthetic ermine. The Bishop of Manchester was being played by the late Lionel Jeffries.
Labour’s proposals were set out in a 26-page document earlier this year
Sir Keir and Mr Sunak led MPs walking from the Commons to the Lords to hear the monarch’s speech read out
Yeomen of the Guard carry out the ceremonial search of Parliament before the arrival of the monarch
At the King’s entry it was apparent he has become more confident with the imperial state crown. The Queen wore a diadem but not, sadly, a ’77 today’ badge.
Lucy Powell, leader of the Commons, had her jaw agape, catching flies. The mobile telephone of Lady Kennedy of Cradley (3rd XI batsman at best) rang at an awkward moment.
Poor King, he had to read the usual rubbish, full of unnecessary prepositions and jargon about ‘missions’ and ‘key drivers’ and ‘driving up standards’.
The King’s pace flagged and he flicked through the pages possibly thinking ‘much more of this?’
Finally, after 13 minutes of cliché, he said: ‘I pray that the blessing of Almighty God may rest upon your counsels’. That is another way of saying ‘God help you!’
The centuries old traditions were played out in Parliament today as the Houses reconvened after the election
The King delivering the speech in the House of Lords today
In clashes with Rishi Sunak in the Commons after the address, Keir Starmer said the package was a ‘marker of our intent’ and a ‘long-term plan to fix the foundation’
Westminster scattered to drinks parties. Two hours later the Commons reassembled, the Speaker by now on noisy form.
Rishi Sunak made a wry speech in which he puzzled over becoming an elder statesman at the age of 44. The Commons clerk was wearing a ceremonial wig. It started slipping off his round head.
Lisa Nandy, culture secretary, won the sucking-up cup for minister who nods most at the PM’s words.
Sir Keir kept referring to ‘my government’, a form of words normally reserved for the monarch. He had a little platform to raise his speech a few inches off the despatch box.
‘No more wedge issues,’ said Sir Keir, on the day he revived class war with his attack on private schools. Oh, and ‘we will stop the chaos’.
When goofball Ed Miliband is in your cabinet, that’s a bold claim to make.
