Crowning gaffes: farewell to foot-in-mouth Phil

cal cardiac centre in February 2013, the Duke was greeted by staff and remarked “the Philippines must be half-empty – you’re all here running the NHS (National Health Service).”

At a state visit in China in 1986, he told a group of visiting British students: “If you stay here much longer you’ll all be slitty-eyed.”

In 1996 after the horrific Dunblane massacre in Scotland, he dismissed calls for tighter gun control with an unfortunate and

“If a cricketer, for instance, suddenly decided to go into a school and batter a lot of people to death with a cricket bat, which he could do very easily, I mean, are you going to ban cricket bats?”

He went on to say there was no evidence people who used guns for sport were any more dangerous that people who used golf clubs, tennis rackets or cricket bats.

In 1993, during a meeting graphic comparison. with the World Wildlife Fund, the Duke stunned guests with a strange review of Cantonese cuisine.

“If it has got four legs and it is not a chair, if it has got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane and if it swims and it is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it,” he said.

In 2002, while touring a factory near Edinburgh, he said a fuse box was so crude it “looked as though it had been put in by an Indian”.

In 2003, he told Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo his ceremonial dress looked like pyjamas and told him “you look like you are ready for bed”.

When the Queen once asked a blind army hero how much sight he had, Prince Philip responded: “not a lot judging by the tie he’s wearing”.

In 2015 he was overheard telling an official photographer to: “just take the f...ing picture” during a photo-call for the Battle of Britain commemorations.