King and Camilla’s great British tour
THE King has carried out his first major engagements at Buckingham Palace since his mother’s funeral and is planning a busy season of visits across the UK.
The Royal Family HQ hosted two grand receptions yesterday as the monarch got into the swing of his duties and announced plans to spend two days in Yorkshire next week.
There was warmth, belly laughs and also belly flops as Charles welcomed Olympic and Paralympic heroes.
He also helped to mark 50 years since the Ugandan Asians expelled by dictator Idi Amin arrived in the UK.
One of the day’s highlights featured the King joking about the risk of belly flops with diving champ Tom Daley and his Olympian partner Matty Lee.
Matty, 24, said: “We were talking about belly flops and I said if we get it wrong it can hurt a lot. He said, ‘I don’t know how you do that’. It’s just crazy – I did not think I would be talking about belly flops on a Wednesday night with the King.”
Tom, 28, suggested to the Queen that she would make a great gymnast due to her petite frame. He said: “I said ‘the smaller you are the faster you spin’ and she said ‘maybe I should have been a gymnast’ and I was like ‘well, you are the Queen’.”
The divers were among 150 medallists from the 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games and the 2022 Beijing Winter and Paralympic Games last night.
Earlier, Charles welcomed more than 400 guests to the reception celebrating Ugandan Asians.
They included celebrities, dignitaries and businessmen and women. The King applauded and laughed after he was serenaded with the Ugandan national anthem sung by veteran broadcasters Jon Snow, Jonathan Dimbleby and former Archbishop of York Lord Bishop Sentamu.
Jon and Jonathan reported on the traumatic events in Uganda. Lord Sentamu – as a young lawyer and judge – was beaten and briefly jailed for voicing opposition to Amin before he and his wife were smuggled out of Uganda to the UK in 1973. Former
Channel 4 News anchor Jon, wearing one of his trademark colourful ties, joked after their rendition of Oh Uganda Land of Beauty: “I thought we’d give him a good blast. I felt he would enjoy it and he did.
“For King Charles to make his first major public moment a multicultural one sends a wonderful message.”
Of the 80,000 people given just 90 days to leave Uganda, 28,000 British passport holders came to the UK, where they were resettled after staying in 16 reception centres across the country.
The TV newsmen later co-hosted a ceremony which included a turn from actor and comedian Sanjeev Bhaskar, who paid tribute to the King and took a playful swipe at Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. Sanjeev, a founding member of the British Asian Trust, told guests inside the State Dining Room: “I have been privileged over the past 25 years to work with the King, the man formerly known as Prince.
“So I can say from first-hand experience his contribution, acknowledgement, encouragement and affection for the British Asian community has been unsurpassed and extraordinary.”
And to laughter, he joked if the PM stepped out of line, Charles could alert “the secret cabal of Asian women of a certain age who can have a word in his ear. I like to call them the Illuminati”.
Wearing the Khadi Poppy in memory of Indian soldiers killed in the Second World War, the King chatted to British Asians with Ugandan heritage who have built successful businesses here. They included members of the Thakrar family – who founded Tilda Rice – and brothers Yogesh, Hitesh and Dilesh Mehta who own firms including Pickfords and perfume company Shaneel Enterprises.
Yogesh said: “The hunger was there to succeed. We came from a reasonably standard of living and wanted to have that standard of living here. We realised education is very important.”
Palace officials are still working on a mixture of engagements that had already been in the diary for Charles and Camilla before the death of the Queen at Balmoral on September 8.
The King heads to Bradford and Leeds next Tuesday and will be accompanied by the Queen at York and Doncaster on Wednesday.
One senior Palace aide said: “We’re putting together a really busy and – we hope – exciting autumn programme for them.”