Ephraim Hardcastle
CHARLES and Camilla were a late addition to the Queen’s Speech programme. The Monarch hoped to have Prince William there to show ‘the succession is secure’, but he declined the honour. My source says: ‘Camilla would have preferred to miss it, too, finding the steps into and out of the carriage a serious trial. Those on the Glass Coach are easier than the Queen Alexandra State Coach ones, but Charles refuses to use it. He recalls taking Diana to the State Opening in 1981, a few months after they married, in the Glass Coach, chosen so the public would get a better view of their new princess.’
THE Monarch suspects some of the clunking phrases in the Queen’s Speech are inserted as a result of betting activity – ie, mischievous political elves who cobble together this stuff place bets on having her utter certain inanities. Indeed, ‘it is not unknown for HM to request rewording of a phrase when she smells a rat’, I am advised.
DAVID Cameron and trouser-suited Harriet Harman didn’t chat, as is traditional when the PM and Leader of the Opposition walk from the House of Commons for the Queen’s Speech. Although they’re distantly related, Ms Harman said of Dave: ‘He’s the kind of man your mother used to warn you about. He’ll promise you the world. But if he ever got his wicked way with you – in the ballot box – you’d never hear from him again.’
COVERING the Queen’s S peech f or Sky yesterday, Adam Boulton, 56, was introduced as the satellite broadcaster’s ‘political supremo’ – cruelly setting him above their nice political editor, Faisal Islam, 36, pictured. Portly Boulton had the job for 25 years before being succeeded by Cambridge graduate Faisal last year. ‘Supremo’ – defined as ‘a person with the most skill and authority in a particular type of activity’ – is a term often used mockingly.
NOW that the Speaker, John Bercow, has survived plots against him, ex-Tory minister Simon Burns is anxious to make amends for past hostility. He was said to have compared 5ft 6in Bercow to one of the seven dwarfs, sneering: ‘So which one are you?’ Yesterday he told Bercow in the Commons chamber: ‘If it’s helpful to you, Mr Speaker, I want to categorically confirm that this incident never happened.’ He couldn’t deny calling the Speaker ‘a stupid, sanctimonious dwarf’ in 2010. He’d apologised for that at the time. How fortunate we are to have such charmers represent us, aren’t we?
SERVING Tory bigwigs were conspicuous by their absence at the West London Synagogue f or ex- minister Leon Brittan’s memorial service. David Mellor, Douglas Hurd, Sir Malcolm Rifkind and Norman Lamont were there, ‘but most serving politicians stayed away’, says my source. ‘Nick Clegg (a former MEP) conversed intensely with European representatives, fuelling speculation that the next time a lucrative EU post comes up he’ll be bidding farewell to his Sheffield Hallam constituents.’