It is a great pleasure to follow the “buttocks” of the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell)—it will be the first time he has heard that, as well.
I am very grateful for the opportunity to pass on my condolences to the royal family and also to pay tribute to Her late Majesty the Queen on behalf of my own family, constituents in Edinburgh South and people all over her beloved Scotland. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth was a mother, a grandmother and a great-grandmother to her own family, but she was also a mother, grandmother and great-grandmother to the nation. We will all remember where we were when we learned of her death yesterday.
We will always remember that it was in Scotland that she spent her last weeks and days and, as we have heard already, she loved being in Scotland and particularly on the Balmoral estate—the tranquillity, the great outdoors and the complete absence of any speed limits.
The Queen loved Scotland and Scotland loved the Queen. The ties between Scotland and our longest-reigning monarch are plentiful, from her very first public speech as a young princess in Aberdeen at the opening of the British Sailors Society, to the yarn of her wedding dress being woven in Scotland, Royal Yacht Britannia being built on the Clyde and retired to the Forth, as well as the opening of the first Forth bridge and the second one 53 years later. She always looked forward to the royal week in Edinburgh each year. Scotland was, as she described it, her “special place”. She said at the opening of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 that,
“if I may make a personal point”
Scotland occupies
“such a special place in my own and my family’s affections.”
I remember my own childhood and the traditions that revolved around Her late Majesty. Every Christmas, she was as much a part of our family as the rituals of the tree and the turkey as every generation of our family crowded around the television for her 3 o’clock Christmas address. She transcended every generation all the way to my two-year-old daughter, who now knows who that was drinking tea with Paddington. I have yet to explain to Zola that Paddington’s friend has passed away.
Over the past 24 hours, I have tried and struggled to find the language to describe her, but the one word that a constituent said to me late last night was “iconic”. She was the very definition of iconic. She was on every pound I ever spent—admittedly fewer than many others because I am a Scot—and on every letter that I ever sent. Her name is on dozens of plaques and buildings all over my constituency and tens of thousands all over the country. She embodied what it means to be British and epitomised public duty, decency and dignity. She picked us up when we were down and when our children and grandchildren look back at this time, it will be Elizabeth II above all else who they will remember as the thread through every part of our post-war history. She was truly our greatest monarch.
I would love to tell a humorous anecdote—I hope that somebody else will tell it—about the visit to Balmoral that she had with Dick Griffin, one of her former protection officers, but there is no time to do that. Somebody else might do so shortly. I never met Her Majesty but we all think we did because she was such an integral part of and influence on our lives. Everyone thinks they did meet her, because anyone who did never stops telling the story. That is the impact she had on each of their lives.
I can only imagine the pain and grief the royal family feel today and that pain and grief is compounded by the duty that King Charles III now has to lead this nation. I, the people of Edinburgh South and the people of Scotland simply say thank you for everything, Ma’am, rest in peace, and God save the King.
3.4 pm