Vice-Regal Saint: Queen and Prime Minister
The Queen receives Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper at Buckingham Palace, 29 May 2008. The media doesn't report these visits anymore, so we will. This is not a courtesy call, but a customary requirement by a Head of Government to brief the Head of State. Obviously the Queen of Canada is privy to government information on the internal domestic affairs of her overseas realms too. 
Unfortunately we don't know what subject matter the prime minister is raising here, but perhaps among other things he is formally asking the boss if Her Majesty will officially open the Vancouver Winter Olympics in 2010. Or perhaps he is apologising for not formally inviting the Queen to the 400th anniversary of the founding of Quebec City. Who knows, but the Queen's prime ministers customarily visit Her Majesty when they are in town. After two years in office, this is Prime Minister Harper's second visit to London and therefore second visit to Buckingham Palace.
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12 comments:
The media actually did report on this briefly.
I saw this same picture in the Main Section of the Star here in Toronto the day after it happened. Granted it wasn't exactly the leading story but it was reported on. It simply stated that: "Prime Minister Harper meets with the Queen at Buckingham Palace during his recent trip to London." or something to that effect.
Are Canadian polititians and prime ministers generally pro-monarchy?
Thanks for the correction.
As for the position of Canadian PMs vis-a-vis the monarchy, it depends. I would say Harper/Mulroney/Campbell moderately so, Trudeau/Chretien/Pearson indifferently so and Clark/Diefenbaker happily so.
Strongly republican politicians are more rare in these parts, but they do exist - John Manley, for example.
The Queen receives a despatch box from Rideau Hall every 2 weeks. fyi.
I'm disappointed that Premier Campbell has not invited Her Majesty to the celebrations for the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Crown Colony of British Columbia.
:(
I'd imagine that the Premier would have to go through the PM since a royal visit incurs expenses that the federal government must cover.
Just another FYI, the Queen not being invited to the 400th anniversary of Quebec was not a decision made to snub Her Majesty. In fact, it was to avoid a riot that no doubt would be incited by the separatists who think the sun rises and sets in their asses.
I honestly could care less about what the Separatists think anymore. The optics of how it looks that every major Head of State, from large countries to the smallest countries is being invited to this thing and our very own Head of State, our Sovereign isn't is disgusting and makes us look like a joke honestly. It's going to show the world how disjointed Canada really is.
I'd imagine that the Premier would have to go through the PM since a royal visit incurs expenses that the federal government must cover.
Thank you for the correction, Viscount Feldon. I had thought that it would be up to the Province to invite her since, IIRC, provinces are considered sovereign entities within Confederation.
Either way, I'm very disappointed that Her Majesty will not be taking part in the 150th anniversary of our founding as a Crown Colony.
FYI, Queen Victoria named our colony "British Columbia" because she thought (rightly IMHO) that the name we were to have, "New Caledonia", would get confused with the French colony in the South Pacific!
:)
I truly hope Her Majesty is at the Opening of the Vancouver/Whistler Olympics. Along with Phillip, Charles, Camilla, and William and Harry (and their girlfriends).
A nation that calls itself a kingdom is a nation with a sense of gravitas, with a future and a past and an equal ease with either. In the descent of kings it traces its own glorious passage through the generations. A monarchy is something to live up to, and to wonder at. It is not fed to us in predigested chunks of reason. You either get it or you don't. - Andrew Coyne
History shows that Mankind was much happier not being subjected as a slave to monarchs and or his religious institutions. The Monarch is supposedly a replacement of a Tribal Chief.
Tribal Chiefs usually care for the welfare of Tribe. Even the blind man sees how much a monarch cares.
Monarch usually find the Average Joe a dispicable creature; the PM is a altar boy who serves the wine and bread as is required.
Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so few to so many! In Flanders Field the poppies do not blow anymore.
If I had known at the age of twenty, what I know today, I would not have subjected my genes to a world ruled by delusional grandeur.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.- Edmund Burke
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.- William Shakespeare
Thou Shall Not Steal.
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