The Queen turns 60, but shows no sign of retiring

Press, 21 April 1986, Page 8

The Queen turns 60, but shows no sign of retiring

By

Brian Mooney

Queen Elizabeth is 60 today. At an age which many in Britain retire, she shows no signs of wishing to trade in her State grant for a State pension. Aides say the Queen, who has sat on what is arguably the world’s most secure throne for 34 years, has every intention of reigning until she either dies or is incapacitated..

“There is absolutely no question of an abdication. Any suggestion of that would be a piece of fiction writing,” the Queen’s personal spokesman, Michael Shea, told Reuters.

The Queen’s birthday, like all else associated with the Royal family in Britain, has unloosed an avalanche of books, television programmes, and press articles. The day is being celebrated with a fanfare of ceremonies. Although now eclipsed by other glittering royal stars, in particular the Princess of Wales, the Queen continues to attract much attention.

Her reign has marked the transition of the British Royal family into a mass media event that has been likened to a royal soap opera, a reallife “Dallas” or “Dynasty." Royal weddings, royal romances, royal tiffs, even royal set pieces receive saturation coverage in media that hunger for more. The appetite

abroad is almost as insatiable.

“As a nation, we are obsessed with royalty,” says one of Britain’s foremost television editors, Nigel Ryan. Writing in a British media magazine, the “U.K. Press Gazette,” about the latest royal craze over the marriage, in July, of Queen Elizabeth’s second son, Andrew, Nigel Ryan adds:

“However much we pretend to one another that we’ve seen and read all we can stomach, circulation figures and TV ratings show we’ll always go back for more.” “The Times,” of London, for example, hardly lets a day go by without a picture of royalty — whatever its news value.

Opinion polls back up this interest. Nine out of 10 Britons support the monarchy. No major party espouses republicanism.

But for all the media attention — much sychophantic and some, Buckingham Palace maintains, only just short of invented — Elizabeth remains in many respects unknown to her subjects.

Television cameras have prised open the Royal family — catching glimpses of the Queen at home, with her family, her favourite corgi dogs and racing horses, at state ceremonies, and on more than 50 overseas tours she has undertaken as monarch.

She is caught at times looking stiff and bored, at others relaxed and interested, glowering with irritation or cheering a winning horse, and even, in New Zealand on a tour this year, with egg on her dress: the offering of a protester. But the woman behind the regal mask of the first television Queen remains at least partially hidden. For all the speeches she has made, few of her subjects could list any of her opinions.

The Queen has never given an interview. Michael Shea says he believes she never will. “It is inconceivable that she could ever stand on a pavement, as Prince Charles did after the birth of his first child, and give an impromptu chat with people in front of the cameras, answering all their personal questions,” Donald Trelford, editor of the weekly Observer, comments. Michael Shea concedes there is an element of

remoteness about the Queen: her sense of humour does not always come across in public. Talking of life close to her, he says: “There’s a huge amount of laughter, quite a lot of fun.” “Her lifebelt is that she likes people,” he says. He describes the Queen as a sensible, matter-of-fact person, and extremely perspicacious. Michael Shea considers one of the Queen’s major achievements abroad is to have helped forge and hold together the Commonwealth, a loose association of Britain and 48 former colonies. She is titular head of the group, which includes 26 republics, and head of state separately of 18 different members.

The Queen, brought up when the colonies were still part of the British Empire, takes great interest in the Commonwealth which links large countries such as India, Canada, Australia, and Kenya with tiny Caribbean states like Grenada.

At home, the Queen has provided an unbroken symbol of political stability since she acceded to the throne on February 6, 1952, following the death of her father, King George VI. Michael Shea cites the sheer load of work undertaken by the Queen as another major achievement of her reign. “A vast amount of work goes on behind the scenes,” he remarks. Although vested with no formal powers, the Queen has acquired an unparal-

leled knowledge of British politics and world affairs by carrying out the routine duties of a monarch. She meets foreign heads of state and government, and is alone in Britain in having had access to all important cabinet papers since she took office. This is one of her few limited rights. From Winston Churchill to Margaret Thatcher, eight prime ministers have served under her, and briefed her regularly. ' “She really has met them all over the years,” Michael Shea says of world leaders over the last three decades. “I doubt, for example, that Reagan ever even met John Kennedy, whereas the Queen knew him well.”

After reading a brief recently that she felt failed to take into account her knowledge of a particular African state, the Queen asked: “Who do they think I am, a junior minister?” Outside her official life, the Queen has promoted a disarmingly ordinary image of herself as mother and grandmother.

But her lifestyle, if not opulent, is rich and her

of Reuters, London

household fits comfortably into the upper-class establishment.

There are no prominent blacks or coloured people among her senior staff, who are recruited generally from well-to-do backgrounds. In 1986 she will draw SNZII.IO million from the state as her annual subsidy. But, as one of the •wealthiest women in the world in her own right, she could finance her household out of her own pocket. She divides her state and private wealth strictly. Her racing stable is financed by her own money.

The Queen has never been tainted by scandals, even as the public perception of what is scandalous has changed. Divorce, which triggered the crisis in 1936 that led to the abdication of her Uncle King Edward VIII when he chose to marry American divorcee, Wallis Simpson, is no longer unacceptable. The Queen’s sister, Princess Margaret, is divorced, as are the parents of the Princess of Wales, the future Queen, and Prince Andrew’s financee, Sarah Ferguson. ;