Address to Her Majesty: Platinum Jubilee

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Thursday 26th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am very conscious that, as you were one of my university students a long time ago, Mr Deputy Speaker, you are expecting a lot of history. However, having heard all the remarks so far on the great history, I am getting rid of that. Although I have had some dodgy ancestors, no one has ever been hung, drawn and quartered—yet.

May I be very personal in terms of my respect, admiration and love for the Queen and my pleasure at contributing to this address on her platinum jubilee? When I was doing my 11-plus exam at Kenyngton Manor School in Sunbury-on-Thames, I looked up from the paper and saw something strange: the caretaker was taking the flag down in a funny way—he was taking it down to half-mast. I have that early memory of the sad time when George VI passed away, and the Queen became Queen Elizabeth II. I remember that very well. Of course all of us have the memories from our childhood—the bonfires and the fun. Many of us in public life have had the luck of meeting the Queen several times and it was the sense of fun that I was most inspired by.

Early on, as a young Member of Parliament, I went to a civic occasion because the President of Brazil was visiting. I sat there and had a very nice time. The whole royal family were there, a couple of speeches were made and there was a melee when people went to get their coffee. Suddenly, I saw this small woman coming towards me and my wife, and she said, “Hello, I’m the Queen.” I was taken aback. She said, “I understand you have four children” and we got into conversation, because she has four children and we have four children—it was a lovely conversation. She said, “Could you tell me one thing? The violinist in the small band, he was wearing an earring on his ear. Does that mean anything special?” My wife and I looked at each other with some puzzlement and could not give her an answer. There was this sense of fun. Every time I met her, there was something quite funny and mischievous, but lovely.

I was lucky enough to work closely with the Duke of Edinburgh, both on his wonderful work on design and on a Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce investigation into the future of the English countryside. That was a great joy because we met at the RSA and in Buckingham Palace. I was astonished at the close relationship between him and the Queen, and at his sense of fun. There was a Labour, a Conservative and Lib Dem Lord on that commission and he always had some bit of information to tease us with.

We had a wonderful annual reception for the Duke of Edinburgh’s prize for design and there would be a lovely party. The Queen said to me, “You know that my husband has a secret method when greeting people. He shakes them by the hand and then sort of swings them away.” So for the rest of the evening, I watched the Duke of Edinburgh and his wonderful way of shaking someone’s hand and then throwing them on to the next business. So a sense of fun is something I remember.

I am the Member of Parliament for Huddersfield. They love the Queen in Huddersfield. We are a very diverse community, much more so than when she became Queen. Everybody in our community in Huddersfield loves and adores the Queen. She has come to my constituency, to the town, twice. Those Members who are not on the railway will not know this, but if the Queen comes to their constituency by train, the mayor greets her and the Member of Parliament is the next to greet her. The first time the Queen came to Huddersfield, my wife was abroad. I got in touch with the people who were organising the Queen’s visit and said, “Would it be all right if I brought two of my children instead of my wife?” The message came back, “Yes, indeed!” So little John and little Verity came along with me to the station. The Queen immediately stopped, because it was quite unusual—all the rest were sort of boring middle-aged people—and she was delighted to meet these two children and have a conversation with them. It is those personal things that I remember. On her two visits to Huddersfield, the Queen was very well received and great fun.

I do not want to go into too much detail in respect of what we are doing to celebrate in Huddersfield but, like the hon. Member for Loughborough (Jane Hunt), we are going to have lots of events. I remember some of the events when I was little. I do not want to give my age away—although everybody knows it—but the first television I saw, in black and white, was the coronation service, although I have to say it was the next-door neighbour’s television, not our own.

One of the Queen’s special visits to Huddersfield was to open the amateur rugby league centre. What better time could there be to remember the opening of that centre? Of course, those who are not so well up on rugby league will perhaps not know that it was founded in 1895 in the George Hotel in Huddersfield. Working men in the north of England had to work six days a week and, if they played sport, they lost a day’s wages. All the posh people in the south of England who played rugby said it would be disgraceful to give them the extra money that they lost from not working on that day. In the end, all the clubs met in the George in 1895 and said, “We will start a new game called rugby league, with 13 in the team rather than 15 and rather different rules.” The only plug that I will make is that this weekend at Tottenham, for the first time in very many years, Huddersfield are playing for the Challenge cup. That made me think of the Queen’s visit.

The last thing I want to say is that we have had really tumultuous times. We kind of forget them, don’t we? But we have gone through some really tough times in our country. We have had good moments, but we have had really tough times. We have had tough times when people in this House have not been very nice to each other. There are times when we have, I think, let ourselves down. The whole country became very divided on political grounds, in the nasty sense of division. The Queen should be recognised for having the ability to bring all those divisions together and to be that act of unity. I have not been privy to the meetings with Prime Ministers or anyone else, but I know in my heart that over these years the Queen has had an influence in calming down elected politicians when they have fallen out. When we have become too aggressive, too personal and too unpleasant to each other, she has been that calming influence behind the scenes, and she has sometimes taken a profile in that calming process.

I am proud to be here today, both personally and on the behalf of my constituents in Huddersfield.