His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Monday 12th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, I have always felt immensely privileged to be a Member of this House and able to speak in it, but today I feel a real sense of privilege in being able to say something about a man whom I have long admired and respected and to have the opportunity, in common with everyone else here, to pass on my condolences to Her Majesty the Queen and the other members of the Royal Family. I was thinking what on earth I was going to say that would be new and not said many times already; I confess that I will fail utterly in not repeating some of the sentiments that have been expressed, but I make no apology for that.

I will say something about the Duke of Edinburgh’s love for Scotland—the clue lies in the name and title. All of us are very much aware of his love for Balmoral and the outdoors. Much has been said about the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, but I believe that Prince Philip’s early experience as a founding pupil at Gordonstoun—which some ignorant people present as a school where people have cold showers and run around in bare feet; it is rather more than that—was fundamental in shaping his character. That character is the reason all of us are so impressed by his achievements today.

I listened to the service from Westminster Abbey and the dean’s preaching on Sunday. He had it absolutely to a tee; he talked about the importance of the Prince’s character and how his faith gave him strength in his attitude towards life and public service. The motto of Gordonstoun School is “Plus est en vous”—noble Lords will excuse my pronunciation—or “There is more in you”. It could almost be a template for the Duke’s whole approach to life itself. It was certainly a template for the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award; Gordonstoun had a thing called the Moray Badge, which members of the school could compete for, as well as people from outside in the community. It taught them the importance of volunteering, of service, of adventure and of taking on that challenge which is more than you believe you can do. The great benefit of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award was not that you learned how to put up a tent or work a Primus stove, but that it gave you confidence in yourself and raised your expectations of what could be achievable. So many millions of youngsters, as we have heard, have benefited from that. I am extremely grateful to Members of this House such as my noble friend Lord Kirkham who have played such a part in making the scheme so widely available around the world.

In recent days, all of us have learned a huge amount about the Duke of Edinburgh and his activities. I pay tribute to the BBC. I pay tribute to the BBC—I say it twice because it is not usual for me to do so, but it has done a fantastic job. My only slight niggle is that it would have been quite good if it had published and publicised some of these things while he was still alive and given him credit for them. Of course, he occasionally said things that upset people; to me he was the antidote to the celebrity culture—the me, how-great-I-am culture. He just got on with the job in hand and moved on to the next thing.

The happiest day of my ministerial career was when I was Secretary of State for Scotland; the Queen accepted an invitation to come and open the new hospital in Oban, which had been much promised and longed for. She came into the bay with the Duke on “Britannia” on a beautiful, sunny day without a cloud in the sky—which is usual for Oban—and as they disembarked I thought how proud I was to be British, what a fantastic day it was and how marvellous would be the ensuing publicity in the Scottish press. The Duke wandered off to talk to some people and made one of his jokes. To my horror, the headlines were about the Duke of Edinburgh’s gaffe. A journalist had taken away an out-of-context joke. I thought, “What must it be like to be the Duke of Edinburgh, carrying out these public services every day and getting no credit for it?” I now know the answer, as a result of the coverage we have heard in recent days—he did not really care. He just wanted to do the right thing and get on with the job.

What can you say about the Duke of Edinburgh? He was a man of faith. He left his country in an orange box and has got all of us here today paying tribute to the immense contribution he has made to our country. He sought no acclamation and no credit; you can see that in the arrangements he left for his funeral and the rest. He embraced change while still valuing the past. However, surely his biggest legacy will be the devotion which he has shown to Her Majesty the Queen, enabling her to serve our country as no previous monarch has been able to do, with such distinction.

How can I sum up his legacy to us, I thought, in two or three words? I decided on this: weren’t we lucky.