His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh

Lord Taylor of Holbeach Excerpts

Monday 12th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach (Con) [V]]

My Lords, it is quite right that the House meets today with the sole business of paying tribute to His Royal Highness Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. Many noble Lords have questioned whether they have anything to add to the volume of tributes paid since his death on Friday. In this debate on the House’s humble Address, we have heard—and will hear—remarkable speeches and very personal recollections of the unique contribution that the Duke made to British life, and of the reinforcement he gave to our unique constitutional settlement, including in his role in this House, in which, until recent years, he joined Her Majesty the Queen at the State Opening of her Parliament.

There is just one thing I can add to this, and it is not from my time as a member of the Royal Household, nor as a Government Whip or Lord-in-Waiting, nor from my five years as Government Chief Whip in this place, which came with the delight of being Captain of the Honourable Corps of the Gentlemen-at-Arms—a role practised by tradition by a number of colleagues in this House and currently, with distinction, by my noble friend Lord Ashton of Hyde. My excuse for joining in this historic debate is a small matter of childhood disappointment, which reminds us of the nature of the man whose death we mourn and provides an illustration of his character, which contributed so much to our nation. Many tributes have mentioned His Royal Highness’s love of sport and Outward Bound. Many have spoken of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award scheme and we have received powerful testimony of its influence for good from the current chairman of its trustees, the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson.

My experience involved something else which was very significant for many: his key role in the National Playing Fields Association. The Duke was due to arrive by helicopter to open a large new playing field, built as part of a neighbouring housing estate. This was the mid-1950s, when Macmillan was building 300,000 houses per year. His Royal Highness recognised the importance of sport and play in the lives of everybody, not just the privileged few. To cut the story short, bad weather meant a change of plan and, to my disappointment, my role was rendered redundant. It was the smallest incident, but the memory of it gave me reflection on Friday of the tens of thousands of visits that he made, not just out of duty but based on a genuine enthusiasm and his belief that he could, from a position of privilege, encourage enthusiasm in others.

There are lessons from this for us in this House. Noble Lords do not arrive without enthusiasm, but we have an opportunity to encourage it in others. This is, perhaps, particularly so in this period of change for the House, with a new Clerk of the Parliaments and a new Lord Speaker. Here we are, post Brexit and soon, I hope, post coronavirus, reflecting on the attributes that Prince Philip brought to the role that history made for him. As the House has heard, he was both a preserver—I think of his early realisation of the importance of the natural world in our lives—and a moderniser who was not afraid to support our Queen to encourage change in the way of maintaining our monarchy, keeping it central to our nation and the Commonwealth.

We in this House are but one small part of the fabric of the nation but, like His Royal Highness, we see that as both a privilege and a duty. Like him, we should see that preserving an institution’s relevance involves accepting change. Above all, we should be like him—enthusiastic about what we believe in: privilege and duty, preservation and change; and, above all, enthusiastic about living. That is why, on the occasion of his death, we can celebrate a life well lived.