Tributes to Her Late Majesty the Queen

Mark Logan Excerpts

Saturday 10th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mark Logan (Bolton North East) (Con)]

It is a sorrowful privilege to rise to pay tribute to Her Majesty the Queen on behalf of Bolton North East. We are faced with the indescribable loss of the guardian of our traditions and the soul of our nation, but Her Majesty was more than that: for evermore, she will be the United Kingdom. We are feeling this loss, achingly so, in Bolton. You only had to be there during the platinum jubilee celebrations to get a sense of the adulation felt for the Queen in our town. Bolton was, on many occasions, the preferred destination of Her Majesty. In 1953, not long after taking the throne, the Queen’s first-ever football match was the FA cup final between Blackpool and Bolton Wanderers at Wembley stadium. Wanderers lost 4-3—though that was later remedied in 1958 when the Duke of Edinburgh awarded them the FA cup after they beat Man United 2-0.

Her Majesty first visited Bolton in 1954 where the royal train pulled up into Trinity Street station, and in 1968 she visited St Paul’s church in Halliwell. In 1988, Queen Elizabeth II visited Bolton to celebrate the town’s 150th birthday, witnessing investment into the town centre, and 30 years on, the town is being revamped once again. Her last visit was to Warburtons, where the rock that was forever by her side—the Duke of Edinburgh—joked with factory workers. I was going to say, “Imagine being a fly on the wall for some of those jokes”, but Warburtons has a great hygiene regime in place and therefore no flies.

We MPs may think we are busy running around our constituencies, but Her Majesty was able to see so many people and places in each of our respective areas. She was there all along, as our living environments and country went through inevitable change. We can learn from her integrity and live up to higher standards—for she was the standard. The wave of her hand, the comfort of her words at 3 pm on Christmas day and the steps she took on every footpath across the kingdom and the Commonwealth kept us all on the one road. We will never cease to miss and cherish her. As Her Majesty said during June’s celebrations,

“I hope this renewed sense of togetherness will be felt for many years to come”.

As we are brought together here to mourn our collective loss, I say, God bless the Queen. God save the King.