| How The Queen "Fooled" Prezza |
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| Written by Joanne Leyland | |
| Thursday, 10 May 2007 | |
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Page 2 of 3 However, thanks to his very useful role as the public, no-nonsense face of 'Old Labour' to Tony Blair's rather more educated face of 'New Labour', Prescott weathered the storms and held on to his job. And so it is that, when Anthony Lyndon Blair quits office on June 27th, his exit from the public stage will be followed by that of 'Prezza'. The Deputy PM has often broken all the rules of protocol, as most evident on the day he thumped and then brawled with a member of the public who threw an egg during a visit to Wales at the height of the 2001 election campaign. So unimpressed is he by royalty that, on meeting Prince Willem-Alexander of The Netherlands at an official gathering in The Hague in 1998, Prescott asked the future King: "You may be the crown prince, but what do you do?" 
Clearly, time at the top of government hadn't changed his ardent opposition to the institution of monarchy.However, considering the somewhat duplicitous tactics to which he was publicly subjected by the Queen herself back in 1981, perhaps this is no surprise! As the elected Labour Member of Parliament for Hull East, Prescott was duty bound to welcome the monarch to his constituency for the opening of the Humber bridge. Coming at a time when the Labour Party was truly famed for its ardent left-wing policies and anti-monarchist sentiments, the Queen was aware that she was to meet a member of Parliament who wasn't at all impressed by all that she stands for and, indeed, represents. Despite pleas from his wife, Pauline, Prescott was adamant that he would not be pictured bowing to the Queen. He clearly believed that such an act would falsely show his public support to the monarchy, an institution he and many more Labour MPs deem to be an anachronism which has no place in what is now 21st Century Britain. Unfortunately for the MP, though, he was to be embarrassingly hoodwinked by noneother than the Queen..... |
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