The royals - Kitty Kelley [157]
“At least we don’t strut around in ludicrous little hats,” said the Margaret Thatcher puppet.
“But you’d love to, wouldn’t you,” retorted the Queen’s puppet.
The Queen’s relationship with Margaret Thatcher was always proper and cordial, but never as warm and cozy as the rapport the Queen had enjoyed with Winston Churchill and Harold Wilson. Part of the problem was her preference for men. “She regards female inferiority as the natural order of things,” said British historian David Cannadine. “The other part of the problem was Margaret Thatcher herself,” Prince Charles told his biographer. “She was too formidable.” The Prince described the Prime Minister to the editor of the Sunday Express as “a bit like a school ma’am.” Charles eventually became so disenchanted with Thatcher’s conservative policies that he sent a memo to the Queen, imploring her to do something before the Prime Minister ruined the country. The Queen, who came to agree with her son, could do nothing, but she occasionally shared her displeasure with Commonwealth leaders.
“Her Majesty was not at ease with Margaret Thatcher’s policies,” said Robert Hawke, the former Prime Minister of Australia. “She saw her as dangerous.” During a dinner with Lord Shawcross, the Queen expressed anger toward her Prime Minister because Margaret Thatcher had reneged on granting the Shah of Iran asylum in England. “Once you give your word,” the Queen said, “that’s it.”
Despite her negative feelings, the Queen did not withhold the Order of the Garter from her Prime Minister after Margaret Thatcher left office. Limited to twenty-four citizens, the Garter, the highest order of chivalry, is usually bestowed by the monarch on a retired prime minister who has not been defeated in a general election. Thatcher resigned in 1990.
The Queen was just as politically suspect to Margaret Thatcher, who told conservative aides that Her Majesty was not “one of us.” The Iron Lady clashed with the Queen over a Commonwealth statement opposing apartheid. She did not share the monarch’s fervor for the Commonwealth; she cared more about Britain’s stature in Europe. In fact, she dismissed the Commonwealth as a bunch of greedy beggars.
The Queen confided in Anthony Benn, a Labor MP, that she loathed the Common Market and considered its leaders rude, cynical, and disillusioned. In his diary Benn suggested that the Queen’s negative attitude came from seeing there was no role for her in a European union. Benn, a republican, also derided the Queen, saying she was incapable of saying “Good morning” without a courtier’s script.
Yet the Queen, despite her Prime Minister, remained devoted to her dominions. And she did everything possible to shore up the creaky concept of monarchy, especially in Canada and Australia, where republican sentiments ran high. By 1982 she had made twelve royal tours of Canada and nine of Australia. And she maintained the Crown’s presence in both countries by regularly dispatching members of her family to visit. In 1983 she sent the Prince and Princess of Wales to Australia for six weeks, although the Princess at first refused to go. After considerable wrangling, she agreed, but she insisted on taking their nine-month-old baby and his nanny.
“You know how you felt,” Diana told Charles. “You were miserable when your mother left you for months at a time, and you were older than Wills.” She reminded her husband of what he had told her about his lonely childhood. Diana felt that he had been emotionally damaged by his parents, who were too busy for him because they were constantly traveling. “I will not do that to Wills,” she said in front of her staff. She cited books she’d read about the first two years of a child’s life being the time when a sense of self-esteem and security are implanted. “I know he’s just a baby,” she said, “but he still needs our attention.”
Diana believed in tactile mothering or, as she defined it, “lots of hugs