‘King Charles III has served the longest apprenticeship in history’

He told GB News: “The Queen was not in any way the slightest bit grand, the job was grand, but she had an absolute natural modesty…

“There’s a very strong case that history should know her as Elizabeth the Great because it is an unprecedented reign.

“She hardly put a foot wrong in 70 years, met 13 American presidents, had 15 prime ministers, met the last one doing her duty as always, only two days ago.

“And the proof of that is they’re at the Palace. Those people haven’t been bussed down. They haven’t been ordered down. They haven’t been told to hold a flag and wave it.

“This is not North Korea. This is not Russia. This is not orchestrated. This is people showing one thing, a very big word, affection, yes. And that you cannot buy.”

Mr Cole, speaking during an interview with Alastair Stewart on GB News, added: “The Queen, who believed very fervently in the value of the Union, has somehow strengthened it by actually dying at Balmoral.

“I think that is incredible and that emphasises the nature of this country, because I don’t know whether people realise the Queen is supreme head of the Church of England, when she crosses the border into Scotland, she becomes a Presbyterian by magic and she’s a member of the Church of Scotland.

“Her body is going to go to Holyrood House, her official residence in Edinburgh and then it’s going to proceed up the Royal Mile and lie in state at St Giles’ Cathedral.”

He said: “She had views which she didn’t express publicly, although Mr Cameron let fly what she felt about the Scottish referendum.

“She believed in that and, I don’t know what you think, but I believe that Tommy and Jock shared too many foxholes in foreign wars for our great union of 1707 to be put asunder.

“This is a great country and it should stay together, and she believed that.”

Mr Cole added: “I always felt Her Majesty the Queen was happiest when she was the squire of Sandringham or she was the laird of Balmoral, when she was in her jodhpurs hacking round on one of her horses or going down to the royal stud.

“She was at heart an English country woman.”

He added: “You’ve been featuring some of the key speeches that she made during her reign but I think there’s one that always sticks in my memory because she was very non-political, but she did make a very, very good speech…

“In the 70s, at the Silver Jubilee, the speech to the both Houses of Parliament in Westminster Hall, she said to them at that time, there was terrible violence in Northern Ireland and people were suggesting that Northern Ireland should be somehow floated off as a separate statelet.

“And she said, I have to remind myself that I was crowned queen of the United Kingdom. And that has been a huge benefit to the people who live here.

“Another event I remembered last night while I was reflecting upon the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, I was covering a story in Canada. When the Quebec people once again tried to have their separation vote they lost the referendum in the end, it was way back when.

“But her majesty on the steps of the Canadian Parliament made that same speech about Canada together is stronger and better than Canada apart.”