Prince Harry tribute to Queen is ‘healing balm’, says Michael Cole

PRINCE Harry’s tribute to the late Queen is a “healing balm” according to royal commentator Michael Cole.

He told GB News: ”These are days of history. We’re witnessing history…what we’re seeing is all unprecedented.

“We’ve got the statement this morning from Prince Harry, a well judged statement, a heartfelt statement and quite clearly one he’s written himself which is not always the case in royal statements

“And it’s healing balm, it will help the healing process quite rapidly. And that was, of course, begun, initiated by King Charles the third in his first televised address.

“He went out of his way to express love for Prince Harry and Megan and their new life lived away from the royal family in this country.

“And that of course, because words have power and kind words have good consequences, Prince William made the call he had to make.

He added: “He called his brother and said ‘look, Harry, we’re going down to the gates you better come with us to meet the people and see the bouquets, see the poses, meet the people’.

“That’s a full step, a short walk, but a big step.

On royal ceremony, Mr Cole said: ”These are these are important things. They are not fripperies. They’re not just rigmarole. They’re important.

“They’re integral to the fabric of this country and the UN our monarchy, which is a bulwark against extremism and dictatorship in this country.

“I’ve always felt and I don’t know whether you agree with me but a constitutional monarchy appeals to the British temperament. We like it.”

He added: “Can you imagine the horror of it, can you imagine a presidential election in this country and we had to choose, shall we say between Tony Blair, Richard Branson, and Lenny Henry? The people would would despair.

“The fact that you have a hereditary monarch, who everybody can respect because they are above politics, I think is a tremendous boon to this country and to the 14 overseas realms that the new monarch will preside over.

“We can congratulate ourselves a little bit.”

He added: “She went to Quebec when it wasn’t too easy when the separatist movement was quite strong when General de Gaulle went there and caused a little bit of trouble by saying ‘vive le Québec libre!’, long live free Quebec, but she went, she had guts, she could have she could have stayed away.

“Her mother, I remember her making a speech, we went up to CNN tower in Toronto and she made a speech, ‘when I was young, I gave my heart to Canada’ and it was absolutely true.

“Politically, it’s important because I covered Watergate 1973-74 for 18 months of agony for America, because their head of state, the chief of the armed forces…was found to be just another dirty politician doing dirty tricks until he had to resign.

“He left and the Canadians looked down from the north and said, ‘thank goodness our head of state isn’t isn’t a politician’.”