Dan Jarvis – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II
The tribute made by Dan Jarvis, the Labour MP for Barnsley Central, in the House of Commons on 9 September 2022.
It is a solemn honour to pay tribute to Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, and I want to begin by offering my condolences on behalf of my Barnsley constituents and myself to His Majesty the King and all of the royal family in their time of grief.
It is hard to believe that Her late Majesty the Queen is no longer with us. For nearly all of us in this place and beyond, her presence is all we have ever known. There is a sense of loss in the country so profound that it will take time to mourn and to come to terms with. She was not only our Queen; she was someone embedded in our hearts. This special place was earned by her devotion to each and every one of us. She embodied dignity, dedication, duty and a service that was unwavering throughout. Her long life and remarkable reign saw our country through the best of times, but our late Queen was also a source of strength in the worst of times, not least in recent years during the pandemic. Her address to the nation in April 2020 was the tonic to a fear and hopelessness that seemed almost insurmountable. She said, “we will meet again”, and we did. We will miss her deeply.
All of those who have had the privilege to serve in our armed forces know there will be a distinct sadness among the armed forces community. This is because, as our head, the late Queen cared about us deeply. Indeed, during the second world war, as a Princess, she chose to serve in the Auxiliary Territorial Service. That closeness to and affection for the armed forces was reciprocated by all who have served. It was not just because we knew she was formidable; it was also because we knew she had a great sense of humour.
Many of us, and my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray) nodded to it, have enjoyed the story told during the platinum jubilee celebrations by a former royal protection officer, Richard Griffin. While accompanying Her late Majesty on a walk near Balmoral, a group approached asking, “Have you ever met the Queen?” Her response was, “No”, before pointing to the protection officer and saying, “but he has!” People did not have to be close to the late Queen to appreciate her sense of humour. The world remembers and will always remember the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics, when she famously was seen to parachute out of a helicopter with Commander James Bond, and who could forget her double act with Paddington?
I am certain that history will judge Her late Majesty as an extraordinary monarch adored by her people, but it will also note that, while the world changed at a rapid rate, the Queen struck the balance perfectly between stability and tradition versus change and modernisation.
A new era now begins, and at this testing moment we must now support the King who is grieving for his mother while leading our nation through a time of mourning.
He has already lived a life of service to others in so many ways, serving in the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force, establishing the Prince’s Trust, and being the patron of many, many charities. Just one example is his role as the Colonel-in-Chief of my old regiment, the Parachute Regiment. Recounting the time he took the parachute training course at RAF Brize Norton, he said:
“I felt I should lead from the front, or at least be able to do some of the things that one expects others to do for our country.”
It is clear that the King will follow the example set before him: to serve, to lead. The torch has been handed to a new monarch, and that sense of duty will continue to burn brightly. Rest in peace, Queen Elizabeth, and God save King Charles.
