Politicians and religious leaders share their funny, private memories of the Queen

Theresa May was the unlikely comedic first turn in parliament today as politicians and religious leaders shared their heartwarming personal memories of the Queen following her death.

The former prime minister, known for her serious demeanor, had MPs laughing as she recounted an incident with a rogue cheese at a Balmoral picnic.

She was among a number of MPs who mixed fond lighthearted memories in with the more somber tributes that followed the monarch’s death yesterday.

The Archbishop of Canterbury also dryly remarked on his ‘fortitude’ as he recounted in the Lords the experience of a winter barbecue with the Royal Family at Sandringham. He also remarked on her ‘dry sense of humour’, adding: ‘The Church of England was very capable of giving her material.’

She was among a number of MPs who mixed fond lighthearted memories in with the more sombre tributes that followed the monarch’s death yesterday.

The Archbishop of Canterbury also dryly remarked on his ‘fortitude’ as he recounted in the Lords the experience of a winter barbecue with the Royal Family at Sandringham.

He also remarked on her ‘dry sense of humour’, adding: ‘The Church of England was very capable of giving her material.’

Mr May reduced the whole House of Commons to laughter with a story about the Queen and some dropped cheese.

The Maidenhead MP said: ‘Her Majesty loved the countryside, and she was down to earth and a woman of common sense.

‘I remember one picnic at Balmoral, which was taking place in one of the bothies on the estate. The hampers came from the castle, and we all mucked in to put the food and drink out on the table.

‘I picked up some cheese, put it on a plate and was transferring it to the table. The cheese fell on the floor. I had a split-second decision to make.’

Mrs May paused as MPs burst into laughter, before adding: ‘I picked up the cheese, put it on the plate and put it on the table. I turned round to see that my every move had been watched very carefully by Her Majesty the Queen.

‘I looked at her. She looked at me and she just smiled. And the cheese remained on the table.’

Afterward, Dame Andrea Leadsom, the former minister, recounted her own experience with the Queen at Christmas. 

Recounting a January visit to Sandringham for a Privy Council meeting she told MPs: ‘I recall the Queen saying what a busy Christmas she had had. And I suggested well at last her family didn’t have to pause Christmas lunch for the Queen’s speech. 

‘Which she told me they most certainly did. As per all of us, the family would pause Christmas lunch and watch the Queen’s speech and Princess Charlotte had run over to the tv screen and said ”look there’s gan-gan”. Very heartwarming.’  

Afterward, Dame Andrea Leadsom, the former minister, recounted her own experience with the Queen at Christmas.

In the Lords,  The Most Rev Justin Welby sparked laughter in as he recounted the holding of barbeques in January at the late Queen’s country seat of Sandringham in Norfolk.

He said: ‘One of the greatest privileges of sitting on these benches is that within a year or so of becoming a diocesan bishop you are invited to spend a weekend at Sandringham and there, often in January, you go for a barbeque – fortitude.’

He went on: ‘And you have the enormous gift given to you of being able to spend time with her late Majesty, with her family, with the jigsaw puzzle and all the other things that are there.

‘Thus on behalf of these benches I know from the conversations we have among ourselves that there is a profound sense of personal sorrow and an even more profound sense of the significance of the virtues of the characteristics of the late Queen.’

The top cleric sparked further laughter when he added: ‘She had a dry sense of humour and the ability to spot the absurd. The Church of England was very capable of giving her material. But she never exercised that at the expense of others.

‘Her memory when I last saw her in June was as sharp as it could ever have been. She remembered meetings 40, 50 years ago and drew on lessons from those times to speak of today and what we needed to learn.’