Elizabeth II spent thousands of hours holding weekly audiences with PMs
Queen Elizabeth II spent more time meeting with Prime Minister’s than Liz Truss did actually being one.
Throughout her reign, the monarch would hold a 30-minute audience every week with whoever the prime minister was at the time.
During the pandemic, this was reduced to a meeting every other week.
This means that over her 70 years on the throne, Her Majesty spent roughly 1,760 hours with prime ministers, the Metro reports.
This is more than 700 hours longer than Liz Truss was in Number 10 for.
The soon-to-be-ex Prime Minister announced her resignation on Thursday afternoon following a meeting with Sir Graham Brady, the chairman of the influential 1922 Committee of backbench MPs.
She was in office for just 44 days, which is 1,056 hours.
So Queen Elizabeth II spent more time chatting and discussing the politics of the day with PM’s, than Truss spent in office.
Assuming the weekly audience is 30 mins, the queen spent longer meeting prime ministers than truss spent being one.
— Tom Whipple (@whippletom) October 20, 2022
Just two days before her passing, the Queen met with Liz Truss in what was her last official engagement.
Truss became the 15th prime minister to serve Her Majesty.
But if the political merry go round continues at the current rate, some have joked that King Charles III could surpass this total within a couple of years.
By next week, the country will have its third prime minister in just two months as Truss announced the Conservative party would hold a fast-tracked leadership election.
Candidates for the Tory leadership will need at least 100 nominations from Tory MPs to enter the contest, significantly higher than the last contest, where only 20 nominations were needed.
Because there are only 357 Tory MPs, a maximum of three candidates will be able to enter the race.
The current front runners are Rishi Sunak (who Truss of course beat in the leadership election last month), Penny Mordaunt and a certain Mr Johnson…
Related links:
- Liz Truss entitled to £115,000 a year for the rest of her life – despite only being PM for 44 days
- Joe Lycett trolls Liz Truss following her resignation
- Truss resignation sparks market recovery – with pound shooting up
