David Bridges
King Charles has raised eyebrows after greeting Liz Truss with the words “dear, oh dear” at Buckingham Palace on Wednesday evening.
A clip of their meeting released by the Palace taken at the beginning of their weekly audience shows a pair of double doors being opened by staff and the prime minister being escorted inside by the King’s equerry.
As Ms Truss enters the reception room, the equerry announces her, saying: “Prime minister, Your Majesty.”
Ms Truss steps forward to shake hands with the King, bowing as she does so.
“Your Majesty, great to see you again,” she says.
King Charles, smiling, replies: “Back again?”
To which Ms Truss responded: “Well, it’s a great pleasure.”
The King replies: “Dear, oh dear. Anyway.”
Social media has lit up with responses to the uncomfortable exchange.
“King Charles is now a ‘woke lefty’ and has joined ‘the anti-growth coalition’”, wrote one Twitter user, while another said: “Not a royalist but the savagery of ‘dear oh dear, anyway’ has sent me.”
Another user described the monarch’s comment as having “great energy”, while one posited: “Can you imagine being so right-wing that even the royals don’t like you?”
“Political awkwardness and unintentional comedy at its finest,” wrote another.
A number of social media users have called on the leader of the opposition, Sir Keir Starmer, to begin next week’s PMQs with, “Back again? Dear, oh dear, anyway.”
The meeting followed Ms Truss’ first PMQs since the mini-Budget, where she insisted that she would not cut public spending in a standoff with Sir Keir.
It also comes after King Charles announced he would not attend Cop27 in Egypt next month following reports that Ms Truss objected to the monarch making an appearance at the international climate change summit.
Reports quote palace and government sources as saying that the monarch reached the decision after consultation with the Prime Minister and that any suggestion of a disagreement was untrue.
Clara Hastings
