The Duke of Edinburgh: the BBC (and its audience) have got it right

The hardest speech I ever had to give as an MP was two days after 9/11. I was due to do the awards night at a local secondary school and was completely lost as to what to say. What was one to offer young people in terms of encouragement about their future, their hopes and dreams, when they had been witnesses to the horror of what their world appeared to be? 

In the end what struck me as the most remarkable element of the events was what was emerging of the calls that people on the planes had made, when they were in the midst of terror, and some were realising that they were about to die. I told my young audience that people had not made calls of hate, or anger or rage — but of love. What had poured out of them at such a moment was their love for those they called, and how they used their precious time, almost unconsciously and certainly impulsively, for such a positive purpose. That should be their abiding memory of 9/11, that such a power and emotion truly overrode so much else. Their future could be secure, after all.

This has all come back to me this weekend. Like many millions, I have been listening to public broadcasting following the announcement of the death of HRH The Duke of Edinburgh. I confess that I turn almost automatically to the BBC at such moments. I do not feel let down. From the moment Martine Croxhall handled the moment perfectly, her professionalism as visible as her emotion, I have found the coverage spot on. The piece put together by Andy Marr and producer Sally Norris was pitch perfect, made deeply memorable by the comments from members of the Royal Family, clearly being asked to recall a father, not yet gone, for our benefit. Talk about a sense of duty — I was awed. 

However the response from so many members of the public has also left me somewhat awed. Occasionally those who have had the privilege to represent the British people, in my case for 33 years, can still be surprised by them. The anecdotes and memories of chance encounters with Prince Philip have been, by turns, humorous, poignant and sometimes damn moving, not least from those who had their lives transformed by the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme. But while those might have been expected, what might not has been the connection so many callers have made between their sense of loss for their loved ones, and Her Majesty the Queen’s sense of bereavement after such a long marriage partnership. 

Story after story has emerged from a series of programmes on Radio 2, where sensitive and experienced presenters, after gently explaining that their programme would be “somewhat different”, have played a reflective choice of music, and encouraged the publics’ contributions. People have called in, remembering their loved ones, from so many different contexts. Those that have died this year through Covid are especially sad, but memorable also are the many memories which have been awakened of those who may have died years before — husbands, wives, partners, siblings, parents and others. What appears to have been unlocked is not just some civic outpouring for a truly remarkable man of service, but people’s own sense of the value of those they have lost. Above all, it is the sense of love which has come from so many stories, particularly from those who have lost someone after many years, or children of parents in such relationships. The sadness of such partings is reflected in their awareness of, and grief for, the personal loss suffered by a wife who is also a monarch — experiencing the heartbreak, however inevitable, from the ultimate severing of a lifelong love and friendship. Queen and people have come together with an unexpected naturalness, about love.  

So, I gently reject the criticism by some of “excess” in the BBC’s coverage. I am glad we have been asked to pause over the past few days from our own lives, just to consider for a short time that we are all part of a greater whole, and that it is not always about us. The BBC has caught the mood well, and its public has responded. The stories are authentic and honest, the combination of so many memories of the Duke, owing to his length of service, combining with remembrance of personal loved ones, to create a touching mosaic of today’s United Kingdom. 

One listener said it was as if his last service to our country had been to allow us a moment of reflection for what was truly important in life. 

None of us could have put it better. 

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