The new king paid tribute to his mother Elisabeth II at his first address to the Nation, after having gone to meet the crowd gathered in front of Buckingham Palace. He then spoke with the Prime Minister, Liz Truss.
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“To my dear mother, who begins her last trip to join my dear dad, I simply want to say thank you.” These words, pronounced at the end of the first speech of King Charles III – He was broadcast on Friday September 9 6 pm, throughout the United Kingdom and beyond-, say the emotion of a man who has just lost her mother first, Queen Elizabeth II who died the day before at the age of 96 years, in its Scottish Château de Balmoral. With warmth and deference, part of the continuity of an exceptional reign, Charles, in black suit, a portrait of the deceased queen on her left, first wanted to reassure.
Because this speaking, just as was the “D-Day”, the first day of his reign, has the value of a test for this 73-year-old sovereign, who has spent decades preparing in the shadow of the sovereign. The moment is delicate: the British fear the passage of the “second era Élisabethaine”, which ended on Thursday – and which the commentators are already raising at that of Elizabeth i re , who reigned From 1558 to 1603 – in the “Carolingian” era. The disappearance of the most enduring monarch in the country -seventy years of reign -, incarnation of the sense of duty and continuity, comes at a moment of fragility for the country.
The United Kingdom accumulates crises: failing public services, a recession that threatens and an energy crisis which risks plunging millions of British into poverty. Not to mention a strong political instability from Brexit: conservative Liz Truss, entering Downing Street only a few days ago, September 6, is the fourth Prime Minister in six years.
“The loss of the queen deprives this country of this anchoring and this comfort [which she procured], precisely when he needs it most,” said Keir Starmer, the leader on Friday of the Labor Party from the House of Commons, collecting the assent of a large part of the elected officials, all sides combined.
For Charles III, there is therefore no question of rushing or evoking too much a uncertain future: serious, the voice much more modulated than this one – famous monocorde – of his mother, he promised in his Address to serve his country “with loyalty, respect and love, as I did throughout my life”. He also subtly wanted to ensure that he had taken the measure of his new role. “As the queen herself did with unshakable dedication, I solemnly engage, during the time that God will give me, to defend the constitutional principles at the heart of our nation.”
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