It is well documented that Queen Elizabeth II enjoyed doing the washing up at Balmoral. Former royal press secretary Dickie Arbiter spoke about it on the first season of our podcast, and biographer Gyles Brandreth revisited the story in Elizabeth: An Intimate Portrait. He wrote that the Queen found the chore “therapeutic.” In episode 1 of season 5 of A Right Royal Podcast, author Valentine Low adds a new twist. In his book Power and the Palace, he reveals what really happened once the late monarch put down her rubber gloves.
Speaking to hosts Andrea Caamano and HELLO!’s royal editor Emily Nash, Low explained how he uncovered the story. “The source of this was Alex Allen, who was the Prime Minister’s private secretary under John Major,” he says.
“The Prime Minister goes there every year for a weekend in September, the private secretary goes with him, and there’s often a barbecue. In the old days, Prince Philip and Prince Andrew would cook the sausages on the barbecue and all that sort of stuff.
“And famously afterwards, the Queen would do the washing up and, you know, people would leap up to help and they’d be told that she enjoys doing it. So Alex Allen leapt up to help and was just told ‘no no no, the Queen enjoys doing it.'”
He then revealed: “But then this lady-in-waiting said to him, ‘but don’t worry, when they get back to Balmoral, it all goes in the dishwasher anyway.'”
Val goes on to reveal in the episode, which you can listen to below, whether the late Queen knew of the fate of her washed dishes.
Elsewhere in the episode, the former The Times royal correspondent reveals how he found out that the late Queen was a “Remainer” as well as her favourite Prime Minister through the years, and her least favourite.
Val also opens up about learning of the shocking news that Queen Camilla fought off an attempted sexual assault when she was a teenager and what the Palace made of his discovery when he went to them with it.
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