Queen Elizabeth mentioned her personal views on the Brexit referendum over lunch with then-US President Barack Obama, a brand new guide claims.
Queen Elizabeth is alleged to have mentioned her views on Brexit with Barack Obama (Picture: Getty)
Queen Elizabeth II was dismayed that Lord Cameron left the destiny of Britain’s membership with the European Union to a public vote, former US President Barack Obama has revealed. The late Queen, who as monarch needed to stay politically neutral and expressed no public views on Brexit, is alleged to have mentioned the matter with the then US President over lunch.
Recalling the dialog in a brand new guide concerning the Queen’s relationship with America, Mr Obama stated she didn’t consider that “as massive a call” because the UK leaving the European Union “ought to have been determined by plebiscite”.
He stated: “‘She [Elizabeth II] stated, successfully, ‘It is exhausting to grasp why a major minister, who presumably understands politics, would put a public referendum ahead that he did not know what the reply can be of such significance’.”
Mr Obama was interviewed by award-winning US journalist Susan Web page for her new guide, The Queen and Her Presidents: The Hidden Hand That Formed Historical past.
He’s one among 4 presidents and three prime ministers to be interviewed for the guide, with traces her relationship with 13 US Presidents – proper as much as Donald Trump.
In an account of a 2016 lunch with President Obama the writer writes: “They mentioned the largest present controversy in Nice Britain, over Brexit. Her view on whether or not to depart the European Union was the topic of countless hypothesis throughout her reign and after her loss of life.”
The Queen, who famously wore a blue hat with yellow flowers that bore a hanging resemblance to the European Union flag, by no means mentioned her views on the political matter – although there was a lot hypothesis on the matter.
Queen Elizabeth as soon as wore a hat that resembled the EU flag (Picture: Getty)
However Ms Web page says that she brazenly mentioned the subject with Mr Obama, with whom she loved a heat relationship.
“On the fercest time of the furore, she had expressed her actual views to Obama,” she writes. “It was an indication of the affinity and the belief she felt for him. At their luncheon, she was not solely cautious of Brexit but in addition dismayed by how Cameron was dealing with it – a really uncommon royal critique of a major minister, in public or personal.
“In a calculation that turned out to be disastrously unsuitable, Cameron had known as a referendum for June, two months away.”
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It was understood to be the one time she had remarked to him about up to date British politics.
The Queen and Her Presidents: The Hidden Hand That Formed Historical past by Susan Web page (Harper, £20.55) is revealed on April 23
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