THE Queen has expressed “displeasure” at David Cameron revealing he encouraged her to meddle in the Scottish independence referendum.
The former Prime Minister told the BBC he asked the Palace if the Queen could “raise an eyebrow” to help after a poll showed Yes edging ahead just before polling day in 2014.
The Queen later told a crowd outside Crathie Kirk in Aberdeenshire she hoped people would “think very carefully about the future”, in a last-minute boost to the No side.
Mr Cameron insisted on Radio 4 on Thursday that he had not asked “anything improper” of the Monarch.
However he admitted he had made a “terrible mistake” in 2014 by telling former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg the Queen “purred down the line” when he told her the result.
After Mr Cameron’s latest disclosure, made in an interview to promote his memoirs, the BBC reported he had upset Buckingham Palace.
A palace source said it served “no one’s interests” for private conversations between the PM and Queen to be public, adding: “It makes it very hard for the relationship to thrive.”
Asked about the criticism, Mr Cameron later said he had tried to give an “honest explanation”.
At First Minister’s Questions, Green MSP Patrick Harvie asked Nicola Sturgeon if she was worried the unelected head of state might “interfere again” in Indyref2.
She said: “Scotland has the right to choose its own future. The revelations - if I can call them that -from David Cameron today say more about him than about anybody else, and they demonstrate the panic that was in the hearts of the UK Government in the run-up to the independence referendum five years ago.
“Of course, that is nothing compared to the panic that is in the hearts of the unionist parties now about independence.
“They are progressively, one by one, making themselves look utterly ridiculous. They are reduced to trying to block or rig Scotland’s democratic right to choose and all because they know that they do not have the arguments against independence.
“They know that, when Scotland is given the right to choose, this time Scotland will choose to become an independent country.”
Alex Salmond, the First Minister in 2014, said he doubted Mr Cameron had secured “a royal intervention”.
He said: “The week after the referendum I was asked to meet the Queen at Balmoral. We discussed Cameron’s ‘purring comments’ to Michael Bloomberg in New York in the aftermath of the referendum, when he again blurted out what he claimed were her private thoughts. Unlike David Cameron, I will not divulge what she said, but suffice to say she was very far from amused at his behaviour.”
Speaking outside the Supreme Court, where she is challenging Boris Johnson’s decision to ask the Queen to prorogue parliament, SNP MP Joanna Cherry QC said Mr Cameron’s behaviour seem to be part of a “pattern” by Tory Prime Ministers.
She said both PMs had attempted to “undermine the independence of the Queen”.
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