High Commissioner for Canada in U.K. discusses King Charles’ visit, throne speech

A historic royal visit is kicking off on Monday.

King Charles is visiting Canada for the 20th time, but this trip marks his first visit to the country since his coronation two years ago. Charles will deliver the throne speech in Ottawa on Tuesday, and will also meet with Prime Minister Mark Carney, Governor General Mary Simon, and spend some time with community members in the nation’s capital.

650 CKOM and 980 CJME will carry the throne speech live on Tuesday.

Read More:

• King Charles, Queen Camilla slated to arrive in Canada today
• King’s throne speech marks ‘pivotal moment’ in Canada’s history, royal watchers say
• Ralph Goodale shares Christmas message from London’s Canada House

Ralph Goodale, high Commissioner for Canada in the United Kingdom, joined the Greg Morgan Morning Show to discuss the visit.

Goodale said its rare for a monarch to deliver the throne speech in person on Canadian soil. In fact, it’s only happened twice before in Canada’s history.

Listen to the full interview here, or read the transcript below:

The following questions and answers have been edited for length and clarity.

GREG MORGAN: King Charles and Queen Camilla are set to touch down in Ottawa today, kicking off the royals’ first visit to Canada since the coronation two years ago. Today, the two will attend a community gathering in Ottawa. I believe they’re planting a ceremonial tree. They’re meeting with the governor general, and then tomorrow the royals will arrive by horse-drawn carriage to deliver the speech from the throne. (Charles) will become only the second monarch to do so. Usually it’s the governor general. The King’s mother, Queen Elizabeth II, read the speech way back in 1957 and 1977, and my next guest was at one of those speeches.

For some insight into the significance of King Charles’ throne speech tomorrow, I’m really happy to be joined by the High Commissioner for Canada in the United Kingdom, Ralph Goodale. Did you just drop the King off at the airport?

RALPH GOODALE: Yes, I did. He left this morning from a Royal Air Force base just outside of London, and I was there to send him off, along with Corporal Colin Paul of the RCMP.

Canada House features 16 rooms named for Canada’s provinces, territories and oceans. The chairs in the Saskatchewan Room are a bright shade of emerald. “Rider green!” Goodale explained with a smile. (Brittany Caffet/650 CKOM)

I mentioned how the Queen had given the address before. You were a young MP, I believe, in 1977 when you were there. I mentioned that because you probably have the best insight into what it’s like. So what are we expecting?

GOODALE: There’s a lot of ceremony involved, but it really is the pinnacle of the performance of our system of democracy. A new parliament has just been elected. There’s a new prime minister in place, a new government in place. There’s a minority parliament, and the government is going to lay out its agenda for dealing with the important issues that are before the country right now, both domestically and internationally. The head of state lays out that agenda. It’s written by the government, obviously, but the head of state is the one that delivers the speech and, on this occasion because of the importance and the historic significance of this occasion, that speech will be delivered by the King himself. I think that indicates the fact that he’s making the special trip to be in Ottawa for this specific purpose. It underlines the importance and the significance of the occasion.

The King is reading the speech at the request of Prime Minister Mark Carney. Do you think he asked the King to do this with our sovereignty in mind on purpose, to help really send a message to the rest of the political world?

GOODALE: It’s an important occasion in itself. As you pointed out, it’s rare when the monarch actually does this in person. This will only be the third time in Canadian history. But the world is a turbulent place these days. There are economic issues around the world. There are geopolitical security issues around the world. This is a message of reassurance. It’s a message of strength and support. It shows that our system of democracy in a free, independent, sovereign country is functioning very well, and that is an important message to send, both to Canadians who need that reassurance and to the rest of the world and to anyone else who’s watching.

You were with the King last week at Canada House. What would we be surprised to learn from those moments that you shared with the King?

GOODALE: He has always been very interested in Canada and very supportive of Canada. He’s visited the country 19 times already, but this will be the first visit as head of state, as the reigning monarch. One of the things that we did at Canada House last week was to lay out a huge map on the floor – which was provided by the Royal Canadian Geographical Society – and we showed the juxtaposition of the two countries. Canada is 40 times bigger than the United Kingdom. You could put all of the United Kingdom into the four corners of the province of Saskatchewan. In that space, we have about one million people, and in the U.K. they have pretty close to 70 million people, so you get the sense of the difference in size, the difference in density, the difference in distance that is intrinsic in how the two countries feel and go about their daily lives.

But he was very interested to see all of the places laid out on that map where he has previously visited in big urban centers and far-flung rural communities, Indigenous communities. He’s been to the far north (and) he’s been as far south as Canada goes, so he was just getting a sense of where he’s been already and where he will be on this trip and future visits to Canada.

This one is very short, so he will be coming back in the relatively near future. That’s always difficult in planning royal agendas, but they’re already looking forward to the next visit to Canada when they’ll be able to spend more time and travel to more places and meet more Canadians and show that tangible support for Canada as a country they really love.