Former Victorian premier shares endearing story about Queen Elizabeth

Former Victorian premier John Brumby has shared an endearing story about a meeting with the late Queen Elizabeth II at Balmoral in 2010.

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During the Black Saturday bushfires, Her Majesty requested ongoing updates on the fires. When the updates stopped, months after the tragedy, Mr Brumby received unexpected communication from Buckingham Palace.

“A message came back from David Buckingham (Agent General for Australia at the time) saying he’d been contacted by Buckingham Palace and her majesty would be keen to continue receiving the briefs, so she received them for months,” Mr Brumby told Ross and Russel.

The Queen invited Mr Brumby to visit her if he was ever in the UK, and later in 2010 he met her at Balmoral, where he picnicked with her at a cottage.

“We all piled in the Land Rovers, she drove, there were seven corgis,” he said.

“One of the corgis escaped, I had to go and find it down the creek somewhere which I successfully did, which endeared me to the Queen!”

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Image: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images/Andrew Matthews – WPA Pool