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Friday, 1 March, 2002, 12:38 GMT
Long line of princely gaffes
International diplomacy is not Prince Philip's strong suit
The Duke of Edinburgh gave another foot-in-mouth display when he asked a Tamil priest about any links to the militant fighters the Tamil Tigers, during a visit to a Hindu temple with the Queen on her Golden Jubilee tour.
Such gaffes have become the prince's trademark while going about his official duties.
 British women can't cook. |
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| The Duke of Edinburgh |
During a state visit to China in 1986, he famously told a group of British students: "If you stay here much longer, you'll all be slitty-eyed".
And speaking to a driving instructor in Oban, Scotland, he asked: "How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to get them through the test?".
Other eyebrow-raising pronouncements have included:
- Still throwing spears? (Question put to an Australian Aborigine during a visit in March 2002)
- "British women can't cook." (1966)
- "Everybody was saying we must have more leisure. Now they are complaining they are unemployed." (during the 1981 recession)
- "We didn't have counsellors rushing around every time somebody let off a gun, asking 'Are you all right? Are you sure you don't have a ghastly problem?' You just got on with it." (commenting in 1995 on modern stress counselling for servicemen)
- "If a cricketer, for instance, suddenly decided to go into a school and batter a lot of people to death with a cricket bat, which he could do very easily, I mean, are you going to ban cricket bats?" (in 1996, amid calls to ban firearms after the Dunblane shooting)
- "Bloody silly fool!" (in 1997, referring to a Cambridge University car park attendant who failed to recognise him)
- "It looks as if it was put in by an Indian." (in 1999, referring to an old-fashioned fuse box in a factory near Edinburgh)
- "Deaf? If you are near there, no wonder you are deaf." (in 1999, to young deaf people in Cardiff, referring to a school's steel band)
- "They must be out of their minds." (in 1982, in the Solomon Islands, after being told that the annual population growth was only 5%)
- "You are a woman, aren't you?" (in 1984, in Kenya, to a native woman who had presented him with a small gift) If it has got four legs and it is not a chair, if it has got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane, and if it swims and it is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it
The Duke of Edinburgh - "Your country is one of the most notorious centres of trading in endangered species in the world." (in 1991, in Thailand, after accepting a conservation award)
- "Oh no, I might catch some ghastly disease." (in 1992 in Australia, when asked to stroke a Koala bear)
- "You can't have been here that long - you haven't got a pot belly." (in 1993, to a Briton in Budapest, Hungary)
- "Aren't most of you descended from pirates?" (in 1994, to an islander in the Cayman Islands)
- "You managed not to get eaten, then?" (in 1998, to a student who had been trekking in Papua New Guinea)
- "If it has got four legs and it is not a chair, if it has got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane, and if it swims and it is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it." (at a 1986 World Wildlife Fund meeting)
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