Buckingham Palace, 25 October 1974
Personal And Confidential
Thank you very much for your letter of 24th October and for having sent me Morrice James’ account of a discussion after dinner, which Mr Whitlam gave in honour of Prince Charles, at which UK/ Australian Constitutional matters were discussed.2
I showed this to The Queen this morning who read it with interest. I wonder if Prince Charles was as mute as is suggested by Morrice’s letter!
Whitlam, of course, said nothing new but the fact that the conversation took place emphasizes, in my view, that these difficult questions are not going to go away.
1 Antony Acland, Principal Private Secretary to the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary, 1972–75.
2 See Document 487.
[UKNA: FCO 24/1933]