Mother of All Parliaments

The other week I took advantage of the fact that the UK Parliament is in recess until early October to take a public tour of the old place. The official name of the Victorian pile where they meet is the Palace of Westminster. Once the home of the royal family, officially remains a royal palace. The site was used as a royal residence until Henry VIII moved the royal family out in 1512 following a fire.

After passing through several layers of logical, thorough, polite British security, I entered the complex through Westminster Hall--a room I've wanted to visit for a good part of my life. Westminster Hall is the oldest part of Parliament. Once used as a law court, the hall has held several notable trials, including that of Sir William Wallace (1305), the Gunpowder Plot conspirators (1606) and King Charles I (1649). Today the hall is used for important state occasions and the lying-in-state of famous Britons. The walls were built in 1097, but the thing I really wanted to see was the huge hammerbeam roof from the 1390s. It's one of the best examples of that kind of architecture in world and amazing that it wasn't destroyed in WWII.

It was in the Hall that our tour group met Nigel, a well-informed guide. A retired Metropolitan police officer, he prefaced and punctuated almost every sentence with, "Ladies and gents." Nigel led us first to the west end of Westminster Palace--the royal end, one could say. We saw the Monarch's Entrance, Her Majesty's Robing Room where Elizabeth II gets dolled up to open the Parliament every fall, the Royal Gallery and finally the House of Lords. All of these rooms were decorated in opulent colors: red and gold, mostly. The decor is really over-the-top Victorian. Most opulent of all was the throne where the monarch opens Parliament every year.

As we made our way through the central lobby to the Commons side of the palace, the opulence vanished and one was left with subdued colors, predominantly green, wood paneling and plain stone walls. Nigel brought us into the antechamber outside the Commons where there are statues and bust of former prime ministers. There was a scary statue of Margaret Thatcher: she's pointing at someone or something and looked as though she might speak.

A highlight of the tour was to stand in the House of Commons. I know it's corny, but I couldn't help but think of the important issues discussed there, the lively speeches given and the great people who have served the British people. We stood amongst the government's benches looking over at the opposition side. On departing I even got to touch the dispatch box from which the PM and his ministers speak.