In her usual no-nonsense style, Princess Anne, often hailed as the “hardest working royal”, has not allowed recent controversy surrounding her brother, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, to disrupt her royal commitments. The Princess Royal and her husband of 32 years, Vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, have embarked on an overseas tour of Australia and Singapore.
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On Friday, the couple were warmly received in Sydney by Governor-General Sam Mostyn and her husband, Simon Beckett. The pair attended a Welcome to Country and smoking ceremony conducted by Cammeraygal Elder Brendan Kerin at Admiralty House. Sharing images of the meeting on social media, the Governor-General’s office wrote: “The Governor-General and Mr Beckett were delighted to welcome Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal and Vice Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence to Admiralty House today.” The post added that Anne, as Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Australian Corps of Signals, was visiting to celebrate the corps’ centenary. The Governor-General will join her for a wreath-laying ceremony at the Anzac Memorial in Hyde Park, followed by a ceremonial parade at Victoria Barracks.
Royal admirers praised the meeting between the two women, calling them “impressive” and “inspirational”. Anne’s overseas trip, announced by Buckingham Palace last month, runs from 8 to 13 November. The Palace confirmed that the Princess will visit Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane to mark 100 years of the Royal Australian Corps of Signals, and as President of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, will also lay a wreath at the Sydney War Cemetery.
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Following her engagements in Australia, the Princess Royal will travel to Singapore for the final leg of the tour. There, she will commemorate 60 years of diplomatic relations between the UK and Singapore, meeting President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. Her itinerary also includes visits to the Kranji War Memorial, the Airbus Asia Training Centre and Rolls-Royce’s Seletar campus. Anne’s trip follows the King and Queen’s recent nine-day state visit to Australia, underscoring the continuing strength of the Commonwealth connection.
