I, Charles, Prince of Wales, do become your liege man of life and limb and of earthly worship and faith and truth I will bear unto you to live and di… - Charles III

Medieval Islam was a religion of remarkable tolerance for its time, allowing Jews and Christians the right to practise their inherited beliefs, and setting an example which was not, unfortunately, copied for many centuries in the West. The surprise, ladies and gentlemen, is the extent to which Islam has been a part of Europe for so long, first in Spain, then in the Balkans, and the extent to which it has contributed so much towards the civilisation which we all too often think of, wrongly, as entirely Western. Islam is part of our past and our present, in all fields of human endeavour. It has helped to create modern Europe. It is part of our own inheritance, not a thing apart.

When my dear late mother, Queen Elizabeth II, opened a new Canadian Parliament in 1957, the Second World War remained a fresh, painful memory. The Cold War was intensifying. Freedom and democracy were under threat. Canada was emerging as a growing economic power and a force for peace in the world. In the decades since, history has been punctuated by epoch-making events: the Vietnam War, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the start of the War on Terror. Today, Canada faces another critical moment. Democracy, pluralism, the rule of law, self-determination, and freedom are values which Canadians hold dear, and ones which the Government is determined to protect. The system of open global trade that, while not perfect, has helped to deliver prosperity for Canadians for decades, is changing. Canada’s relationships with partners are also changing.

There is a persistent current that flows along undermining the integrity and motives of individuals, organisations and institutions. An insidious impression is thereby created that, for instance, the police are corrupt, British justice is flawed, the BBC is moribund and public servants are time-serving wasters of taxpayers' money. Can we really believe the fashionable theorists in the English faculties of our universities who have tried to tear apart many of our wonderful novelists, poets and playwrights because they do not fit their abstruse theories of the day?