The Queen summons William Hague to Buckingham Palace

The Queen has summoned William Hague, the foreign secretary, to a private meeting  Tim Walker. Edited by Richard Eden

7:30AM GMT 07 Dec 2013

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Buckingham Palace 'hired out' for bank dinner

JP Morgan, the US investment bank, is reported to have hired Buckingham Palace for a dinner, hosted by the Duke of York, and attended by the bank's clients and associates, along with Tony Blair and Kofi Annan

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Prince Charles takes over Buckingham Palace for party fit for a king

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Choosing how to celebrate a landmark birthday is always tricky. For the Prince of Wales, the answer was a lavish party in the palace that will become his home, to the music of Richard Wagner.

The celebration took place in Buckingham Palace last Thursday, with 400 guests including George Osborne, the Chancellor, and his wife, Frances, and some of the wealthiest people in Britain.

“It was an exquisite evening,” one of the invitees tells Mandrake. “It started with a champagne reception and then there was a concert performed by the Philharmonia Orchestra.”

The event, which cost £500,000, was paid for Cyrus Vandrevala, the Indian private equity tycoon and philanthropist, and his wife, Priya. She was seated at the head of the table next to Prince Charles, while her husband was placed next to Charles’s wife, the Duchess of Cornwall.

The couple have become close to Charles and Camilla through their financial support of the Elephant Family conservation charity, which was founded by Mark Shand, the Duchess’s brother.

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“We are lucky that His Royal Highness has chosen to celebrate his birthday with us,” they said on the invitation. “But even tonight, as with so much of his life, he is on duty on behalf of the country. Indeed, this whole wonderful celebration evening will help bring benefit to so many.”

As well as marking the heir to the throne’s birthday, the party celebrated the 35th anniversary of his patronage of the Philharmonia, and the bicentenary of Wagner.

The Prince chose the music for the concert, at which parts of the German composer’s Ring Cycle were performed. The event took 12 months to plan.

“We have long enjoyed supporting His Royal Highness with all of his great works and we should all be grateful that there is someone like him leading the way in so many fields of philanthropy, partticularly in the arts, where so much support is needed.”

They add: “It is not elitist, and we are honoured to support such excellence, In our book, His Royal Highness represents excellence and achievement of the highest order.”

Among the guests at the party were Lakshmi Mittal, Britain’s fourth richest man, and his wife, Usha, along with the Hinduja brothers, Sri and Gopi, who are the country’s third wealthiest, with their spouses.

The Prince’s close friend Nicholas Soames, the Conservative MP, was there with his wife, Serena. Gert-Rudolph Flick, the heir to the Daimler-Benz fortune, and his wife, Corinne, attended, as well as the new American ambassador, Matthew Barzun.

The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh were conspicuous by their absence. By convention, the heir to the throne can host parties at Buckingham Palace only when the monarch is not resident. The Queen is believed to have been at Windsor Castle.

Charles’s birthday was seven days earlier, on November 14, but he and the Duchess were in the Indian state of Kerala, on a visit before they attended the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Sri Lanka.

Read more from Mandrake here

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Daleks infiltrate Buckingham Palace as Doctor Who celebrates 50th anniversary

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Buckingham Palace has had its share of intruder alerts over the years, but never has royal security been threatened by anything as formidable as a Dalek – until today.

Thankfully, no fewer than four Doctor Whos materialised to prevent the Queen being exterminated as they attended a reception to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the BBC series.

Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Matt Smith and John Hurt – who plays a previously unknown “dark” incarnation of the Time Lord in this weekend’s anniversary edition – were among the guests invited to the Palace by the Countess of Wessex.

The Countess of Wessex confessed to being frightened by Daleks when she was younger (EDDIE MULHOLLAND FOR THE TELEGRAPH)

The Countess told the four Doctors that she was a fan of the series as a child, watching it with her brother, David, though she insisted she was “braver than him”.

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Tom Baker, 79, who played the Doctor from 1974 to 1981, said: “She told me I was her favourite Doctor, which is very thrilling and very flattering and I will probably never recover.”

The Countess looked delighted to meet K9 (EDDIE MULHOLLAND FOR THE TELEGRAPH)

Smith, 31, said the Countess had told him “she was frightened by the Daleks when she was a kid”, while Davison, 62, said the sight of two Daleks and a Tardis in the Bow Room of Buckingham Palace was “the most incongruous thing I’ve ever seen”.

On Saturday the anniversary episode will be broadcast simultaneously in 84 countries, and Smith, 31, who bows out as the Doctor later this year, admitted that being reunited with cast and crew members brought home to him the fact that he had moved on.

Attending the reception with his mother Lynne, he said: “Just seeing my old friends that I work with and the kids and the Daleks here and you think it was a great job, but I left. No use crying over spilt milk.

Trying out a sonic screwdriver (EDDIE MULHOLLAND FOR THE TELEGRAPH)

“Who knows, in 50 years if they will let me come back, I will.

“As of Christmas Day it’s on to Peter (Capaldi). I wish him all the best.”

Baker, who still plays the Doctor in audio adventures, said: “Everything else after playing the Doctor is a downer. He is a hero, but do-gooders are frightful bores, whereas the Doctor is a do-gooder who’s whimsical and funny and children can identify with and is naughty sometimes, and silly sometimes.”

Sophie Wessex during the reception (EDDIE MULHOLLAND FOR THE TELEGRAPH)

Hurt, 73, said: “I hadn’t realised before I got to play the Doctor just how huge it has become. I thought it would be amusing to do it, and thought it had cult status, but it has gone mainstream, it is shown in so many countries.

“My involvement was just a one-off but I can see how it would be incredibly addictive.”

Asked if there was friendly rivalry between the actors who have played the Doctor in his 13 incarnations, Davison, 62, said: “I think secretly we all think we are the best Doctor, but there is great camaraderie between us.”

Jenna-Louise Coleman, who plays the Doctor’s current assistant, Clara Oswald, disclosed that she has already filmed her first scenes with Peter Capaldi, who takes over as the 13th Doctor at Christmas, and “he’s definitely arrived”.

Jenna Louise Coleman, left, and Catherine Tate were among the guests (EDDIE MULHOLLAND FOR THE TELEGRAPH)

Catherine Tate, who played former assistant Donna Noble, said it was “incredible” to be celebrating the show’s 50th year, adding: “There’s a lot of people here I’ve never met, even though we’re all part of the same brand, like Tom Baker – he was my Doctor as a child.”

Lord Hall, the BBC director-general, said: “Right back to your childhood you remember things like Doctor Who that are quintessentially BBC and bring everyone together.”

Lord Hall, who told Radio Times this week that the most exciting moment of his time as head of the BBC was getting the chance to “fly” the Tardis on a visit to the set in Cardiff, added: “It keeps regenerating so I hope it will still be going for another 50 years.”

Also at the reception were children from two Cardiff schools, Gladstone Primary and Mount Stuart Primary, who entered a local competition to design a Tardis for the Queen.

The Time Lords parked the Tardis at the back of Buckingham Palace during the reception (EDDIE MULHOLLAND FOR THE TELEGRAPH)

One of the winners, Hafza Hassan, 10, had painted a gold-plated time machine with a Union flag door, which the Countess joked would be “very expensive to make”, while Emily Parnce, 11, had included a dog flap for the Queen’s corgis and an illuminated crown on the roof.

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In Doctor Who

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Daleks to invade Buckingham Palace

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The Daleks will descend on Buckingham Palace next week at a reception to mark the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who.

Doctors past and present will join the Countess of Wessex at the Queen's London home for a special celebration of the BBC's long-running hit science fiction show.

The Time Lord's TARDIS will also journey to the royal residence, alongside other props such as costumes worn by the Doctors and a Dalek, the Doctor's arch enemy.

The BBC's Director General Lord Hall will join former Doctors' assistants, programme writers and members of the production team in the Bow Room of the Palace for the reception on Monday November 18.

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The series celebrates its 50th birthday later this month with a TV drama about the early days of the show called An Adventure In Space And Time, followed by an anniversary episode on November 23 called The Day of the Doctor with the current Doctor, Matt Smith, as well as his predecessor David Tennant.

Smith's stint as the Time Lord ends this year when he will be replaced by Peter Capaldi, best known for his role as the spin doctor Malcolm Tucker in the BBC series The Thick of It.

The Countess will also meet young competition winners from two schools in South Wales where scenes from the 50th episode were filmed. The children will show Sophie their winning drawings of "The Queen's TARDIS".

Doctor Who holds the Guinness World Record for the longest running science fiction series in the world. It began on 23 November 1963, starring William Hartnell as the Doctor and there have been 11 Doctors to date.

PICTURE SPECIAL: DOCTOR WHO - THE TIMELORDS

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