• Scott Morrison recalls meeting the Queen at Buckingham Palace.
• Former Australian Prime Minister says she made him feel right at home in an instant.
• The Queen was the first reigning monarch to set foot on Australian soil in 1954.

Former Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said that meeting the Queen was the most nerve-racking experience of his life.

The former leader recalled how he and his wife Jenny had rushed to get ready for the event at Buckingham Palace in 2019.

The Queen, he said, “immediately picks it out of the bag, she’s flicking through it like a schoolgirl, she lit up like you wouldn’t believe”.

It was a time of relief and levity for everyone. Queen Elizabeth II “made us feel right at home in an instant.”

She was the first reigning monarch to set foot on Australian soil in 1954. According to Mr. Morrison, it was the beginning of a special bond with Australia and its people.

“She loved this country,” he said. “She’d been here 16 times. You don’t do that if you don’t like the place, and she came back again and again and again.”

He claimed that the Queen understood the country and life on the land.

“I believe she admired the tenacity of Australians who work and live off the land here,” he explained. “I believe she greatly respected them, and I believe she greatly encouraged them.”

“They had a particular bond with her as Australians – even more so than perhaps anyone else here in the country.”

Australia’s relationship with the Royal Family has not been easy, but its admiration for the Queen has endured.

A referendum was held in 1999 to determine whether the country should formally become a republic.

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