"I'm frequently accused of meddling in affairs
that have no concern of mine. I'm always told
I mustn't take sides."
The Duke of Edinburgh. He may be the most
senior man in the royal family, and of course
has been the queen's consort since she took
the throne - but this hasn't stopped him from
being prone to the odd mistake. This week,
when visiting a care centre in Norfolk, he
made a joke about pushing a toddler off an
inflatable ball - which is the latest in a
long line of many Prince Philip indiscretions.
Here are some 
of our favourite gaffes. Let's start with
the 60s. In this decade, the Duke announced
that "British women can't cook". He famously
said he "would like to go to Russia very much"
before accusing the nation of murdering half
his family. He asked Tom Jones if he gargled
with pebbles and said of the Royal Family's
finances: "We go into the red next year. I
shall probably have to give up polo". When
looking at Ethiopian art, he stated "It looks
like the kind of thing my daughter would bring
back from school art lessons". And the Duke
said to a nurse in the Caribbean: "You have
mosquitoes. I have the Press."
I must not be controversial.
Then in the 70s we saw these gems.
On a tour of Canada he said: "We don't come
here for our health. We can think of other
ways of enjoying ourselves" and reportedly
said to a civil servant - "You're just a silly
little Whitehall twit: you don't trust me
and I don't trust you."
The 1980s were also a busy time for the Duke.
In the recession in the early part of the
decade he said: "Everybody was saying we must
have more leisure. Now they are complaining
they are unemployed" and during a visit to
Kenya he asked a lady who presented him with
a gift: "You are a woman aren't you?"
You may think that I spend a rather long time
laying down the law without justification.
And the Duke's troubles abroad continued into
the 90s when in the Cayman Islands, he asked
a local "Aren't most of you descended from
pirates?"
Also in the 90s, he said to survivors after
the Lockerbie bombing he said: "People usually
say that after a fire it is water damage that
is the worst. We're still drying out Windsor
Castle." And of course one of his most famous
gaffes was when he asked a Scottish driving
instructor: "How do you keep the natives off
the booze long enough to pass the test?"
We should be beyond the pint. We have to have
a revolution or something about these things.
And then came the new millennium. Here's a
run down of the 2000s. This classic quote
happened - "People think there's a rigid class
system here, but dukes have been known to
marry chorus girls. Some have even married
Americans." And of course, we all loved this
incident, when he told Elton John: "Oh it's
you that owns that ghastly car is it? We often
see it when driving to Windsor Castle."
During a famous visit to Australia, Prince
Philip said to an Aboriginal leader : "Do
you still throw spears at each other?"
And when chatting with Cate Blanchett, he
asked her to fix his DVD player because she
worked "in the film industry". Priceless.
