OTTAWA In her 60 years on the throne, Queen Elizabeth II has presided over 20 Parliaments in Canada, featuring 11 prime ministers and 11 governors general.

What is it like to work for the Queen? Former prime ministers and governors general offer glimpses of working life under Her Majesty’s rule.

Michaëlle Jean

No one tells you when you are named governor general that you might end up doing dishes with the Queen. But this is what happened in 2005 as Michaëlle Jean was preparing to take up her new role as the Queen’s representative in Canada.

About three weeks before her formal installation, Jean spent some time with the Queen at Balmoral Castle. Rather unusually, in terms of protocol and precedence, Jean brought along her husband, filmmaker Jean-Daniel Lafond, and their daughter, Marie-Eden, then six years old.

When Jean and her family arrived at Balmoral, the Queen and Prince Philip were standing at the front door like any weekend hosts, casually walking out and extending their hands. Philip pulled Marie aside and asked if she wanted a Coca-Cola. Marie said she wasn’t allowed to have this at home.

“It’ll just be between you and me,” Philip replied. Jean realized, then and there, that she could start breathing.

The Queen led the family to their quarters, which happened to be Queen Victoria’s old suite, and showed them how to use the tub, including the fussy new faucets installed after a recent renovation.

“She wanted to greet us in her home, herself.”

The entire stay turned out to be a remarkable glimpse into the warm family life of the royals.

The Queen told Jean they would be dining at a favourite cottage on the property, about a half-hour’s drive from the castle. The driver turned out to be none other than the Queen herself, behind the wheel of a new, fully outfitted Range Rover, which clearly was a prized possession.

Tearing along the road with Lafond in front and Jean and Marie in the back seat, the Queen told of how she had learned to take apart car engines as a volunteer mechanic during the Second World War.

“She drives very fast. (Yet) she handles the car very well … We got a great sense of her character and her independence.”

Pulling up to the cottage, Jean noticed a man by the barbecue wearing hunting plaid, who had obviously been given the task of cooking the dinner. While the Queen and the rest of Jean’s family went inside the cottage, Jean wandered over and discovered another surprise — Prince Philip doing barbecue duty.

They chatted and Philip gave Jean a bit of advice: compliment the Queen on her salad dressing. Apparently it’s a recipe that Her Majesty invented and she is quite proud of it.

Walking inside, Jean discovered a hive of kitchen activity. “And who do I see cooking? The Earl of Wessex (Edward, the Queen’s youngest son), cooking the appetizers.”

No staff members were in sight. This was a dinner entirely created by the royals for their Canadian visitors. It was one family dining with another.

“It was great conversation, fun ... no protocol.”

It also happened to be Jean’s 48th birthday — a fact she hadn’t disclosed. But a cake appeared at the end of dinner with “21 Forever” written in icing.

After dinner, both families gathered up the plates, went into the kitchen and did the dishes.

“It was probably the best birthday of my life.”

Adrienne Clarkson

The Queen’s last big anniversary was in 2002, when she marked half a century on the throne. In honour of this milestone, Commonwealth governors general were invited to spend time with the Queen at Windsor Castle that April. Canada’s governor general at the time was Adrienne Clarkson.

The Queen had lost her mother and her sister earlier that year and was officially in mourning, but the ceremonies went ahead.

Clarkson and the other governors general were taken through a gallery featuring the royal art collection with works by masters such as Rembrandt, Rubens and Titian.

Once in her room, Clarkson had a little time to kill before tea with the Queen, and she set out on her own to take a closer look at the paintings.

Entranced by the art, Clarkson kept walking along the castle’s cavernous corridors, without taking note of her route.

“Suddenly, I thought: ‘How do I get back to our room?’” Clarkson said. Realizing she was lost, Clarkson kept looking at the paintings while watching for an exit.

Suddenly, along came a dozen of the Queen’s corgis and dachshund-corgi mixes. Clarkson made a snap decision to follow the dogs in order to find her way out of the art-lined maze.

“I sort of rushed behind them. We turned a corner … and there is Her Majesty, standing in riding clothes, looking hale and hardy. She had a riding crop in one hand and in her other hand she had little treats that she was giving to the corgis.”

Unruffled, the Queen said a friendly hello and then a breezy, “See you at tea time.”

The corgis swarmed behind her and Clarkson was left to find her own way — successfully — back to her room.

Clarkson said it should be noted that the Queen never discusses politics — at least in her experience.

“We only discussed personalities. The Queen stays completely out of (politics and government.) She never inquires and never says things like, ‘Gee, you have an awful lot of minority governments,’ or anything like that. She is totally appropriate.”

Brian Mulroney

In his nine years in office from 1984 to 1993, Brian Mulroney was able to forge a deep friendship with the Queen. He dined with her and other world leaders at Buckingham Palace in 1986, at the height of efforts to free Nelson Mandela from prison in South Africa.

On many occasions during the Queen’s trips to Canada, Mulroney would convene small, convivial dinners with Her Majesty at 24 Sussex Drive, often with just his family and perhaps a couple of close friends as guests.

On Canada Day in 1992, the country’s 125th birthday, the Queen explicitly asked to clear some time in her schedule to relax with the Mulroneys at the official residence.

They organized a low-key lunch on the second floor of the residence with a spectacular view of the Rideau River and Quebec on the far shore. A modest glass of wine in hand, the Queen kicked off her shoes, put her feet up and started to chat with Brian and Mila Mulroney about “free spirits” — people who throw off their societal obligations and go where their hearts take them.

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“I thought it was fascinating because she’s so constrained by protocol and all the stuff she has to do,” Mulroney said.

She spoke about Susan Barrantes, mother of Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York who was married at the time to the Queen’s son, Andrew. In the 1970s, Barrantes ran off to Argentina to marry professional polo player Hector Barrantes. She earned the nickname “the bolter” and was largely ostracized by the upper class in Britain.

But the Queen pronounced no judgment. She spoke of the need to understand such free spirits, to respect their life decisions.

“It was almost as if she was saying: ‘Don’t make hard and fast value judgments on people just because they’re not like you.’ I was taken by this.”

Mulroney’s friendship with the Queen has endured. He has seen her socially in the past few years.

“She’s delightful. She’s known everybody since Adam. She’s shrewd and thoughtful and incisive.”

Jean Chrétien

One prime minister can claim a very special relationship with the Queen and Jean Chrétien has the title to prove it. In 2009, Chrétien was made part of the Queen’s Order of Merit, an elite group with just 24 members described as “individuals of exceptional distinction in the arts, learning, sciences and other areas such as public service.”

In deference to that relationship, Prime Minister Stephen Harper named Chrétien as Canada’s representative to the Diamond Jubilee Trust.

Some of Chretien’s stories about the Queen are legendary. There was the famous signing of the Constitution on Parliament Hill in 1982, for instance, when Chrétien was justice minister and the Queen was present for the ceremony.

When it came time for Chrétien to put his signature on the document, he found that his prime minister, Pierre Trudeau, had broken the nib of the pen.

“Merde,” Chrétien proclaimed, just before he realized he had sworn in front of Her Majesty. While he was red-faced, though, the Queen was laughing.

In Chretien’s second biography, My Years as Prime Minister, he tells more anecdotes about his long association with the Queen.

As prime minister, his first encounter with her was at Sandringham in January 1994, when he learned that the Queen and the Queen Mother loved to speak French. In Chretien’s mother tongue, they spoke of Her Majesty’s first trip to Canada in 1939 when she was a child.

Chrétien and the Queen shared some laughs in 1995 about a Montreal radio prank that had inadvertently revealed the monarch’s affection for the Canadian prime minister. A comedian named Pierre Brassard, pretending to be Chrétien, had managed to get the Queen on the telephone and kept her on the line for 15 minutes, asking whether she would make a televised speech in the midst of the Quebec referendum.

“I will probably be able to do something for you ... No problem, no, I can do that,” the Queen told the fake Chrétien. The conversation also included nonsensical rambles by Brassard about the Queen’s picture on Canadian Tire money and what she was wearing for Halloween.

In his biography, Chrétien recalls the Queen’s lack of amusement at Brassard’s prank. But she reportedly told Chrétien: “I didn’t think you sounded quite like yourself, but I thought, given all the duress you were under, you might have been drunk.”

Paul Martin

In 2005, Saskatchewan and Alberta were celebrating their 100th year as provinces in Canada. The prime minister was Paul Martin and the Queen arrived in May for anniversary festivities.

It was pouring rain in Regina when the Queen and Prince Philip arrived at the legislature. Undeterred by the downpour, the Queen made her remarks and then proceeded, according to plan, on her walkabout accompanied by the prime minister.

Martin has a reputation for courtly manners around women and reached out and touched the Queen on the back while guiding her around the rain-slick surface. Chivalrous perhaps, but a big no-no. One does not place one’s hands on Her Majesty.

“Protocol gave me the heights of hell,” Martin said.

Later, the Queen and Martin had a good laugh over his alleged blunder. She didn’t mind and their wide-ranging conversation included talk of Martin’s parents.

Paul Martin Sr. and his wife, Nell, got to know the Queen when the elder Martin served as Canada’s high commissioner to Great Britain in the 1970s.

“They liked her very much so we talked about them, and we brought it all home.”

Toronto Star