Queen to miss Epsom Derby Shortly after the service of thanksgiving, it was announced that the Queen would not be attending her favourite horse race at Epsom on Saturday. Princess Anne is expected to attend in her place. The Queen is expected to watch the major sporting event on television at Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace has confirmed. It is the second event the Queen has been forced to miss, after having to pull out of attending the thanksgiving service at St Paul’s today due to mobility problems that have plagued her jubilee year. Summary Here’s a roundup of the key developments of the day: Senior royals, parliamentarians and diplomats joined 400 members of the public honoured for key roles they have played in their communities in the 2,000-strong congregation at St Paul’s to celebrate the 70-year reign of the Queen. The service was designed to be the spiritual heart of the platinum jubilee weekend. The Prince of Wales filled in for the Queen at the thanksgiving service today. Buckingham Palace said the monarch, 96, was missing the service “with great reluctance” having experienced episodic mobility problems throughout the day on Thursday at the start of her jubilee celebrations. The Archbishop of York has thanked the Queen for “staying the course”. Stephen Cottrell said he assumed she was watching the service on television. He said: “Your Majesty, we are sorry that you’re not here with us this morning, but we are so glad that you are still in the saddle. And we are glad that there is still more to come.” Some members of the crowd loudly booed as the prime minister, Boris Johnson, and his wife, Carrie, got out of their car and walked up the steps of St Paul’s Cathedral. Also present were a number of former prime ministers including Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Theresa May. Johnson read from the New Testament. A huge cheer went up when Prince Harry and Meghan arrived. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex sat in the second row of the congregation, with Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie and their husbands, and Lady Sarah Chatto, the daughter of Princess Margaret, and her family. The royals, senior politicians and other guests attended a jubilee reception at the Guildhall in central London following the service. Vincent Keaveny, lord mayor of the city, has given a speech to guests. In it, he praised the Queen’s decades of “continuity, stability and unity” during her long reign. Television viewing figures for the first day of the Queen’s jubilee were substantially down on previous royal occasions, although millions still tuned in. A peak audience of 7.5 million people watched the BBC’s broadcast of trooping the colour on Thursday, as it kicked off a long weekend of coverage to celebrate 70 years of the Queen’s reign. The Queen had a “lovely” time at Thursday’s platinum jubilee celebrations but found the day “very tiring”, the Duchess of Cambridge is said to have told an attendee at a Guildhall reception. Thunderstorms could dampen platinum jubilee festivities, with the Met Office issuing a weather warning for southern England. Forecasters are predicting heavy rain and lightning in some places and a yellow warning has been put in place from midnight until 10am on Saturday. Thanks so much for joining me today. We are closing this liveblog now. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s return to Britain has, so far, been extremely low key. Invited by the Queen to join the family for the platinum jubilee celebrations, the couple were never going to be on the balcony for the official flypast after trooping the colour. They were, however, invited to watch the ceremony, along with other members of the royal family, from offices overlooking Horse Guards Parade. But for the endeavours of long-lens photographers who managed to capture through the window grainy shots of the two briefly larking around with the young children of Zara and Mike Tindall, there was little evidence they were even present. St Paul’s Cathedral was always going to be the event for their first public engagement with other family members since they quit royal duties and the UK. It could have had echoes of the last time Harry and Meghan were seen with William and Kate, when the couples barely acknowledged each other at the Commonwealth Day service in March 2020. But aides appeared to have averted any such comparison by seating the Sussexes far away from the Cambridges – and, indeed, from the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall. Their place on the second row, behind the Wessexes and separated from the most senior royals by an aisle, was indicative of their reduced official status as non-working royals, despite Harry’s bloodline. Neither did the couple attend a reception at the Guildhall after the service of thanksgiving. Staying at Frogmore Cottage, Windsor, their first marital home, they are a stone’s throw from the Queen at Windsor Castle. There is speculation that Harry and Meghan could choose to have their daughter Lilibet, who turns one on Saturday, christened while at Windsor. It is “a rare occasion” for the Queen not to be able to attend the Epsom Derby, Phil White, the London regional director for the Jockey Club, has said. In a statement, he said: We would like to wish Her Majesty the Queen a wonderful platinum jubilee. It is a rare occasion that the Queen is unable to join us at Epsom Downs but we are delighted she plans to enjoy derby day on television. We have big plans to celebrate Her Majesty’s contribution to horse racing and the nation, and these will continue in full tomorrow. The derby is a unique race and we are looking forward to welcoming people in their thousands to help us create a spectacular carnival atmosphere. The Princess Royal went to feed penguins at Edinburgh zoo as members of the royal family visit the nations of the UK to celebrate the Queen’s platinum jubilee. She was joined by her husband, Tim Laurence, on her visit to the Scottish capital on Friday. Anne joined children for an animal-handling session in the rainforest room at the zoo, before visiting the penguin enclosure. She was then due to visit HMS Albion and inspect a Guard of Honour before boarding the ship. The world’s two biggest names in musical theatre, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Lin-Manuel Miranda, will perform in Saturday evening’s Platinum Party at the Palace, a three-hour live music spectacular held on stages in front of Buckingham Palace and screened on BBC One from 7.30pm after the jubilee pageant through Whitehall and the Mall. Casts from The Phantom of the Opera, Hamilton, Six, The Lion King, and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat are also appearing, as well as the tenor Andrea Bocelli, the Royal Ballet, and an 86-year-old Julie Andrews. The Queen might be rather less familiar with some of the acts in a section titled 70 Years of Pop Music: the show’s producers bring this right up to date with pop-dance names such as Mabel and Jax Jones, and the appearance of the lascivious, formidably talented British rapper Stefflon Don raises the prospect of someone explaining twerking to a baffled-but-hopefully-impressed head of state. You could, however, imagine her asking a footman (or Alexa) to add Celeste to the royal playlist – the young British soul singer has a timelessly powerful voice. “When I woke up this morning, I thought, ‘Oh my God is anyone going to come?’” said Annie Hobart, talking about the hastily planned jubilee street party she and her neighbour, Aysha Rahman, organised just three weeks ago. “We weren’t sure how it was going to happen, but it’s come together nicely,” said Rahman. The pair were thrilled to see so many faces at their party in Moseley, south Birmingham. “It’s really nice to see so many people here,” said Hobart. The street party was one of 16,000 expected to be held over the jubilee bank holiday weekend, with some councils reporting record applications for road closures. While most were scheduled to take place on Saturday and Sunday, a number were kicking off earlier. On Ashbourne Road in Wolverhampton on Thursday, hairdresser Emma Smith stood outside her house proudly admiring the street bustling with children under rows of union jack bunting. She decided to organise the street party a few weeks ago on a whim after seeing TV coverage of the jubilee celebrations, as she felt people living on the street could do with a boost after a tough few years. “Obviously we’ve had Covid, and our street has had a bad reputation as well,” she said, referring to a shooting on the street three years ago in which a young boy was injured. “I just thought we needed something which says this is what we’re all about, community. And the kids are loving it, they’re absolutely loving it.” Smith said she was out at 8am getting the street ready, cleaning up broken glass and sending her son-in-law up a ladder to hang bunting from the street lights. With the help of her neighbours Yvonne Aston and Elaine Johnson, the street was filled with activity, including a bouncy castle and penalty shoot-out for the kids, and tables of food – sausage rolls, sandwiches, chocolate biscuits. All three have lived on the street for decades but have never seen a street party happen before. “I was a bit nervous to be honest, I wasn’t quite sure what to do, what food to make,” said Smith. “But we love the Queen, and wanted to do something for her.” Donna Wright and her daughters Dolly, 10, and Leila, eight, had originally set their alarms for 4am on Friday morning to try to get the best spot to see the Queen after the thanksgiving service at St Paul’s Cathedral. Instead, after it was announced on Thursday that the Queen would not be in attendance, they were at least “able to have a little bit of a lie-in before coming down”. Wright said: My daughters are such huge fans of the royal family, the last royal event we properly celebrated was Meghan and Harry’s wedding so we were really looking forward to seeing the Queen. They’re a bit sad that she wasn’t able to come today. But the Queen’s discomfort, which led to her missing the service, did not deter the crowds of flag-waving royal fans. Wright and her daughters, who travelled from Yorkshire, were among the thousands of people who gathered along the rails of Cheapside hoping to see other members of the royal family pass by after the service. Wright said: The atmosphere here has just been so amazing, everyone has been really friendly. It’s just been so lovely. We enjoyed yesterday, but I think today will be the highlight. The goal is to try to get a wave from a member of the royal family as they pass by here later. Christine, a homemaker in her late 60s, does not leave the Lake District often but travelled to London especially for the jubilee, donning a baker-boy union jack hat she made herself, having been inspired by a design she saw on the Great British Sewing Bee. Her daughter Anna Garnett said: She’s tried to come down to London for all the big royal events and was even here for the silver jubilee in the 70s as well. She was a bit nervous coming here because of the crowds, but we’re here to see the royal family’s cars after the service and I think it will be worth it. David and Victoria Beckham will host a special jubilee lunch for inspirational individuals as part of the Queen’s platinum jubilee celebrations. The A-list couple will celebrate people who have made incredible contributions to their communities. The Beckham’s Big Jubilee Lunch will air as part of the platinum pageant on BBC One on Sunday, PA News reports. In a post shared to Instagram on Thursday, David, 47, hailed the Queen’s reign as “remarkable”, writing: Today, we celebrate our Queen’s platinum jubilee. Seventy years of service and inspirational leadership of our country. Let’s come together and commemorate her remarkable reign with a great British party these next few days. Those attending the couple’s lunch include MBE recipients, including Judith Harper, who was made an MBE for services to fostering, having fostered more than 100 children. Also at the lunch will be Saeed Atcha, who was made an MBE for services to young people and the community in 2019. Atcha, at 22, was the youngest recipient on the 2019 honours list. Queen to miss Epsom Derby Shortly after the service of thanksgiving, it was announced that the Queen would not be attending her favourite horse race at Epsom on Saturday. Princess Anne is expected to attend in her place. The Queen is expected to watch the major sporting event on television at Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace has confirmed. It is the second event the Queen has been forced to miss, after having to pull out of attending the thanksgiving service at St Paul’s today due to mobility problems that have plagued her jubilee year. The Queen had a “lovely” time at Thursday’s platinum jubilee celebrations but found the day “very tiring”, the Duchess of Cambridge is said to have told an attendee at a Guildhall reception. Gill Smallwood from Bolton spoke with Kate on Friday after a service of thanksgiving at the nearby St Paul’s Cathedral. Smallwood said she had asked Kate how the Queen was doing. She told the PA news agency: She [Kate] said, ‘yes, she was fine, it was just very tiring yesterday, and she [the Queen] had had a lovely, lovely time’. She said Kate told her that princes George and Louis and Princess Charlotte also “had a lovely time” at Thursday’s celebrations, during which all three Cambridge children appeared on the Buckingham Palace balcony for a flypast. Smallwood, chief executive of the domestic violence charity Fortalice, was made an MBE in the new year honours. Corgi-shaped cakes, trifle bowls and posh souvenir mugs are among the platinum jubilee-themed products that have hit the spot for shoppers amid a high street battle for the £400m of extra sales riding on the festivities. Corgi merchandise was one of the big retail trends to emerge, with the small dogs emblazoned on everything from biscuits to mugs, T-shirts and cushions. Marks & Spencer scored a hit with its Queen Connie and Corgi caterpillar cake duo, which sold out in many stores, including on Ocado. It is estimated that 39 million adults are celebrating the jubilee, with 4.1 million families planning to attend a street party. They will have spent about £45m on jubilee cakes and sweets to share, according to the Centre for Retail Research (CRR), which predicts the overall spending boost will be £408m – part of a wider economic lift that could be as much as £6bn. The household specialist Lakeland said its £35 vintage-look trifle bowls sold out as soon as a lemon and swiss roll amaretti version of the classic dessert was declared as the official pudding. Cake-stand sales at Waitrose have also doubled with customers searching its website for Victoria sponge and scone recipes with “afternoon tea”. The retail marketplace OnBuy, which had warned of a potential bunting shortage due to the scramble it saw for party supplies last week, said union flag bunting, party hats and banners were among the products that had sold out. CRR thinks the souvenir and memorabilia trade will have been worth about £282m, with 6m mugs and 10m flags among the mountain of T-shirts, cushions, stationery and knick-knacks sold. Television viewing figures for the first day of the Queen’s jubilee were substantially down on previous royal occasions, although millions still tuned in. A peak audience of 7.5 million people watched the BBC’s broadcast of trooping the colour on Thursday, as it kicked off a long weekend of coverage to celebrate 70 years of the Queen’s reign. Later that evening, the BBC’s broadcast of the lighting of beacons to mark the Queen’s 70th year on the throne attracted a peak 5 million viewers, according to figures produced by rating agency BARB. By comparison the audience for Prince Philip’s funeral last year peaked at more than 13 million people, while Prince William and Harry’s weddings hit 26 million and 18 million viewers respectively. The relatively muted figures suggest the public took advantage of the extra bank holiday and good weather to head outside, rather than being glued to their televisions. While trooping the colour was still the most watched programme on terrestrial television, ITV’s Coronation Street and Britain’s Got Talent were not far behind, with almost 4 million viewers each. The BBC has sometimes struggled with the tone of its royal coverage, having come under criticism during the Queen’s diamond jubilee in 2012 for trying to use younger presenters in an attempt to attract a wider audience. Last year, the national broadcaster also received a record number of complaints from members of the public who felt it went overboard with wall-to-wall coverage of Prince Philip’s death. Kirsty Young returned to television to anchor the BBC’s jubilee coverage after four years off air after a diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis with secondary fibromyalgia. The BBC’s live commentary was provided by Huw Edwards and strayed into controversy when a former officer in the Irish Guards described the soldiers as “a great mick cocktail”. Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton said: “The micks have this fantastic mix of guards’ discipline and pursuit of excellence, with that Irish ‘irrational tenth’ if I can quote Lawrence of Arabia, which makes it the best regiment on the planet.” Edwards interjected to say that while viewers might think the term was offensive, “it’s worth underlining that’s what you Irish Guards call yourselves”. Joe Dwyer of Sinn Féin wrote on Twitter: “The year is 2022 … and a BBC presenter and someone from the British army are explaining why ‘micks’ actually isn’t an offensive term for Irish people.” Ed Sheeran has revealed how past jubilee celebrations inspired his musical career ahead of his performance at the Platinum Jubilee Pageant on Sunday. In a post on Instagram, the singer wrote: 20 years ago I decided I wanted to pick up a guitar because I watched the Golden Jubilee on tv, saw Eric Clapton play Layla and said ‘that’s what I wanna do’. 10 years later I played The A Team at the Diamond Jubilee, and now 10 years on I’m playing the Platinum Jubilee this Sunday. Life is weird how it keeps coming full circle in lovely ways. Tune in on Sunday and see ya there x Sheeran, 31, is set to perform his song Perfect during Sunday’s celebrations, as a tribute to the Queen and her late husband the Duke of Edinburgh, PA News reports. Which events are still to come? As we near the half-way point of the four-day weekend to mark the Queen’s platinum jubilee, here are the key timings for the remaining official celebrations. Saturday 4.30pm (BST) Royal family members are due to attend the Derby at Epsom Downs. For people in the UK, it will be broadcast live on ITV1. Saturday 8pm Elton John, Alicia Keys, Stefflon Don, Craig David and Andrea Bocelli are among the stars performing at the Platinum Party at the Palace – a concert at Buckingham Palace for 22,000 people, including royals and 5,000 key workers – plus many more from home watching on BBC One. Proceedings will be overseen by the hosts Kirsty Young and Roman Kemp. The concert will also be shown on big screens at St James’ Park and the Mall, Bute Park and Princes Street Gardens. Sunday lunchtime More than 10 million people across the UK are expected to attend lunch events as part of the “big jubilee lunch”. Outside the UK, more than 600 lunches have been planned across the Commonwealth. Sunday 2.30pm The gold state carriage, led by the sovereign’s escort but not carrying the Queen, will lead a pageant on a 3km route up the Mall to Buckingham Palace. Involving more than 10,000 people – including military, volunteers, performers and key workers – it will be available to watch on BBC One from 1pm and on the big screens in London, Cardiff and Edinburgh. Thunderstorms could dampen platinum jubilee celebrations, with the Met Office issuing a weather warning for southern England. Forecasters are predicting heavy rain and lightning in some places and a yellow warning has been put in place from midnight until 10am on Saturday, PA Media reports. The area covered by the warning stretches from Dover to Penzance and up to Bath and south London. The warning has been issued for the morning after initially being thought that thunderstorms could strike on Saturday evening, during the BBC’s Platinum party at the Palace. Around 22,000 people are expected at the event, which will see performances including Craig David, Alicia Keys, and Sir Rod Stewart. The royals and other guests are currently at a jubilee reception at the Guildhall in central London. Vincent Keaveny, lord mayor of the city, has given a speech to guests. In it, he praised the Queen’s decades of “continuity, stability and unity” during her long reign. “We are immensely grateful for her 70 years of service to the United Kingdom and to the Commonwealth that we are celebrating today,” he said. “She has been a great example of duty and public service for all of us. She is one of the most widely recognised and respected people in the world. “And for 70 years she has provided continuity, stability and unity. There could be no better ambassador for this country and for the Commonwealth. “All of us here are very grateful for the service she has given and the way she has served as head of state – with dignity, devotion and a deeply rooted faith.”