EXCLUSIVE: This Morning star Gyles Brandreth is a Trustee of Queen Camilla’s Reading Room charity

Broadcaster Gyles Bradreth has opened up on his charity work with Queen Camilla (Image: Getty)

This Morning star Gyles Brandreth has shared an insight into his relationship with Queen Camilla. The broadcaster, journalist and author has worked closely with Her Majesty as one of the trustees of her charity The Queen’s Reading Room since 2023. He was responsible for hosting the launch event for  their first major outreach project, A Kensington Christmas Story, in November 2024. He also attended the inaugural Queen’s Reading Room Literary Festival in June 2023, hosted by King Charles III and Queen Camilla. Suffice to say he has spent a lot of time around her.

Speaking exclusively to Express.co.uk Gyles confirmed her love of reading and passion for the work of the charity. “I’m a trustee of The Queen’s Reading Room, which is Queen Camilla’s charity for encouraging reading, the joy of reading. Essentially, she loves reading, and what it’s all about is giving people opportunities to read more, to enjoy reading more,” he said of Camilla’s initiative.

Gyles Brandreth has a close association with Queen Camilla thanks to her Reading Room charity (Image: Getty)

“We’ve done lots of research showing how reading is good for your mental well being – even reading five minutes a day, just five minutes of fiction, can improve your your mental well being, by about 20%.”

He previously said about her to Good Housekeeping: “She has always been fun and anyone who has met her confirms she is very easy to get on with. I have been with her when people have come up and said: “Can I have a selfie?” and she has said, “Why not?” I think that may have had to stop now, but she was totally relaxed about it.”

Camilla’s charity isn’t the only one Gyles is involved with. Indeed he dedicates quite a lot of his spare time to helping various organisations something he said he finds “both worthwhile and very moving.” One of his next upcoming charity engagements will be on October 23 when he is the guest speaker for the Autumn Lunch of Surrey based charity, Queen Elizabeth’s Foundation for Disabled People’s (QEF) a charity he believes do great work.

Reflecting on his work with charities supporting people with disabilities he says his friend Christopher Robin Milne, the son of Winnie the Pooh author AA Milne, who was the little boy featured in the books, changed how he aproaches the work after he opened up to him about his daugher Clare, who had cerebral palsy.

“He told me having a disabled child is only a sadness if you are looking for the sadness. If you are envious or concerned about what they don’t have, think about what they do have. With his own daughter he said they loved her and celebrated her for what she did have,” Gyles recalled.

Christopher Robin Milne and Gyles Brandreth, seen together in 1986, were good friends (Image: Supplied)

“Through knowing Christopher and through meeting his daughter, Clare, I think I changed the way I look at people with disabilities. I’m involved with a range of charities that do things for people with disabilities and when I go there and meet the people, I put on my Christopher Robin hat, and I think, Look at these people for what they are not, for what they are not. Because he explained to me that we tend to look at disabled people for what they are not, rather than for what they are.”

His friendship with Christopher Robin also features in his latest book Somewhere, A Boy and a Bear, which coincides with the 100th anniversary of the creation of Winnie the Pooh. Gyles says Christopher Robin had a complicted relationship with his father’s work.

Somewhere, A Boy and a Bear by Gyles Brandreth (Michael Joseph, £25) is out now. Gyles is supporting Queen Elizabeth’s Foundation for Disabled People (QEF) and is a guest speaker at its Autumn Lunch on October 23. More information and tickets are available here. 

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