Prince George STARTS first day at Eton College as Jacob Rees-Mogg REVEALS what life will be like...

Well, today Prince George, future king, will be enrolling in Eton College, just very near Winter Castle, of course. The Prince and Princess of Wales will be dropping him off for his first day. So we thought we would give you here at GB News an insight into the world of Eton College, what schools of education you'll be getting, and what will he be experiencing in his first weeks and months in the world-famous school, really. And I'm delighted to be joined by Jacob Rees-Mogg, who of course is GB News' presenter, former minister, but also former pupil of an alumni of Eton himself. Welcome. Well, thank you very much. In my early political career, I thought I had a quadruple-barrelled name because I was always Jacob Old Etonian Rees-Mogg, and that is something I've never minded. I've been very proud of my old school. And do you remember your first day at Eton? Yes, I do very well. Prince George will be going a day early, rather appropriately as Eton is dedicated to Our Lady. He'll be going on Our Lady's birthday, the 8th of September. But that didn't happen in my day. You went back when everybody else went back. We were given tea by my housemaster. We were shown to our rooms. We had to set up our own rooms. Every boy at Eton has his own room from day one. It's one of its great virtues. But in my day, you brought your own armchair, your own curtains. You had a bed that went up against the wall, and you had curtains around that. Even your own lampshade. I think for fire safety reasons, the school now provides all these things. Oh, I see. And in terms of the kind of education in those first weeks and months, what do you think he'll be kind of studying? Well, first of all, he's going to have to get used to a new language because Eton, like many schools, has its own language. So the houses aren't known by the name of the house. They're known by the name of the housemaster. Prince William was in ALHG, Dr Gailey's house, not the manor house. Eton boys hardly ever refer to houses by their actual name. So that's one of the things. They'll have to remember that there aren't any teachers Eton. There are beaks. There are no lessons. There are schools. On it goes. There are no terms. There are halves. This is beginning to sound like a conundrum. And divs are lessons, yes. And of course, Prince William, as you alluded to, also went to Eton. And you actually wrote a letter to him on his first day. Just explain what happened. I did an open letter at the commission of the Daily Mail to Prince William on his first day at Eton to welcome him there and to give him some tips for Eton life. This is now a rather long time ago. I can't remember what I wrote. And the internet doesn't go back that far because this would have been in the 1990s. But I remember that the Daily Mail asked me to write a letter to Prince William on his first day. And you're, in a sense, repeating this by asking me on your podcast. Yes, of course. But I suppose that's what 30 odd years since. Do you think Eton has changed since Prince William's day that Prince George perhaps will have different experiences? Or do you think it's kept most of the traditions? Well, having been there 40 years ago, I've now got two sons there. My eldest has just left. Last year I had three sons there. And Eton maintains the character that makes Eton a phenomenally successful school, and one that has been successful for centuries. And that is, it encourages people to do something. And whatever you want to do, Eton is able to help you to do it. It caters for a wide range of interests. The only person it doesn't cater very well for is the complete idler, who probably finds it a rather trying place. But any boy who wants to give something a shot, whether it is societies inviting guest speakers, whether it's football. I mean, there's a very top level footballer, and I say a little about football, but who was at college and overlapped with my eldest son, so left within the last five years or so, who's enormously successful and gets paid all these millions the footballers get. So Eton encourages whatever it is the boys want to do. And of course, Prince George's uncle, Prince Harry, also attended Eton. And we're not quite sure if he perhaps got as much out of it as perhaps he could have compared to his brother, William. Well, the retrospective is always difficult to tell that some people who were enormously popular at Eton, and I have a feeling Prince Harry was quite popular at Eton. He was one of the lads, he was one of the cool chaps at Eton. Not an area I was ever in any great competition for, personally. Don't put yourself down. It's perfectly true. But I was getting my contemporaries. I wonder whether it's as bad as he now makes out. There is a misery memoir approach that some famous old Etonians like to indulge in, and people who knew them when they were there think they had a very nice time when they were 13 to 18. In terms of the other pupils, they will be well aware that Prince George is future king. His destiny is already set, in some sense. So what's your experience of Eton boys, and how do you think they are going to interact with Prince George, given his status? It's a very good and difficult question, that Eton is very used to having quite grand people there, that the King of DePaul was there, and he was a god. So there was a beak when I was there who maintained that a cupboard in his schoolroom had been painted by God, because the now sadly deceased King of DePaul had painted it for him decades ago. So Eton's used to having the great and the good, but the Prince of the English Blood Royal is a different category, even from divinities. I'm not sure our Lord went to Eton, though it's quite likely. So I'm sure there will be some people who want to know him because he is going to be our king. There will be others who are very diffident towards him because he's going to be our king, and that is a cross he has to bear through his life, that there will be greasers and sycophants who want to talk to him, and there will be people who think, oh my goodness, you're going to be my king, I'm going to stay clear of you because I don't want to be thought of as a greaser. Eton is unique in the sense that it is in part quite an open campus, and pupils do walk up and down Eton High Street for various reasons, or to get to different lessons, or indeed their houses. The Prince and Princess of Wales are understandably incredibly concerned about the privacy of Prince George while he is studying at Eton, and it's all very well and good, of course, us journalists respecting that privacy, but of course there's nothing stopping, let's say, a tourist with a mobile phone taking photographs. So how do you think Eton as an institution can handle that? Well, first of all, if you're in a public place, people are entitled to take your photograph. Privacy is not something that you have a right to in public, and if you are going to be the King of England, well, the quid pro quo is you don't have much privacy. Even as a child? I'm very unsympathetic to this idea that royals have private lives. They don't really. They get to be King of England, they get to be princes, they get all that goes with that, and they therefore lose a good deal of their private life in return, and that's just how it is. And that's how it is from when they're born, and if tourists see him, and that's what they want to do in a public place, I don't think there's anything you can or should do to stop it. However, a lot of the school is out of bounds to visitors, that obviously there'll be privacy within the house that he's in and in the school rooms that he's in. The playing fields are private property. It will be going to and from that he will be in a public place. But that's also one of Eton's great virtues, and I think it's one of Eton's great strengths, is that it is a school, but it's more like a university. It requires a huge level of independence from the pupils, who have to work out where they need to be and how to get there, rather than simply being in the same building the whole time, or in a relatively small campus. They have to be much more independent, and I think that will be a virtue for the prince. And of course, Eton is a very expensive school to send one's children to, and of course, is seen as very privileged education. A number of former Prime Ministers went there, as you well know. I suppose Republicans would say, and those who perhaps think all private schools should be scraps in this country, that the future King of England, or the United Kingdom, who arguably needs to be more in tune with the majority of the public, why should he be educated there rather than, let's say, Slough Comprehensive? Well, I think this being in touch with public stuff is feral nonsense, that kings need to understand how their subjects live and need to have an empathy with it. But nobody else gets a crown put on his head and gets anointed with sacred oil by the Archbishop of Canterbury. The king is different, by the grace of God. And that's very important to remember. Either you've got a monarchy, or you haven't. If you've got a monarchy, your sovereign and the members of the sovereign's family are different, and they deserve, by virtue of their position, a degree of respect and deference. Having said that, you also want them to be very well educated. And Eton attracts people from all around the world because it provides an enormously good education. And surely we want that for our future king, not least so that he understands the Constitution. It's worth bearing in mind that the late Queen was taught the Constitution by the So I think we can claim Elizabeth II as an old Etonian, along with the Prince of Wales. Yes, and I suppose convenient for the Prince and Princess of Wales, having George at Eton, and boarding at Eton, so perhaps less time focused on child care and more time focused, perhaps, on royal duties as well. Yes, I assume they've got help anyway. With Annie. Of course. Yes, of course they do. Jacob, just before I let you go, of course, you were at Eton for a number of years, and your children, as you say, were as well. What's one of the highlights that you experienced at school that you hope Prince George will, throughout his time there? Well, I would say the great virtue of Eton is the ability to allow you to get on and do things that you want. I haven't changed very much since I was a school boy. And what may be perfectly natural in a 57-year-old is perhaps considered eccentric when you're 13. And Eton encouraged me to get on with that. And that was wonderful in terms of my own education and my experience of Eton. So, one of my great experiences was I invited Harold Macmillan down to speak, and I think it was his last public speech. He must have been about 90 at the time. And this amazing link with history, a man who'd fought in the First World War, been Prime Minister in the late 50s and early 60s, came and delivered this really remarkable and uplifting speech to a bunch of school boys. And Eton is in the privileged position that it's able to do things like that and encourage his boys, because I'd invited him, to get on and do the invitations. So, I think Eton is a really very wonderful school. I've seen with my own sons that I think it is just as good as it was when I was there. I was very lucky I was there when Eric Anderson was headmaster, who was a truly exceptional educator. But I think Eton is even better now, and this will be a huge opportunity for Prince George, and let's hope in due course for Prince Louis as well. Yes, and of course, a convenience walk up to the castle to see his grandfather, just as Prince William did back in the day. Absolutely perfect, yes. And George III used to be a regular visitor to Eton and used to talk to the boys in Windsor Great Park as well, which is why Eton's great day of celebration is the 4th of June, which is George III's birthday, rather than the 6th of December, which is associated with Henry VI, the founder. Well, it's certainly got a rich history. Jacob Rees-Mogg, thank you for joining me here on GBNews Originals.