Alan Sugar had a salty exchange with Prince Philip at a lunch with the Queen.
The tycoon, 74, revealed he butted heads with the Duke of Edinburgh in a tense clash about whether printers were made in the UK.
Recalling the times he had met the Queen, Lord Sugar said: “When I first met her, I was a superstar and was the upcoming star of the city.
“They invited me for lunch and I sat next to Prince Philip. He’s a bundle of fun, ain’t he?”
After Philip asked what he did for a living, the Amstrad founder recalled replying: “‘I make computers and all that stuff’.
“Prince Philip said, ‘Do you do printers?’ I said, ‘Printers are not really made in England. They are made by Americans and Japanese’. He said, ‘No, not at all. IBM make printers’.
“I said, ‘Yeah they are an American company and they don’t make them in England!’ He said, ‘Yes they do!’”
Eventually, Lord Sugar gave up the row with the Duke, who died last year in April aged 99, and was soon summoned to talk to the Queen.
The Apprentice star said: “I thought, ‘What am I going to talk to her about? I have not got a clue!’ I was only about 30. We talked about nothing.”
The billionaire, who was knighted in 2000, is notoriously fiery but insists he is less short-fused now, saying: “I haven’t lost my temper for a long time.
“I am trying to teach myself to count to five before reacting. I am not all bad. I have not punched anyone!”
- The Apprentice returns on Thursday, January 6 at 9pm on BBC1
