Red box (government)

Despatch boxes of a very different design remain in use in the chamber of the lower house of the British and Australian parliaments.

In practice ministers use despatch boxes for transporting the majority of their documents due to the greater level of security they offer.

[2] Winston Churchill's red box (manufactured by Wickwar) was sold by Sotheby's in 2014 for £158,500, 25 times the estimated price.

[3] Red boxes are often given to the outgoing President of the United States as a symbol of the relationship between the US and UK governments.

[7] However, it is also claimed that the practice began in the late 16th century, when Queen Elizabeth I's representative, Francis Throckmorton, presented the Spanish ambassador, Bernardino de Mendoza, with a specially-constructed red briefcase filled with black puddings.

[7] A blue box with a red stripe is used specifically for confidential papers only seen by the prime minister, their private secretary, and intelligence officials.

Permanent secretaries, who are civil servants rather than MPs or Lords, have similar boxes but coloured green.

[7] There is an annual custom of the Chancellor of the Exchequer holding up a red box to the press in Downing Street to symbolise the new budget of the UK government.

[8] The budget of the spring of 1868 was infamous for Chancellor George Ward-Hunt opening his dispatch box to find that he had left his speech at home.

[16] The monarch's role as head of state requires being kept abreast of what is happening in Parliament and the governments of all the other Commonwealth countries, as well as current events from around the world.

Documents which the monarch must sign and provide royal assent for are delivered in red despatch boxes, which are addressed daily.