Former Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey has revealed the late-Queen once told him she “can’t resign” when he visited the palace to try to step down from the job, according to a new documentary.

His comments are part of a new five-part series called The Real Crown: Inside the House Of Windsor, in which Lord Carey recounts his conversation with the Queen, where he added: “But she would never go anyway”.

In the final episode of the series, Lord Carey said: “I remember going to see the Queen once to hand in my resignation and said: ‘Your Majesty the time has come’.

“And she looked at me, more or less she said: ‘You people come and go, I can’t resign, I can’t surrender – I’ve got to keep going’.

“And I said: ‘Well, the Lord tells me at the age of 70 I’ve got to go’. But she would never go anyway.”

He served as the Archbishop of Canterbury between 1991 and 2002, and took part in the funeral for Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997, as well becoming the first archbishop to ordain women into the priesthood.

As part of the documentary, he also revealed how he arranged a secret meeting with Camilla at his son’s south-east London flat, to help get to know each other before she married the now-king.

Lord Carey described how the now-Queen Consort spoke about the early days of her relationship with the king during their clandestine meeting in Peckham

He said: “She walked through the front door, we met and had coffee together, and I was really struck by her.

“Very nice looking lady, very presentable, very intelligent, we had a really animated conversation.

“And we talked about her relationship with Charles, going way back to when they were teenagers and so on. And after she left, I said: ‘Well, there’s no way I could ever treat her as other than a really nice human being who’s deeply in love with Charles’.

“And that affected me in talking to other people behind the scenes and I hoped it had a way forward – I think it did.”