The council has assembled in the presence of the sovereign on two occasions: First, at 10:00 am on Thanksgiving Monday of 1957, at the monarch's residence in Ottawa, Rideau Hall. There, Queen Elizabeth II chaired a meeting of 22 of her privy councilors—including her consort, by then Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, whom Elizabeth appointed to the Privy Council at that conference—and therein approved an Order in Council. Two years later, the Privy Council again met before the Queen in Halifax, Nova Scotia, to confirm the appointment of Georges Vanier as governor general. There was originally some speculation that the coming together of the sovereign and her council was not constitutionally sound; however, the prime minister at the time, John Diefenbaker, found no legal impropriety in the idea, and desired to create a physical illustration of Elizabeth's position of Queen of Canada being separate to that of Queen of the United Kingdom.