Royal Standard of the United Kingdom in the context of "National flag"

The coat of arms of the United Kingdom, also referred to as the royal arms, are the arms of dominion of the British monarch, currently Charles III. They are used by the Government of the United Kingdom and by other Crown institutions, including courts in the United Kingdom and in some parts of the Commonwealth. Differenced versions of the arms are used by members of the British royal family. The monarch's official flag, the royal standard, is the coat of arms in flag form.

There are two versions of the coat of arms. One is used in Scotland, and includes elements derived from the coat of arms of the Kingdom of Scotland, and the other is used elsewhere and includes elements derived from the coat of arms of the Kingdom of England. The shields of both versions of the arms quarter the arms of the kingdoms of England and Scotland, which united to form the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707, and the Kingdom of Ireland, which united with Great Britain to form the United Kingdom in 1801. The Irish quarter was unaltered following the division of Ireland into Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State in 1922.

The Victoria Tower is a square tower at the south-west end of the Palace of Westminster in London, adjacent to Black Rod's Garden on the west and Old Palace Yard on the east. At 98.5 metres (323 ft) it is the tallest part of the palace, being 2.2 metres (7.2 ft) taller than the Elizabeth Tower (which contains Big Ben) at the north end of the building. It was designed by Charles Barry and Augustus Pugin in the Perpendicular Gothic style and was completed in 1860. It houses the Parliamentary Archives in archive conditions meeting the BS 5454 standard, on 12 floors. All 14 floors of the building were originally linked via a single wrought-iron Victorian staircase of 553 steps, of which five floors survive. The steps are made of granite quarried from Cairngall in Aberdeenshire.

The main entrance at the base of the tower is the sovereign's entrance, through which the monarch passes at the State Opening of Parliament. On top of the Victoria Tower is an iron flagstaff from which flies the Union Flag or, when the sovereign is present in the palace, the royal standard. The flag used to be flown only on days when either House of Parliament sat, but since January 2010 it has been flown every day.