The Coronation on 6 May will be a welcome cause for celebration in difficult times, but will it be a mixed blessing for Charles and Camilla? It’s not exactly like the works’ Christmas curry in terms of just trying to get the seating plan right and avoiding embarrassing moments. The entire world will be watching, analysing, hypothecating and so on. And the King is not even in charge of who gets invited, as it is a state occasion.
Uninvited Guests
Quite unsurprisingly, SNP First Minister Humza Yousaf will be attending and doubtless the last three Westminster Prime Ministers will be looking for selfies that they can use in Hello Magazine to improve their fee rates on the speaker circuit.
Quite surprisingly and more importantly, Sinn Fein Vice President Michelle O’Neill will also be attending. One wonders if this signals a thaw in the relationship between Sinn Fein and the monarchy / Westminster government? If it does, it would produce further pressure on the DUP to stop their ‘strike’ and return to Stormont. This would be a welcome development, instead of holding the people of Northern Ireland to ransom over their continuing objections to Brexit arrangements which they voted for.
Then there are the more awkward family moments to manage. Fresh out of court, The Duke of Sussex will be attending, presumably in a further attempt to repair familial relationships that he desperately wants. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the late Queen’s favourite son, Prince Andrew will also be in attendance, presumably sat at some distance from younger members of the family.
Coronation Chickens come home to roost
I don’t mind the Royal Family. Yes, I know people complain about the Royal’s cost to the nation, their birthright and so on, but my views run something like this. It’s not King Charles’ fault that he’s King Charles. When we compare the amount that the Royals cost with the nuclear levels of money wasted on Brexit, PPE and other affairs, their costs pale by comparison.
However, I do expect more of our Royal Family in exchange for allowing them to maintain their privileged position. Specifically, I do expect Charles to speak out on climate disaster, on breaking international law, on the destruction to lives and livelihoods wrought by Brexit and so on. This is the privilege and responsibility of leadership. If he cannot do that, my opinion on his right to sit on the throne changes with it.
Power, influence and authority
Some will point out that The King has no authority. But he has massive amounts of influence and soft power. In this context I urge people to write him a letter after the Coronation to ask Charles to exercise quiet influence on the things which concern his ‘subjects’. It is best if you write your own letter, as multiple copies of letters tend to be ignored. Here however is a template you may adapt to suit your needs.
I recommend using the rule of three … pick three issues from the main body of the letter to use. I also recommend that you send your letter by post for maximum impact. Handwritten letters are especially valuable. The address is Buckingham Palace, London SW1A 1AA.
A letter to the King on Brexit Britain
First and foremost, I hope that you will use your influence to help us address the pressing issue of climate catastrophe, which threatens us all. Planet earth will not wait for sub-committees to agree compromises which allow our planet to continue warming. Instead of responding to the call to suspend the use of fossil fuels in favour of sustainable energy sources, we are presently pursuing the controversial issue of fracking, a subject on which your latest Prime Minister may have been badly advised. The prime reason for removing the ban imposed as recently 2019 by his predecessor has been justified by the war in Ukraine and its effects on the economy and consumers.
Yet the energy crisis preceded the advent of this war. Does this not raise questions to the advocates of this course of action? Fracking is more expensive than solar and other forms of energy production. We should look upon the UK via the medium of the BBC sitcom The Good Life, in other words, we must be responsible environmental stewards. A hallmark of our existence is to leave the planet in a better state than when we arrived.
At the same time, the bonfire on standards due to Brexit enhances environmental damage through increased carbon footprint from ever longer trading across continents, moral hazard through use of poor materials for manufacturing and an increased use of irresponsible capitalism.
Brexit has not delivered on the promises made in the ‘brochure’ in 2016. Instead it threatens the breakup of your Kingdom, the loss of Britain’s position as a world leader in many fields, breakages of international law, a possible return to the troubles in Northern Ireland and human trafficking of people to Rwanda as a supposed ‘solution’ to migration by people fleeing from war and oppression. Just when many countries in the world are recognising that joined up thinking is needed to solve joined up problems, we appear to have elected to live in un-splendid isolation.
I know that your mother Queen Elizabeth II was opposed to Brexit and I hope you will exert further influence in this direction for a better Britain in a better Europe for a better world.
Clean beaches and Britain’s waterways have always been one of the defining hallmarks of our green and pleasant land. They are under systemic attack from our Government, simply because the laws that allowed us to reach these standards of excellence did not emanate from Westminster. It matters not who sets the bar for excellence on planet earth.
What matters is excellence itself. I hope you will agree that we must maintain clean beaches, clean rivers and clean towns and villages. Each and every one of us can play a part in this, but it needs your leadership to bind the country together. It is both distasteful and dangerous to allow our waterways to be filled with Escherichia coli (E. coli).
We have developed a class of people who are skilled in the art of offering easy answers to difficult problems. We know that complex problems have no easy answers and we need to take time to understand the systemic consequences of our actions. But it is clear that our standards have been decimated over recent years, with more to come due to the ideology of Brexit which requires the purging of all that emanates from the EU. Of course, 98% of these standards were ones which Britain created or supported.
It has become apparent that we need to reform farming towards more sustainable approaches and an approach that conserves the land to reclaim food security for Britain. Whilst it was right for the Government to replace EU subsidies for farmers with an equivalent scheme, the scheme was not of equivalent value and it was wrong to then cancel that scheme. This will undoubtedly affect lives and livelihoods for people who manage 71% of our land to everyone’s ultimate loss.
Britain had a role as a world leader in science and science relies on collaboration with the finest minds on the planet. Every single scientific body warned against Brexit as having the potential to reduce the gene pool of talent on which some of our greatest achievements have rested. Your distant forebear, King Charles II, founded the Royal Society which continues to make awards for contributions to the promotion, advancement, or use of science for the benefit of society.
We have a long tradition of successful collaborations in science, whether that be in advances in health, aerospace, defence, living standards and so on. In the 4th industrial age, the age of information, we owe it to our children to offer them the best environment to bring innovative collaborations together through projects such as HORIZON.
For some time now, British democracy has been under attack. Examples include the illegal prorogation of parliament; manifesto promises being broken almost on a monthly basis and the erosion of truth and trust in politicians and politics. Flip flop politics are not without consequence. In recent times our economic experiments on the population of Britain have caused untold irreversible increases in mortgages and the cost of living. Prime Ministers are now elected without recourse to the vast majority of the people of Britain. We need a proper written constitution and the reform of our democracy and democratic processes as a matter of urgency.
The self-isolation of Brexit is clearly affecting our relationships with Commonwealth countries, for example Bermuda. This has cross impacts on your own families’ standing as leaders and representatives of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth. It takes decades to build trust and co-operation and minutes to destroy it. We must save precious relationships on which we rely.
You mentioned that you were born on the same date as the NHS and quipped that you felt you were doing better than it when interviewed. Our NHS is under threat of becoming a two-tier system rather like the US, but without any safety net for those without means. A hallmark of a civilised society is in how vulnerable people are treated. Our NHS is too precious to be traded away as an asset.
I understand that you are unable to act in public as it would contravene your role. However, I urge you to influence the debates on our ‘Britastrophe’. I remain, Your Majesty, your faithful and loyal subject.
Your name
Celebrating the occasion: Coronation chicken, quiche and a Full English Brexit
And finally, the Coronation of King Charles III is a mass celebration of our sovereignty and heritage. Like everyone else, I will relish the opportunity to eat some Coronation chicken, even quiche! But there is another side to sovereignty and the ‘bard of Barking’ Mr Billy Bragg sums up the darker side of our addiction to flags, fawning and faux fascism in his song Full English Brexit:
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