Monarchy – More Zonkyness

The Crown Estate: Why Attacking It Isn’t An Attack On The Monarchy

Jul 272024

Just recently (and possibly triggered by the £45 million pound share of the Crown Estate income that the monarchy is getting), there has been a lot of republican jumping up and down about how the king owns the sea (i.e. off-shore wind farms pay rent to the Crown Estate).

I get it. Although I’m not an active republican, I do think selecting the head of state by being the first-born into the right family is a bloody daft way of picking one. I just think there are more important matters to sort out first. Just remember, if we elect a head of state we could wind up with a lettuce.

Well, I say first-born child of the monarch, but in reality parliament decides who gets the crown even if it is the first-born by default. It has been that way since parliament demoted the first Charlie with an ax.

Ever since that time, control over the Crown Estate has effectively been under parliament’s control. That control became explicit when George III explicitly passed control over the Crown Estate to parliament in return for no longer being responsible for the expenses of government.

That last bit is significant – the third Charlie has two fortunes – his private fortune and the Crown Estate. Why two? Because the Crown Estate is supposed to serve a special purpose – it is supposed to be used to pay for government.

And it does. The overwhelming majority of the Crown Estate income goes into the Treasury; Charlie gets 15% supposedly to pay his expenses as head of state. Now this may well be too much (especially as it has risen to £45 million), but some is perfectly reasonable. If we were to pick a random person to be the monarch (perhaps not a bad idea), paying them something out of the Crown Estate would be only sensible.

An attack on the Crown Estate is not an attack on the monarchy; if we abolish the monarchy, the crown estate will still exist. It might go through a name change and it might not be quite so generous to the head of state, but it exists independently of the monarchy.

The Queen Is Dead, Long Live The King

Politics No Responses »

Sep 262022

So the queen is dead, and Twitter went berserk with all sorts of tweets. Some of the anti-colonialism ones were a little tasteless …

“Chief monarch”? Have we got additional monarchs scurrying around? Not that I’ve ever heard of.

Even if the queen was responsible for the crimes of the British Empire, wishing she would die in excruciating pain is tasteless in the extreme. After all, we didn’t torture Hitler’s henchpersons to death – they got a quick hanging.

And blaming the queen for all the evils of the British Empire shows a remarkable lack of knowledge about how power in Britain works. After all real power has been delegated to parliament, and has been since Charles II (in 1660 so it’s been a while).

Sure some earlier monarchs were involved in the slave trade and were directly responsible for the establishment of certain colonies. But the last monarch with that kind of power was Charles I who was demoted with an ax.

Blame the governments of the time, or the relevant person in charge of the atrocities.

The Republicans

Now I’m no die-hard monarchist – I certainly lean in the direction of republicanism, although I’m of the opinion that there are bigger political problems to solve first. And I don’t have a problem with republicans campaigning honestly and with legitimate issues.

Although expecting change on a monarch change is a bit unrealistic – the next in line becomes the new monarch immediately upon the death of the old one. Whilst parliament determines the rules of succession; once in place as law, the succession takes place automatically. All the ceremonies that take place are merely confirmation.

No the ones I’m irritated with are those who exaggerate the power of the monarchy to make their point. Almost all of the power of a monarch is wielded by parliament itself (with the exception of the King’s Consent which needs to go). These are either ignorant or are being dishonest.

The fact is that the undemocratic nature of our current electoral system is a far bigger problem that which puppet we stick a crown on.

“At Least I’m Not A Subject”

General, Politics No Responses »

Dec 052020

If you ever talk with US citizens on the problems with their country, there is all too often someone who comes up with this old chestnut – “At least I’m not a subject”.

Which is false and even if it were true, it wouldn’t be quite what it appears.

For a start we haven’t been “subjects” since the Nationality Act of 1948, except for a tiny number of special category subjects because for special circumstances they don’t qualify for citizenship – mostly pre-1949 immigrants from the Republic of Ireland, or India.

And if we were subjects, we would be subjects of parliament not an inherited monarchy. Yes we have a monarchy, but the power of the monarch is wielded by parliament under a doctrine known as the “Queen-in-parliament“.

Which is a weird kind of solution to the problem of letting a monarch keep their crown, but keeping real power in the hands of parliament. Once you’ve ‘demoted’ a monarch with an axe and the world hasn’t come to a standstill, you’re no longer “subjects” in the sense of being the property of an absolute monarch.

Let us emphasise that last bit – we let the monarchs keep their throne, and they serve at our pleasure. To give a real world example of how that works is the story of Edward VIII who was the present queen’s uncle. To sum up, he wanted to marry a previously married woman and “the establishment” (various prime ministers and the archbishop of Canterbury) was opposed; in the end it was Edward who abdicated and “the establishment” got their way.

Now the reasons were ridiculous (although the outcome may have been unintentionally fortuitous given Edwards VIII and Mrs Simpson’s sympathy for the Nazis), but the balance of power is clear to see.

I dare say those who loudly proclaim “At least I’m not a subject” will ignore this.