Monarchy

Tom Griffin (London, OK): The debate about reforming the Act of Settlement has prompted some interesting musings over at the Slugger O'Toole website:

I have known a number of unionist republicans: most would be fairly liberal, though still clearly unionists. However, there are also unionists, albeit fewer, from a more hardline view point who support what has recently been suggested as the United Republic rather than the United Kingdom. Others who hold sometimes surprisingly ambivalent views on the monarchy include some fundamentalists.

That might seem a unexpected admission from Turgon, a supporter of Northern Ireland's most hardline unionist party, the TUV, but as he points out such views are not without their historical roots:

It must be remembered that the idea of monarchy was not considered the ideal in The Bible (1 Samuel 8:7). In addition across Oliver Cromwell’s tomb it is said the inscription read “Christ, not man, is king.” Many fundamentalists may well owe significant allegiance to the UK and indeed its head of state; there is, however, another country to which they vow true fealty, as indeed is clear in the third verse of that hymn. (Best tune ever to my mind).

One 'unionist republican' from the more liberal end of the spectrum is the Ulster Unionist Director of Communications, Alex Kane. He wrote in January:

I have absolutely no objection to Her Majesty on a personal level. Indeed, I think she does a remarkable job. But as someone who regards himself as a democratic purist I have said that my personal preference---and it is only my personal preference---would be that we have an elected Head of State. Putting it bluntly, everyone in authority, from the humblest parish councillor to the Head of State should be both elected and removable. But that State would remain the United Kingdom...

...Believing in an elected Head of State doesn't make me an Irish Republican and it certainly doesn't diminish or undermine my sense of unionism or my British identity.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Since I started blogging I found that one of the best rules of thumb is to agree with Sunny Hundal, who is wise, practical and funny - and brief and to the point. Oh dear. Is he getting old before his time, and a touch too tolerant? Or am I becoming hardened? I refer to Sunny's extraordinarily relaxed, let's not get hot under the collar reaction as reported by the BBC to a member of the Royal Family thinking it normal to call people Paki. In my view, if this is what an Eton education does for you we should be worried: racism starts at the top. 

This is not the language a young officer should be using. It is loaded with disrespect and laced with the presumptions and arrogance of rule. In cases like this I always think about the US Army. It may well be used for imperialist ends but it is an exceptionally effective multi-racial organisation. It did not get that way by casual tolerance. Colin Powell, I believe, was one of those who decided to rid the Army ranks of racism towards each other (I'm not talking about Abu Graib). How could they rid it of snide remarks about food and diet? They forced the entire army (it is said) to eat specific ethnic foods on a given day. They trained themselves to know what it was like to be the other. OK, that is putting it rather grandly. But there was a determinatioin to stamp out prejudice not pander to it or treat it lightly. One result was Powell's extraordinarily powerful and influential endorsement of Obama when he said that an American muslim had every right to aspire to be president. Can you imagine Harry saying to a TV interviewer, "Why can't a Paki one day be king?".

The point, not to go on about it too long, is that the Prince is not an ordinary bloke. He is a commander, trained as such, born to lead. Now the BNP can shout 'Harry, Harry, Harry' as they kick someone's head in, and we will all know what they mean. But can you charge someone with racist chanting and taunting if they proclaim their allegiance to the third in line to the throne? 

Stuart Weir (Cambridge, Democratic Audit): It is said that Chris Bryant, the Labour MP for The Rhonda Valley, presented his constitutional reform package for Labour's manifesto to Downing Street, saying "It's a bit wild", and Downing Street replied "make it wilder."  Well his reforms have hit the spot with the Guardian, who blazoned them across their front page, but wild they aren't. It is pleasing to know that the succession to the throne will be made free of discrimination on grounds of gender or faith, but they do stop well short of ending an anomalous hereditary monarchy and discrimination against second and subsequent children. Now that, in Labour terms, would have been wild.
 
It is important to be fair.  Bryant was clearly working within the inhibiting prejudices of his party and under the brooding presence of the Prime Minister and his coterie. Yet the idea of handing the role and powers of the Privy Council to Parliament is both a significant and bold reform, and I hope that they would be bolder still and not keep it on as a ceremonial relic.  The Council is an opaque executive and law-making organ through which much important governance, domestic and foreign, is conducted, usually subject to little or no democratic scrutiny.  Reform of the House of Lords as a fully elected second chamber is also a significant part of the agenda, as I guess are the drab Constitutional Renewal Bill compromises.

Tom Griffin (London, OK): This morning's Daily Mail reports on a campaign by MPs against the parliamentary oath of allegiance to the Queen, which has aroused the ire of Lord Tebbit:

This seems to me to be an attack upon the State itself. The monarch is the one embodiment of the State which is outside the political, partisan process.

The people behind this campaign must either oppose the idea of anyone who is non-partisan having a role in the affairs of state, or they would rather be swearing allegiance to Brussels.'  

What has sparked Tebbit's anger is an Early Day Motion put down by Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker in June, although its dire subversive implications were apparently not recognised until the dog days of August.

Andrew Blick and Stuart Weir (Democratic Audit): On the principle that the devil makes work for idle hands, it seems a good idea to find a role in life for Prince Andrew whose playboy tendencies and visit to School Dinners, a kind of pre-lapdance place with waitresses in St Trinian’s gear have made the tabloid press. Since 2001 Prince Andrew has been the unpaid UK ‘Special Representative for International Trade and Investment’, another of those foreign appointments like Lord Levy’s which the government can hand out under royal prerogative powers and which escape scrutiny.

Andrew’s website boasts how he attends an average of ‘5.6 trade/business related engagements a week’; all to further UK commercial interests; and claims that he has helped secure a number of big deals.

A useful exploitation of our almost unique Royal brand? Perhaps, but there are problems. First there has been a steady drip of stories about how his foreign visits – funded by a pretty exclusive quango, UK Trade and Investment, and the Department of Transport (in other words, us) – often seem to provide the Prince with an opportunity to take holidays and work on his golf handicap. His list of engagements for 2004 described how he attended ‘a UK Trade and Investment reception during the US Masters’.

Now it has emerged that his house, Sunninghill – a 1986 marriage gift from the Queen – has been sold for about £3 million over the odds to an energy magnate from Kazakhstan, a country he has visited on official business three times since 2003, and on more occasions in private. There are of course plenty of people who will be unduly generous to the rich or famous simply for the prestige which may attach to the ‘friendship’. But by the same token, it behoves those who are engaged on public business not to accept favours (if this is, as it seems, what has happened in this case). It is worth remarking that neither Andrew nor Levy were subject to the same regulation and accountability as regular civil servants nor ministers.

The international objectives of the UK include, in theory at least, a strong ethical dimension; and the public believe that this is an important aspect of our foreign policy. But the terms of reference for the Prince are exclusively about securing commercial advantage for the UK (or rather, firms that purport to be ‘British’). Kazakhstan itself has a dubious human rights record and an inventory of countries whose business he has courted – including China and various Middle East states – reads more like an Amnesty International blacklist. In 2004, at a business do in in Moscow, he praised Tsar Ivan the Terrible as an ‘insightful’ leader, for his focus on trade, prosperity and security.

Tom Griffin (London, The Green Ribbon) The Telegraph's Damian Thompson has a theory about why Gordon Brown is considering ditching the Act of Settlement.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): A great story in yesterday's Mail on Sunday: QUEEN FURY OVER BROWN OATH filled its front page. The palace had gone to the extraordinary step of giving the paper an on-the-record-statement: "The Palace was not consulted with regard to the Goldsmith review". Wow, was the Palace showing good judgement? Had it at least understood that being British meant not asking everyone to go on their knees and swear fealty to the monarch? That this would politicise the institution and drag it into disrepute?

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Listen to Helena Kennedy and Lord Goldsmith discuss Britishness and citizenship ceremonies here. What do you think?

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): The following is in today's Mail. We've carried quite a lot about Lord Goldsmith who has as many jobs as Tony Blair, questioning whether anyone would want to buy citizenship from such a man back in October. The comments on the Mail article are interesting. Some say 'quite right' and 'about time' others, "I wouldn't mind swearing allegiance to the Queen, but to King Charles? No thanks." or "I would NEVER swear any oath of allegiance to ANY member of the royal family. They are a bunch of parasites sponging off the taxpayer. I would NEVER allow my children to swear such an oath either before they reached the age of majority." The point is, are we to become a modern democracy - or how long do we have to suffer this attempt to modernise feudalism?

HERE

"The secret is out - idiot elements of the media have forced the early withdrawal from Afghanistan of Prince Harry.

But it doesn't matter. Despite the prince's disappointment, he has served his country, demonstrated his courage and ensured the survival of the British monarchy for at least another hundred years.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Gordon Brown has just received a lesson in Britishness: it is not about 'values' it is about institutions of Empire especially the monarchy and the armed forces. The Royals are a military family, with regimental insignia, kit, parades, and action! As usual with the media torrent a lot of the coverage about the revelation that Harry has served in Helmland is all about itself, what it kept quiet about and covered up, and what now it can reveal and whether it was right to do so and what kind of publicity has resulted. Images and talk about images. Then there is the "Is he 'ordinary' or special" routine that has greater impact here as it goes beyond the usual celebrity reflections (in the sense of superficial glitter) - because the royal family are more than just celebrities. The whole episode is contrived yet,  also, a really British moment of 'national pride'.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): The Queen is worried and "distressed" even anxious over the Rowan Williams Sharia row, the Telegraph reports. There has always been a royal aspect to this. Charles was ahead of the curve, way back, when he said that he wanted to be "Defender of the Faiths". Although this sounded ridiculous at the time it showed that he grasped the central principle of traditional rule, once honed to perfection by the British ruling class. It was put succinctly by Lampedusa in his epic novel of aristocratic decline in 19th-century Sicily, Il Gattopardo (The Leopard): "If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change". The Archbishop was attempting something similar. If it isn't working, as indeed it seems it isn't, then the report of the Queen's concern may signal that Britain has entered that most dangerous and usually fatal moment for regimes everwhere. The point when its rulers decides that if things are to stay as they are, then things will have to stay as they are.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): So the Queen is now Britain's oldest living monarch. Imagine if she had done something lasting. If, since taking the throne, she had ordered an intelligent courtier to acquire one work by the best young artists under thirty, what a collection she would now have, or just the best sculptures. Or suppose she had sought to buy and preserve a couple of pieces of forest or woodland or wetland in different counties each year, how the royal ecology would be admired and celebrated today! Or if she had collected cars or British technology, what lines there would be at their exhibition; or hand-made jewellery or crafts, imagine the skills that would have flourished thanks to the ongoing touch of her patronage…just ANYTHING which one could introduce by saying, “Without Elizabeth II”.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Thanks to Ben Brogan I learnt that Lord 'Citizen' Goldsmith who is preparing a definition of Britishness for the Prime Minister while pocketing around £1million a year for his legal services told Sky TV that the National Anthem  needed a bit of re-branding: "There's some problem with part of it absolutely," the peer said. "Part of it is not actually that inclusive, but that's if you go onto the later verses". It's the "absolutely" that gets me. There is more than a whiff of fin de regime in the air at the moment but somehow I don't think it is Elizabeth's.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): There is a great deal about Diana over at the Spectator's Coffee House blog and the significance of her, of the 10th anniversary of her death and whether we are now an emotional country, and will it be 'closure'. Scorn not. These issues touch a nerve, there can be no healthy or intelligent democracy without emotions. The problem is the poverty of thought about it and a pathetic over-personalisation. As with all relationships what matters is not the inner nature of this personality or that but the relationship between them. The monarchy was not put at risk by Diana's personality or by that of Charles or by Elizabeth, however appalling/admirable you think them. It was put at risk by the uncontrollable civil war that broke out between all three. Of course, the monarchy was strengthened by Diana's death. If ten years ago a meteor had hit Balmoral and wiped out the other side leaving Diana as a regent Queen with William as the young King, the monarchy would also have "emerged strengthened".

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): I have been quoted in today’s Observer by Mary Riddell in an interesting discussion of the monarchy ten years after Diana. Our political class is still very nervous about what happened when she died and the media are now trying to close down the memory of it by calling it “a moment of madness”. This description is false. A large majority of the population were moved but not hysterical or afraid. The clapping and flowers that accompanied her coffin were, I wrote at the time, the equivalent of ‘Well played, Diana!’ – a cheer for the fright she gave the establishment.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): With debate bubbling about whether a written constitution is needed to help resolve issues of layered identity and integration, the core anti-argument popped up in response to a feeble Comment is Free article against the monarchy by Graham Smith of Republic that was a response to the wretched John Gray that I blogged yesterday. On the monarchy also what matters is having a written constitution. If a majority vote in a referendum to keep it hereditary it will be a pity, I’d prefer a republic. But I’m a democrat first. What's important is that the monarch swears an oath of allegiance to a democratic constitution which defines the role of the head of state and thus we see the last of divine right. Smith’s article said, mildly and in passing, that he wanted a written constitution and this drew a wonderful example of our ancient regime’s policeman’s plod mentality from “Billy1” (Comment No. 731326)

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Two articles in today’s Observer show the two sides of contemporary English judgement: at its best and its worst. It is the difference between someone who thinks and researches deeply and writes clearly and with care against the zeitgist of superficiality while the other postures, strives for effect, gets things wrong and is a perfect example of the Age of Blair. One is by an esteemed Professor of European Thought at the LSE the other penned by a thriller writer, journalist and editor of Vanity Fair.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): One story this picture tells us is about who isn't there.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): Trooping the colour which starts this morning and ends with a fly-past salute of jets screaming across Ken’s London, is a reminder that the royal family is a military clan like few others. “There were three of us in this marriage", Diana said, complaining that it was "a bit crowded". Well there has always been another member of the royal family, the army. This is not a boastful military parade, showing off the latest rocket, rejoicing in a victory (the Falklands celebrations is at arms length) or commemorating losses as on 11 November. It’s a birthday parade for the sovereign, with musical marches. I bought the programme for this year’s on my way to the Compass conference when St James was closed for a rehearsal. As it helpfully explains, “With a sharp eye and more personal experience of this parade than any other person present, Her Majesty will immediately notice any detail that is not 100% correct, which is why there are two full dress rehearsals for this event”. The Queen is not famed as a reader, which may be a good thing in this case, or her sharp eyes might have noticed a terrible howler. On page 2, S.J.L. Roberts, Major General Commanding the Household Division, writes that trooping the colour became an annual event “After George IV became King in 1762”. That was when he was born. He only became King (and the ceremony an annual one, it seems, allowing for bad weather, wars and other emergencies) in 1820.