To ask if this is really what the queen wanted??

[MyMourningIsSadderThanYours]

Hospital appointments cancelled, funerals delayed and food banks closed. Businesses adopting ridiculous measures to prove how much they loved the queen and are mourning her. I guess, the queen can't be held responsible for the stupidity of businesses such as center parcs but didn't the media say that the event of her passing and the subsequent period of mourning were carefully planned and had her stamp of approval?

However, if she was the kind of person who would have wanted someone's medical appointment to be cancelled just because of her then doesn't that mean that she wasn't really that nice a person? In other words if she was as altruistic and service minded as we would like to think she was wouldn't she have been horrified by this circus and by what is happening apparently for the sake of mourning her passing?

And if this circus wasn't her idea then don't you think that either the royal family or the government are milking the death of an apparently not just highly respected but also beloved person purely for their advantage? Are they not going down in your esteem?

Yabu: we have to mark this historical event in as dramatic a way as possible and show in clear terms that we are in fact mourning. Besides you are not just mistaken but also very disrespectful. Off with your head.

Yanbu: yes, the proportion that this event has taken on is very worrying and it's a shame that the royal family, businesses and large parts of the country are all playing along with this populist jingoism.

Surgery hasn't been cancelled at the NHS Trust i work for, and lots of other appointments are going ahead too. Individual trusts have been left to decide.

I don't really know what I think the answer to your question is I must admit. Funeral on a Sunday certainly would have made a lot of things easier.

Just because it's been made a holiday doesn't mean your employer needs to give it. Depends what your contract says.

Most big events like this come with a bank holiday, the jubilee was a long weekend difference being everyone had time to plan, the Queen dying while expected wasn't on a schedule.

I don’t think she was a particularly nice person tbh 🤷‍♀️ and yes I absolutely think the bread and circuses is exactly what she would have wanted. The serfs need to know their place - and man do they revel in the servitude 😳.

Its nothing to do with the RF or the queen whether businesses cancel things

The argument about businesses having to close because schools are shut, well most of them are open on normal bank holidays, hospitals are, holiday parks are so this is nonsense

Whats happened is that businesses are shutting in some fake 'respect' thing, otherwise you wouldnt have had organisations like British Cycling instructing their club members not to go cycling on Monday!!!!

Ive had operations and even outpatient appointments on bank holidays before, we always eat out or we're on holiday on bank holidays so theres no reason for things to shut just because schools are shut, where do they get staff from on those days normally?

There are enough people who are not interested in the funeral for businesses to run a skeleton staff on Monday and then those same people take their BH another day as annual leave later on.

YABU. This is exactly what she wanted. She planned most of this.

Her entire life was about showing up to places, normal life stopping and people marvelling at the pomp because their betters had arrived.

She spent her entire life in unimaginable opulence, with everyone deferring to her in every way; all paid for by her subjects.

She would have had neither clue nor interest about the lives of those inconvenienced by all this, such trivialities were beneath her.

This is what we owe her for her wonderful lifetime of service.

When it all comes down to it, none of this is really about the Queen, or what she wanted after her death. As others have said, at its heart all the pomp and circumstance is about establishing Charles as our new monarch and shoring up support for the monarchy. Maintaining the status quo, essentially, and avoiding any vacuum where people might begin to question the idea of a hereditary monarchy. The take-home message for her subjects is: ‘this is how things were; the is how things are; this is how things will always be.’

As I heard someone point out on the radio this morning, we now have the technology to run a pretty efficient timed ticket system for the lying in state, so the massive queue needn’t have been a thing. But the optics of having streams of people shuffle along in a queue for hours, pilgrimage style, is obviously better for giving the impression of an establishment that has overwhelming public support.

I think, it's a combination of both . Since the bank holiday is so sudden it's difficult to make arrangements maybe to organise skeleton staff. I don't know. I prefer to think that employers are pushed into this rather than that they are just hoping to get brownie points with their conservative clientele by being sadder than thou.

An employer doesnt have to give the holiday on that day, so its not hard to organise a skeleton staff at all, you simply say we are remaining open and some of you can take the day off but I need a couple of people who want to work but I cant allow everyone to take Monday as a BH so either draw straws or volunteer to work it

Someone told me that the Queen’s funeral couldn’t be held on a Sunday, as that wasn’t the tradition.

I’m not keen on tradition for tradition’s sake. I think we should keep the traditions that still work and ditch the ones that don’t. The country’s infrastructure clearly can’t cope well when a bank holiday is called at short notice. Issues with childcare and transport force some essential services to grind to a halt.

This what I don't understand: isn't all the inconvenience caused and the apparent show of self serving entitlement making the royal family less popular? Wouldn't most people think that this whole thing is a bit unnecessary and distasteful especially when it's causing suffering for real people.

This what I don't understand: isn't all the inconvenience caused and the apparent show of self serving entitlement making the royal family less popular?

I think those of us who think it’s all a bit excessive are meant to look at the blanket media coverage and the teary vox pop tributes and the 5 mile queue and conclude that we are in a tiny minority.

Regarding your second point: Was it and is it really that common? Having a monarch as the head of state is often compared to having a president but I don't remember many bank holidays being declared and so many services being cancelled when presidents have died.

I remember Ronald Reagan having a state funeral which involved the coffin on a gun carriage very much like the Queen's. I've just googled it and the period of mourning was 7 days, the coffin was transported to various places, he lay in state for 3 days with people queuing up to file past and the government was shut down on the day of the funeral. So quite similar really.

YANBU

The Queen, above all, committed herself to duty and tradition and went to great lengths to uphold the significance of the monarchy. I think she’s want that importance and significance to still be upheld.

I think we need to stop making the mistake that all little old ladies are benevolent and selfless - I respected the Queen enormously, and have been devastate by her death…but no one but her family know her. I couldn’t describe her personality, not if you paid me to! That’s how she wanted it to be and how it should be - monarchs are not celebrities or caricatures. And so how would any of us know if she’s the type of woman who’d Fret over other people’s hospital appointments? Would she even give a shit? She did her job incredibly well but this ‘the Queen wouldn’t want this’ has to stop because none of us have a clue what her personal opinions would be. Just that she upheld her duty.

I’m a royalist and I think the 5 mile queue is total and utter lunacy.

OP, you seem to think the Queen and / or the Royal Family are responsible for decisions by independent organisations.

Although the ceremonies / content of services etc will have been either laid down by ye ancient tradition or decided in consultation with the Queen and her family and close advisors, the behaviour is the public and choices of organisations are down to them.

The Gvt website guide is very clear on this www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-demise-of-her-majesty-queen-elizabeth-ii-national-mourning-guidance/the-demise-of-her-majesty-queen-elizabeth-ii-national-mourning-guidance
^^
“There is no expectation on the public or organisations to observe specific behaviours during the mourning period

Public services will continue as usual, although there may be some changes to service availability on the day of the State Funeral”

This!!

She was our Queen. Of course the country should mourn her and if you don't want to then that's fine.

I wonder if the people who have had their appointments cancelled are as "outraged" as the people who are commenting 🤔

My sister works in the NHS and when she started phoning people to reschedule a lot of them were surprised that she even phoned they just assumed it would be cancelled and they’d get another letter. Many of them were relieved because they didn’t want to miss the funeral themselves.

and if everything had gone ahead

I work in a different field and one day last week none of my customers turned up for their appointments with me because they were out on the streets watching Charles and Camilla arrive in town.

so imagine how many nhs appointments would have been wasted anyway with no shows!

many nhs staff will end up working Sundays to catch up the same way they have been doing since covid.

so Yabu

I Think the royal family should be paying for the whole shebang, not the tax payer. Charles saved a fair whack by not paying inheritance tax. At a time where cost of living is becoming hard for so many how can they justify allocating funds to this?

Its a State funeral the last one was 1965 of course its going to be a Bank Holiday.

Did you enjoy your Bank Holiday for the 70th anniversary?

Big hint the Coronation is also likely to be a Bank Holiday.

We haven't cancelled anything in our department (NHS). We are however expecting a high number of DNAs due to people either wanting to observe the funeral or public transport unavailable. Hopefully, most people will have the decency to call if they don't plan to come to their appointments on Monday though.

The levels of ridiculousness demonstrated by the likes of Centre Parcs can hardly be blamed on the royal family.

This.

The Queen would have been sad at how it’s played out. Not the queue, that’s kinda cool, but the school closures and cancelled operations and funerals - she would never have wanted that. Especially with her family being paraded around and exploited for the financial benefit of international news organisations.

The royal family can’t be the driving force behind all this nonsense, it isn’t in their interest. I’m very curious who is. I picture an army of ‘helpers’ bullying everyone into blindly following whatever new traditions they dream up.

She probably knew schools and shops would close. Thats a tradition. People will want to watch either for the historical factor, the pomp, to pay respects.

Operations and funerals aren't really fair to cancel especially if its going to be a long wait to reschedule them.

What I do find a bit crazy is the thread about people who don't work Mondays asking if they should get a day in lue.

The last state funeral was on a Saturday.

It is ridiculous to declare a bank holiday with one week's notice. It's never happened before in the context of a modern NHS and it's caused chaos. It's been non-stop emergency planning all week at my trust, as if people didn't have anything better to do. Staff can't get childcare so can't work, patient transport won't be running as that's run by a private company, other hard and soft facilities stuff is up the spout. Most elective work is having to be stood down as it just can't go ahead safely.

They should have held it on Sunday.

Tbf, our government has been shut down for months …