...so what exactly is "service and duty"?

[ServiceAndDuty]

After countless threads on the royal family, I feel nobody goes into full detail of what the royal family do apart from the same phrase "service and duty".

I genuinely would like to be enlightened on what this "service and duty" is, not including showing up to events and waving, watching tennis and rugby matches, opening places, having an expensive wedding sometimes etc.

I feel nobody has really answered in detail what it is.

I am open to being educated if I'm missing something.

The Prince's Trust has helped a lot of ordinary people.

As for what they do, I suppose I see more value in the endless duty visits than some on this thread. We all know what it's like to do a thankless but important job day in day out without anybody saying thank you or even seeming to notice what you're doing. It can make all the difference in the world to have somebody take an interest and say thank you, especially if the person concerned is important and influential. I read somewhere on here in the last ten days about Princess Anne's schedule and how she takes on the unglamorous visits to e.g. a sewage farm or a fish farm, and how she takes a real interest and makes people feel 'seen'. (Possibly she's just a very good actor, but same difference.) If the Royal Family didn't do this, would anybody else do it? Easy to say 'we have philanthropists or politicians who would do it' - on the same scale? Would it make ordinary people feel they had, however briefly and superficially, had some connection to the head of state?

I bet also that their connections have sometimes opened doors and made connections that otherwise wouldn't have happened. That sort of stuff does end up making a difference.

So what is the point of the monarchy if it has no powers to ensure we are better governed?

Bravo! Well said.

There are plenty of other countries where the Head of State is a ceremonial role, not an executive one. We actually had a Civil War in the UK over the powers of the monarchy, a few hundred years ago. Parliament makes the laws, the monarch signs them off. That's the way we do things. The monarch has some influence because of her/his close relationship to the PM, but it would be a constitutional crisis if the monarch tried to force our elected government to do something against their own agenda.

@CulturePigeon

Of course they are.

Its literally bred into them.

They believe all the protocols etc are because they're better/deserve it.

They expect the deference and adoration.

Why else would they if not because they think they're better.

Charles couldn't even lift a pen.

The only person who acknowledged the staff opening car doors for them yest was Louise.

Don't act like they don't think they're special. Of course they do

Why anyone else falls for it is baffling

It's the biggest load of bollocks I've ever heard.
It's time they went.

Yes I know all that, I’m trying to understand why people think we are a better country for having a monarchy.

Ok, so the meetings. On average I have about 5 a day. Did Charles have to do any of the following (which my administrator and I have to do for every meeting):

Go through diaries to find a suitable date, set up a doodle poll to find a date, go back to diaries for more dates
Decide the agenda and ask people for items for that agenda
Prepare the agenda and send it out to everyone coming to the meeting along with the invitation
If face to face find a room and book it and, if necessary book coffee/tea/water
Go through the action log for the last meeting and chase people for reports/updates/presentations
make sure all actions from last meeting are completed/if not then identify why not
Write reports/updates/presentations for meeting
Arrange and have pre-meets if a briefing is needed eg if there is a conflict to resolve and an agreed approach needed
Get to meeting under own steam and on time if F2F, deal with panicked phone calls from people getting lost/stuck in traffic/train cancelled
If virtual, deal with technical issues
Chair the meeting
Contribute to meeting and take on actions
Remind people that they are on mute/delays when people are frozen on screen/can't screen share
Take minutes
Deal with the one person who always saves the really complicated and urgent issue until AOB
Clear up the room
Deal with the people who hang around at the end of the meeting chatting
Go to next meeting and making sure you've got all the paperwork needed and have had time to read it
Type up minutes and send them out
Rinse and repeat for the next time

Or does he just rock up and sit there, being waited on and then bog off at the end without even clearning his coffee cup?

I don't think we are, but this is where we are, and as I said upthread the upheaval of scrapping it and deciding what would replace it fills me with horror. It would make Brexit look like a vicarage tea party.

ExHack · Today 10:50
The success of the Commonwealth is of course a towering achievement. @EdithWeston Another meaningless phrase that was oft-repeated yesterday! What exactly is the Commonwealth known for (apart from a pared-down Olympic games)?

Any friendly grouping/conference of nations on this troubled planet is surely something to be celebrated? It's not compulsory, and those countries which want out can leave, with no repercussions.

I watched an interview with a woman who's in charge of Commonwealth matters and she was fascinating. She had started off (in her youth) as very anti-Commonwealth, but had become passionate about its value. One point she made was that many of the members are very small, often island, countries which wouldn't get a place at the table in any other context, and for that reason, many see it as a good thing.

But there's a common theme among so many of these posts...and I'm sorry, I'm going to sound nasty and I don't mean to.

Hello! You've got to read the broadsheets, watch documentaries, read history and politics books and things like Newsnight etc....if you want the answers to these and other questions.

'What exactly is the Commonwealth known for?' indeed. The info is OUT THERE...but I very much doubt it's no MN. It's like a conversation down the pub. Opinions are only valuable if they're informed, surely.

Come on. Would you say the same about the PM or a CEO of a company whose schedule will also include lots of meetings? Their role is to attend the meeting, having previously gone through the briefings, and make a contribution in whatever form has been agreed. In the case of the Prince's Trust it sounds as if Prince Charles (as he was) made a substantial contribution to setting that up and setting the direction, keeping it going etc etc. In the case of a lot of other charities and so on, it would be more a case of turning up, listening, small talk and pressing the flesh. Same for top policitians, diplomats and business people.

Shaking hands once in a while in between shooting geese for fun and riding horses or something can hardly be called working, let’s be honest.

ask key workers who worked during the pandemic what they got for their service and duty other than just their salaries and some claps for saving lives and risking their own

Difference is that these other people you mention don’t get idolised, don’t get a life of immense privilege just because they were born, in a country so rich but that also allows children to go hungry

Opinions are only valuable if they're informed, surely.

I agree, but in spite of the internet making it easier than at any point in human history to get hold of information, not enough people (a) do that and (b) think critically about what they're being told and the reliability of the source. Nuance and context don't mesh well with social media.

What a ridiculous comment. The RF consists of multiple individuals who people barely know exist. No one would turn a hair if a minor royal stopped doing whatever they do. Even in the case of senior royals causibg a 'bit of a stir' is much more viable than resigning ftom a job you're dependent on to pay the bills. As you know very well.

The Queen worked until two days before her death, at 96

My great uncle died whilst at work. He was 60. He hadn't been feeling well for the last few days, but couldn't take time off sick because he wouldn't have been paid - and he and my great aunt didn't have any other income because she was a carer for their disabled adult son.

The Royal Family don't have a monopoly on celebrity status and money. The Duke of Westminster is the richest person in the country, possibly after the monarch. Where's the vitriol directed at him? Plenty of people making obscene amounts of money in the City, and giving nothing back to this country. A good many of them got there through school and family connections.

Well, yes; she probably had to do a bit of that, though not all.

What do you suppose an Ambassador does, for example? It’s a role that is similarly situated somewhere between an executive and a ceremonial role — it’s both. You live “over the shop”, being available as a host as well as being an employer. A lot of what most people regard as “free” time are instead actually spent on the job or performing ceremonial duties. But you also spend a lot of time reading paperwork and minutes, being briefed on things you need to know about. When you host an event you must behave impeccably, including knowing everyone who’s coming, memorising a brief biography of them each beforehand, and being able to talk to each of them about their work. People report to you, but they also work for you, and so you manage them too.

The Queen usually was on trips to public events, often overnight or for two nights, every ten days as well as everything else.

Plus reading all the parliamentary papers each day. Can’t skip them because you do need to sign them. And even though our head of state is not formally an executive role like the POTUS, it’s not purely ceremonial either. It’s somewhere in the middle — deliberately so.

Charles — who I don’t especially like, to be honest — reportedly works for large parts of the day, skipping lunch, and including four hours of paperwork and correspondence each night.

Plus the monarch is also the head of the CofE, and has a not merely ceremonial role there. Fancy going to church at least a couple of times each week, all your life, and never skipping it unless you’re pretty gravely ill? I don’t.

As I say, I’m not a monarchist. I don’t like the cushion of inherited wealth, nor the class system; and the monarchy has a fair number of monstrously thick hangers-on siphoning up money and privilege.

But I also recognise that it is a pretty gruelling job which never goes away. I wouldn’t like to do it. I think it’s probably a racing certainty that Elizabeth was an old-fashioned workaholic, and the service and duty thing was part of that.

But she certainly didn’t have nothing to do but swan about all day; and if we got rid of the monarchy and replaced it with a different kind of Head of State model, there would be a lot of work that needed doing for the role, and it would also be extremely expensive (take a look at the expenses of the French presidency, for example).

I'm very sorry to hear that, and it isn't right for a society not to support people with caring responsibilities. We have far too big a gap between rich and poor, and it should be a real mark of shame not to pay tax. However, I'm guessing this was some time ago, given he was your great-uncle. Life expectancy has gone up a lot in recent decades. I hope things would be a bit better now. Most people have some entitlement to sick pay or benefits in those circumstances.

This.

So he set up a charity.....

What doe she actually do in that charity?

I find all these royal threads bizarre. However the 'inherited wealth' gets brought up all the time. There isn't a single person on Mumsnet, or probably in the country, who would inherit a fortune and say 'no sorry I don't want it, give it to someone else'. Not one. And anyone who says they would Is a liar.

Even the wealthy who give lots away still make sure they can fund their own lifestyle first.

No that is diplomacy.

because there are loads of people who haven’t earned their advantages we shouldn’t not criticise some of them?

are you sure there is no vitriol directed at bankers and the like?

2 wrongs doesn’t make a right,

etc.

Anyway, let me know where I can find them and I’ll let rip to their faces what I think of them and their unearned privilege.

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