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The royal family
Original poster

Abolishing the Monarchy

410 replies

tigger2022 · 19/06/2023 14:42

A few people on different sides of the debate have expressed an interest in discussing/debating this, so I thought we could give it a go…

Abolishing the monarchy?

My personal view: I used to be a staunch republican but have since completely changed my view. I think the constitutional monarchy is a slightly odd system, but seems to do the job, and I can’t think of another country’s system which is actually preferable. I also find myself less & less convinced by republican arguments…

Thoughts?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
8
Roussette · 20/06/2023 09:05

Barbadossunset · 20/06/2023 08:55

Roussette 17.53 yesterday.

I've answered to the best of my ability 👍🙂

Daftasabroom · 20/06/2023 09:10

Gracewithoutend · 19/06/2023 16:28

For starters I would like to see reform of the HoL. No hereditary peers. No disgraced PMs handing out peerages to donors, mates, their hairdresser and someone who has kompromat on them!

I think our HoL is actually a very interesting place. It's full of very knowledgeable people in specific subjects so if you listen to their debates, they're talk with facts rather than rhetoric. And because they're not elected, they don't have to adjust their views to please the electorate.
If we go to an all elected membership, it will just be more politicians of the same parties. At present there are nearly 200 crossbench members, which just wouldn't happen in a political house.
Labour have said they're going to reform the HoL when they get elected but it runs the risk of just being just more braying politicians, mirroring the the HoC. I think it will be sad to lose the specialist knowledge it has.

Why would a reformed HOL be full of braying politicians? I like the idea of at least a portion of representatives being elected by proportional representation. I also like the idea of not for profit membership organisations being represented e.g. 1 representative for each 100,000 members, that representative being elected by the members.

Id also reform the Commons so that all MPs are employees of the Commons and apply normal HR practices.

Barbadossunset · 20/06/2023 09:14

Roussette thank you for answering my question.
Maybe

Barbadossunset · 20/06/2023 09:15

Sorry I posted too early - maybe anti monarchists could storm the palace as happened to the Winter Palace during the Russian revolution and loot the place - thus enabling a distribution of wealth.

sashagabadon · 20/06/2023 09:17

I think the Royal family would actually become more wealthy if they ceased their constitutional roles. They’d still have their titles and their homes and their interests.
i guess the public could have Buckingham palace for the tourists ( although tourists can look round it now ) and possibly we’d keep the Crown Jewels ( which again tourists can already see)

upinaballoon · 20/06/2023 09:20

jeffgoldblum · 20/06/2023 08:48

@Barbadossunset , I'm not an expert but every thing that belongs to them personally will be theirs still , anything like Buckingham palace will belong to the state, so us normal citizens won't be getting a big payday.
And will still need to pay for its upkeep.

I've said this before. I knew someone who used to gee-up his wife and mother-in-law by saying that BP should be turned into council flats.

If that happened presumably the rents would pay for the upkeep.

Alternatively, if the RF had been abolished BP could be a tourist attraction every day of the year instead of the current Aug/Sept time, which would help the tax-payers.

Barbadossunset · 20/06/2023 09:29

If that happened presumably the rents would pay for the upkeep.

Presumably the rents would be have to be pretty high to pay for the upkeep. Also there’s a large garden to be maintained.

Novella4 · 20/06/2023 09:32

@tigger2022

You say that the UK is a constitutional monarchy but I’d like you to define ‘constitutional’ further so readers know exactly what you mean by that .
We have no written constitution.

We regularly have posters repeat the confused argument about the USA and France - when those countries combine PM and President into one role so the comparison is invalid

A presidential figure , if one were needed, ( there is no law saying you must have one ) would have no power so you can relax about that.

The few reminding European monarchies appear to have clear structures which show that the monarch is committed to upholding democracy

Where is that pledge from the Windsors?
We have the coronation nonsense - where we are reminded that we are subjects and Cammy and Chuck were given the COE and the people to ‘protect’ ( all the lols at that one)
The UK has an ‘unwritten’ constitution - in other words the establishment does what it sees fit and the royal con plays a big part in that.
MPs have to pledge to the King , not the people
Charles is literally above the law - he cannot break the law because nothing he does can be classified as illegal . He is the law …
Let’s start with correcting that nonsense.
Protocol is designed to reinforce the insufferable idea that the Windsors are ‘superior’. It’s all an illusion .

Barbadossunset · 20/06/2023 10:05

Novella you obviously feel very strongly about it. Why don’t you organise a riot along the lines of the Russian and French revolutions to overthrow this terrible institution?
Im sure the Guardian would sponsor it.

SarahShorty · 20/06/2023 10:11

The UK does have a constitution, it's just not codified like it is in the US. It's formed of Acts of Parliament, court judgements and conventions. Unfortunately, when people say 'constitution' they immediately think of the first 10 amendments to the US Constitution, otherwise known as the US Bill of Rights.

Novella4 · 20/06/2023 10:25

@SarahShorty

As I said, it is an ‘unwritten constitution ‘ in other words a piecemeal collection of laws .
Laws can be changed as we have seen with the planned ‘bonfire’ of European standards.
Popluations are more vulnerable in this situation

Inany case, how do the Windsors fit in this ‘unwritten constitution ‘ They are literally above it all.
The law that applies to the rest of us does not apply to the monarchy .
That would be laughable if it weren’t so serious .
HOL reform and further reform are needed .
Keep your king if you feel so strongly . Pay for him yourself though and get him away from democracy - that is my point

We do not have a mature democracy at the moment .

SarahShorty · 20/06/2023 10:36

The RF are installed by an Act of Parliament. If Charles was to be sworn into Parliament tomorrow, and then if he said "You have done nothing worthwhile, be gone" etc, he'd be removed and the UK will go back to being a republic, only in the present day rather than in 1649-1660. Saying all that, I would love an absolute monarchy.

Roussette · 20/06/2023 10:39

Barbadossunset · 20/06/2023 09:15

Sorry I posted too early - maybe anti monarchists could storm the palace as happened to the Winter Palace during the Russian revolution and loot the place - thus enabling a distribution of wealth.

Lol that's a bit drastic!

CathyorClaire · 20/06/2023 11:06

I think the institution missed a trick in failing to walk gracefully into the sunset when the late queen died.

We've just paid for the fourth extravagant circus in the space of a year while the family said circuses celebrate fight like rats in a sack and that's before we get onto the enormous unearned privileges they enjoy.

How that's considered superior to a democratically elected head of state is beyond me.

Gothambutnotahamster · 20/06/2023 11:17

CoffeeCantata · 19/06/2023 16:52

I agree, OP, that on paper it sounds ridiculous, and if you were starting to create a constitution you wouldn't come up with this - but, yes, it works.

I know all the arguments about it being elitist - but I don't agree with them. I don't think it impacts our democracy in any negative way in reality. I'm a pragmatist, not a person of principle, so my attitude is always - if it isn't broken, don't mend it. I like the continuity which monarchy gives and I love all the attendant fuss and pageantry. Why would we give up on something we do so well? The cost is offset in all kinds of ways, and frankly, wouldn't be much decreased if we had a president. The US Presidential inauguration costs about 80+ million (and that's not including all the election expenses every 7 years, which must be astronomical). So I don't think cutting costs is much of an argument for abolition.

I like the way royal events have been the backdrop to my own life - I remember watching them with my grandparents, then my parents and finally with my children. It might not matter to many posters here, but the fact that the monarch goes on when governments etc are transient is important and reassuring to me.

I used to think I was a republican in my youth - but I've come to see the point of it all now I'm older. Yes, they don't need all those houses, but apart from that, it works well. A Scandinavian set-up would be fine by me.

I agree with this.

I'm not a massive royalist but do support the monarchy. I especially dread to think what it would be replaced my. We definitely don't need anymore politicians.

Barbadossunset · 20/06/2023 11:22

CathyorClare so are you doing anything to actively oust the Royal Family? As I said earlier, I thought the republican movement was going into action once the Queen died.
If the institution is so unpopular why isn’t Keir Starmer proposing its dissolution in Labour’s manifesto for the next election?

Novella4 · 20/06/2023 11:57

CathyorClaire · 20/06/2023 11:06

I think the institution missed a trick in failing to walk gracefully into the sunset when the late queen died.

We've just paid for the fourth extravagant circus in the space of a year while the family said circuses celebrate fight like rats in a sack and that's before we get onto the enormous unearned privileges they enjoy.

How that's considered superior to a democratically elected head of state is beyond me.

I agree it would have been an elegant response to the inevitability of their slow decline

Instead we have the aged Charles and Camilla who provide a visual metaphor for the state of the institution.

It will be a slow disappeance I suspect as a combination of democratic reform and reducing interest lets the Windsors wither.
They are currently supported by parts of the COE ( which is a minority religion ) , tabloid media ( which is may turn once they sense blood in the water) and an aging cohort of the population .

Original poster
tigger2022 · 20/06/2023 11:57

@Novella4 if you don’t like “constitutional monarchy” I think the phrase “parliamentary monarchy” can be used interchangeably. It means the monarch is extremely limited in how he/she can exercise power. We don’t have a written constitution like some countries but we still do have some! Constitutions can be coded or uncoded. In any system of government laws can be “written and unwritten” so a republic wouldn’t help us much there.

OP posts:
Novella4 · 20/06/2023 12:00

@tigger2022

That same parliament is made up of MPs who must swear allegiance not to the people who elected them , but to Chalres Windsor .

We do not have a mature democracy

An elected HOS would have no power and we wouldn’t need to worry about ‘limiting ‘ them . It would all be codified .

Iwantcakeeveryday · 20/06/2023 12:00

Novella4 · 20/06/2023 11:57

I agree it would have been an elegant response to the inevitability of their slow decline

Instead we have the aged Charles and Camilla who provide a visual metaphor for the state of the institution.

It will be a slow disappeance I suspect as a combination of democratic reform and reducing interest lets the Windsors wither.
They are currently supported by parts of the COE ( which is a minority religion ) , tabloid media ( which is may turn once they sense blood in the water) and an aging cohort of the population .

Show quote history

Agree with both of you too. The Queens passing was a time to change how they did things and what their role was but instead we are paying for elaborate events while living through a cost of living crisis, which just feels exactly the same as how the Queen did things. I do not see how any of this is meant to be better than a democratically elected head of state either.

Original poster
tigger2022 · 20/06/2023 12:06

Novella4 · 20/06/2023 12:00

@tigger2022

That same parliament is made up of MPs who must swear allegiance not to the people who elected them , but to Chalres Windsor .

We do not have a mature democracy

An elected HOS would have no power and we wouldn’t need to worry about ‘limiting ‘ them . It would all be codified .

They swear allegiance to the King as a figurehead for the nation and the people. That’s the purpose of a figurehead, they are not saying “I will do whatever the king wants”. In the US they pledge allegiance to the flag - they are not literally swearing loyalty to a bit of cloth but who it represents. This is the whole reason that the monarch is not expected to express their views or show preference, because they are a symbol to represent everyone (including the people who did not vote for the eventual winner)

OP posts:
Novella4 · 20/06/2023 12:20

@tigger2022 Yeah yeah figurehead blah blah - I’ve heard it all before

The Windsors are a mere figurehead when it suits them .

Private citizen (whose extra martial affairs and dodgy financial deals must be kept private ) when it suits them

And your thoughts on Charles being above the law ? That’s ok with you too no doubt ?

Novella4 · 20/06/2023 12:22

Oh good god I’ve just re read your post !

’not expected to express views ‘

thats right - meanwhile they check all laws and exempt themselves from any they don’t like the look of !
Hundreds of laws that we must follow but you know , the ‘figurehead’ doesn’t want to do they exempt themselves

Iwantcakeeveryday · 20/06/2023 12:27

@Novella4 that's shocking police can't enter the estates to investigate crime without the monarchs permission! They really are above the law!