Royal Family & riots

[bitesthedust]

Has KC or anyone from the RF issue any statements about the recent riots?

If not, why not?

Genuine question.

Respectfully that isn't correct. It wasn't correct when it was fed to me 50 years ago, and it most certainly wasn't correct when it emerged the Queen was unable to prevent Boris Johnson illegally proroguing parliament.

The monarch possess no "special powers". Fuck all. They are an animated cyclostyled signature that doubles as a crown stand a few days a year. The King on my chessboard has more chance of dissolving parliament if I shoved it into the civil service IT systems and it caused a crash.

So woulf you agree to elected monarchy?

Or do you believe that monarchs should only exist under divine right and hereditary succession with a preference for children over sibilings and sons over daughters?

Divine right disappeared centuries ago.

The monarchy exists in a political framework today. I'm not keen on electing the monarch, you elect a political leader and I think if you elected a monarch it would inevitably become a political position rather than remaining apolitical as it is now.

I'm happy with the succession rules as they are now, in birth order regardless of sex (would love to see the arostocracy catch up with this too). I would like to see a change to the rules surrounding Counsellors of State, I think they should be limited to working members of the family only.

The monarchy exists in a political framework today. I'm not keen on electing the monarch, you elect a political leader and I think if you elected a monarch it would inevitably become a political position rather than remaining apolitical as it is now.

Given the total and utter absence of any power in the Monarch, who gives a fig what their politics are. Chuck could be a raving loony Nazi for all I care. It's not like he can order us to goose step to the Lambeth Walk.

At least an elected head of state has the legitimacy of .... well, being elected.

I say the Monarch has no power, which is strictly not true. They do have the power to get legislation amended before anyone is allowed to see it, just in case it upsets them. Not that we peasants would ever know.

If not elected than the divine rights stand as they are all successors of past RFs??

She could have checked him - she had the legal power to do so if she had wanted. I was bitterly disappointed when she didn't. (She was probably advised that it would provoke riots if she were to be seen to be thwarting Brexit and Johnson, who had just won a "landslide" election (FPTP - another facet of our system that sucks - a huge majority with less than half the vote ).

But your point is well made that the Monarch's powers have atrophied over the years, to the point where it would cause a constitutional crisis if Charles were to start wielding them now.

She could have checked him - she had the legal power to do so if she had wanted.

You know the rules. You assert. You prove. I stand by the fact she did not as evidence she could not. Something I have asserted for 50 years and told to stop being a "silly girl" when I was younger to shut me up.

So when you produce the stature law that provides for the Monarch to tell the PM to "F orf" we agree it doesn't exist.

QED what is the point of the Monarchy ? Surely there aren't that many crowns we can sell that need modelling ?

Charles II - rather wisely - quietly dropped the idea of the divine right. Something that was made law in the 1688 Bill of Rights, if memory serves. Which is why it's called the glorious revolution ...

Divine right is the belief that the individual who ascends to the throne has been chosen for the role by God. I don't think anyone holds this belief any more, since we regularly boot out unsuitable monarchs.

I've got the right to shout loudly in my bzck garden. That I choose not to doesn't mean I don't have that right.

I've also got at O level in British Constitution.

As someone else explained, it no longer exists, by law. We have an hereditary, constitutional monarchy, nothing divine about it, just how the system works.

Lots of people admire Sweden as a country that has an equitable and fair society. It too has a hereditary constitutional monarchy. Same with Denmark 🤷‍♀️

I still have a Tufty club badge somewhere.

Posh!

If he effectively dropped the idea of Divine Law I do not understand how he is the king and how his son and grandson are heirs to the throne

Surely ‘divine law’ dictates where and how - in which family - every single human being is born?

We could also call it ‘radomness law’ for the atheists, but the meaning is the same and the ‘chosen’ ones go on being part of royalty without any merit and strictly from their family tree

You get the Royal Family still inheriting their position, but without anyone hav8ng tonpretend that this was God's will.

Genetics, not deity - the same as for all the other aristocratic families.

that is exactly why I mentioned ramdoness

’random’s will’ or ‘god’s will’, whatever label is chosen, will lead to the same outcome regardless of one’s faith

Yes.
It freed us up, as a (then) Christian country to choose a different HoS when genetics threw up a bad 'un. Previously the argument was that we had to put up with the bad 'uns because itvwas God's will and, as good Christians, we shouldn't challenge Him.

She could have checked him - she had the legal power to do so if she had wanted
No she couldn't. An unelected Monarch cannot overturn decisions made by the elected part of Parliament. It doesn't matter if she was lied to or not. She couldn't do anything at all about it. As Jacob Rees Mogg said at the time, The monarch does what they are told to do. They could throw all the red boxes into the fire, and the only difference it would make would be that they wouldn't know what legislation they wanted to exempt themselves from that they didn't like. I think there are too many other things that are more important about our political system that need changing before something that would make little difference, good or bad is changed, but I do believe they need to be radically slashed in terms of personnel ( King/heir/ spouses) staff, homes and influence over the people who are supposed to he holding truth to power, like Parliament allowing them to exempt themselves from tax, environmental legislation, wills etc, and the press falling over themselves to cover up for them in the hope of an invite to the Palace and a knighthood. I don̈t think they are doing anything anyone else wouldn't do in their position, but the culture of obsequiousness let's them get away with a lot more than an elected ceremonial President as in Ireland woukd be allowed.

I suspect constitutional lawyers might have an opinion.

The trial of King Charles I is the starting point. It's how a King can be guilty of treason.

It was abour proroguing Parliament, not overturning legislation, though.

Which the courts said was illegal. She either didn't know enough to hold the government to account for trying to do something illegal( despite being Head if State) or she had no power to stop him doing something illegal and had to rely on the judiciary to do it. I suspect it was the latter. Convention dictates that the Monarch has no power to do anything. They are just a figurehead. There would be no difference if they were there or not.

The Government (in the form of Boris) did something (it the prorogation) that was kicking the arse out of how prorogation is normally used. And said it's fine, Parliament gets prorogued for lots of reasons and varying durations.

We do not know how the late Queen used her powers to advise and admonish on that. And at the time, the PM was declaring the action to be legal, and within his powers. And the courts had not ruled.

And yes, the courts ruled the action illegal. And I think it's entirely correct, indeed vital, that it is the courts who decide, not the monarch (views unknown) nor the PM, what is correct.

We do not know how the late Queen used her powers to advise and admonish on that.

Oh yes we do. A big fat nothing of consequence. Certainly didn't affect the outcome one teeny bit.

And I think it's entirely correct, indeed vital, that it is the courts who decide, not the monarch (views unknown) nor the PM, what is correct.

So you agree a Monarch is redundant to the process. Well that'll go a way towards plugging a £22bn shortfall.

Source for the assertion that she didn't use those powers?

The Queen's meetings with her PMs are strictly confidential and it would have been major news if that ever were ever breached. I do not remember any coverage of those meetings at the time, or since.

And no I do not agree that the monarch was "redundant". There is nothing to suggest anything other than that she acted correctly within her constitutional role.