Debating the monarchy's relevance, reform and public accountability in modern Britain

[LipglossAndLies]

Welcome to this thread! 👋 I am hoping it provides a dedicated space to discuss and debate the relevance, utility, and future of the institution of monarchy in modern times.

To help make this a welcoming space for genuine discussion, I would like to encourage everyone to follow a few simple guidelines:

💬 Respectful Challenge, Not Nastiness: let's keep the focus entirely on the ideas, not the people posting them.

👀 Focus on the roles, not the people: This thread is about governance, constitutional law, economics, and the function of a head of state. I think it would help to use the official roles and not personal names to keep the conversation completely agnostic.

🙏 Gossip free: Please avoid discussing personal family drama, media feuds, or the private lives of individual family members. There are plenty of other threads for that!

💁‍♀️ Report or ignore: If you feel someone is not commenting in good faith, or is trying to provoke a hostile reaction as it will help keep the conversation on track.

To kick off the debate, for me I would think its time for significant structural reform. Recent years have highlighted major blind spots in how official state roles such as official trade or investment envoy appointments are handed out, funded, and scrutinised by the public. When individuals holding these titles face serious scrutiny over their expenses, or how they utilise state-backed influence, it reflects heavily on the entire institution.

If the monarchy is to survive in modern times, it needs to move past a culture of internal deference and accept rigorous financial oversight, auditing, and transparency as any other government body receiving taxpayers money.

@CathyorClaire
https://www.thetimes.com/business/economics/article/prince-william-homewards-homeless-jobs-pret-ikea-c6ngkrn2h

@CathyorClaire

https://www.forbes.com/sites/afdhelaziz/2026/05/25/how-prince-williams-homewards-is-quietly-rewriting-the-playbook-on-homelessness---starting-in-a-cornish-village/

https://people.com/prince-william-makes-good-promise-made-youth-club-12123099

Not Homewards, but I'm impressed he had the roof fixed in a timely fashion. The city of NYC would not have finished until 2028 and thecroof would still be leaking.

Also, many NYC affordable housing units that are built in market rate buildings have a separate poor door or are housed in a separate building from the market rate units. It's impressive that the Cormwall housing is not built like that, and doesn't sound like a housing project design.

Thank you.

The link is paywalled but I've just pointed out on another thread the Ikea connection may conflict with another of W's projects.

https://www.lse.ac.uk/news/new-research-for-prince-williams-homewards-programme-on-preventing-family-homelessness

It looks as though they are trying to legitimately track the results.

Thanks again but also paywalled.

If you paste the link in archive.ph you will be able to override the paywall.

I'm in the subway with spotty connectivity so can't archive right now.

With the exception of People, the other three sources are pretty reputable.

Our mayor keeps talking about our housing crisis and the homeless but I'm not seeing any thoughtful, planned positive change. They s d give permission to get another 2 luxury apartment buildings down the block from me with no parking right after they cut back on the buses.

Homewards was launched in 2023 with the ambitious promise of demonstrating that homelessness could be made rare, brief and unrepeated. Three years into its five-year programme, surely it's reasonable to ask what it has actually achieved against that ambition?

Where are the measurable outcomes? How many people have avoided homelessness specifically because of Homewards?

What's genuinely new? The recent LSE research you linked to examines approaches already being used by the Magpie Project. Learning from existing charities is worthwhile, but hardly groundbreaking innovation.

How scalable is Cornwall? The 24 homes rely on Duchy land and £3 million in charitable funding. How is an ordinary council or charity supposed to replicate that model without those exceptional resources?

What's the additional impact? Would these projects have happened anyway through existing charities and housing organisations?

I'm not suggesting Homewards has achieved nothing, but there's a considerable difference between launching initiatives, facilitating partnerships and demonstrating lasting, measurable change. With 2 more years to go I am not sure it will be able to answer those questions or being able to provide tangible measureable results. If Cornwall isn't repeatable then its failed in one respect.

Surely the measure of its relevance should be the lasting difference it makes, rather than how many glowing articles are written about its initiatives with no real measures that prove its making a difference?

There is no one way to end homelessness. The whole point of the initiative was to work with local partners and tailor the solution to the local circumstances. These six locations would then provide examples to be replicated. I will be interested in the report at the end of the five years.

What? You're down on a homelessness project? Are you for real?!

@MonetsLilac

Why the hell should people NOT examine outcomes ?

If he was donating millions out of his own pocket( as many billionaires do) and not endlessly puffing up his own actions you might have a point .

William is publicly funded - yes I am referring to the Duchy too .
Most recently alarms were raised about William selling off 20 % of Duchy farmland in order to build housing .

Firstly it was not his to sell . Secondly there are questions surrounding the fact that William will continue to pocket the rents . Yes we know William cannot directly take profits from sales in the Duchy so this scheme ensures the rent keeps rolling in with growing future profits and PR can trumpet that he’s ending homelessness

Just don’t ask about the farmers who have had their farmland sold from under them.

Does anyone know if others are partnering with William over the sell off and future profits?

Wow! Just saying! 😂
Folks are free to say what they want, including me.
I just think there's plenty to criticise them about, but, controversially.... I think Homewards is a good thing! (ducks for cover)
Don't get bogged down with the personalities. It's the system I dislike, not the people.

@LipglossAndLies - in your OP:
"Focus on the roles, not the people"
That's a very good premise 👍🏼

Ok @MonetsLilac

In his ROLE as ‘Prince of wales’ William as a PERSON is trying to present an investment in his own future profits ( selling off 20% of the duchy for building ) as a ‘donation’

None of the Windsors help charity . Charity is used by them to manage their image / try to justify their take from the tax payer

No need for the capital letters. I can read.
I was hoping for a discussion as laid out by the OP.
However, I don't really want to be patronised.
Enjoy your chat.

I just think there's plenty to criticise them about, but, controversially.... I think Homewards is a good thing! (ducks for cover)

We've been told W intends to 'royal with a small r' and as part of that has ditched patronages wholesale with the intention of concentrating on his 'big projects'.

We're told he works tirelessly behind the scenes while drawing millions from the public purse with the implication these projects take up much of his time.

It's not unreasonable to ask for proven results.

He's offering the leaseholders the opportunity to buy the land, and then investing the money to build housing. The builders will obviously be local Dutchy inhabitants and the the materials will be sourced locally. It reminds me of the WPA projects in NYC during the Depression except the Duchy is funding the project and not the city and US Government. My grandfather was a WPA architect and was able to buy a home with his salary.

If he keeps people in the Dutchy with money to spend, it will be advantageous for the Dutchy. Look at Greece - an almost entirely tourism economy. Do you want that for Devon and Cornwall?

I would like to see some sort of cost/benefit analysis. The defenders of the status quo often talk about the RFs “soft diplomacy” and “value to tourism” and “contribution to charity”. I would
like to see exactly what is meant by this.

As would I ! As a defender of the status quo. Value to tourism , I'm not entirely convinced by , soft diplomacy , well I suppose that's my opinion that QEII , KC had/ have a bigger voice internationally than a president would , but I can't quantify it. Charity , I think I might have some figures about a Norfolk based charity who said what C's involvement got them, but I would have to check.

(One more quick thing I have tried to PM you on a Barbour related matter. Do have a look if you are minded to - I may have one you'd like , gratis)

As I said the objective was to end up with solutions that can be repeated. If someone can explain how a council is to come up with £3m and some land and this yo be repeated up and down the country go for it. I am not convinced. Magpie was something already running in the borough so not a new solution. Same with IKEA, IKEA has been providing jobs way before this initiative came along. So what has this initiative actually achieved? Hence why I am saying what are the measurable outcomes as there should be some real ones not piggy backing off others work and claiming credit.

He's offering the leaseholders the opportunity to buy the land, and then investing the money to build housing.

Even with 'discounts' it seems some current tenant farmers will be unable to raise the funds they need. Echoes here of kicking the littles to the kerb to establish the exclusion zone round his most recent forever home.

https://www.herefordtimes.com/news/26499875.duchy-cornwall-offering-routes-ownership-farmers/

As for the proposed sale I don't think it's been firmly established as yet whether W is even able to dispose of any percentage of Duchy holdings given he doesn't own them but in any case I think we need far more clarity on the small print.

The sale is supposed to be supporting the development of homes and sustainable environmental projects.

What we don't know is proposed detail on associated licences, fees and rents which will inevitably be attached to any property deal.

What's unexplained is why the Duchy is puffing environmental credentials when among W's earliest acts on taking over was the issue of hugely destructive mineral mining rights.

What we do know is the royals don't act altruistically and it's highly unlikely hands-on parent W is stiffing either his own or the next Duke of Cornwall's millions.

Thanks OP for starting the thread.

The monarchy are irrelevant and parasitic and just feed Britain's insatiable need for drama and following celebrities. However, nobody can conceive of an alternative because of the succession of diabolical politicians we've somehow voted in. Until the Westminster swamp has been drained and the bar is raised for political accountability, we are stuck with the RF.

The UK has no plan.

No plan at all, but three cheers for Lord Foulkes.

At least someone has the balls to stand up and be counted

https://twitter.com/MirrorPolitics/status/2110445541918474306

@@simpsonthecat

He's apparently a member of the Privy Council and HoL so no, he has no balls either in my humble anarchic opinion. They're all in it for themselves and keen to point fingers, until proven otherwise. I would love some proof otherwise.

Jeremy Corbyn had the right idea by initially refusing to join the Privy Council, and then when he did join, not kneeling to take the oath and not singing GSTQ.