Would the Queen...

[Mark in Oshawa]

My opinion is that this is probably the best thread I've ever started. It's educational and the insights that have been offered aren't the kind found in books and magazines. Mark, it's nice having you unemployed and online.

It sucks being unemployed. My pocketbook is empty but I am glad I can debate here anyhow.

Regardless of what the Commonwealth feels, I think much of the rest of the world holds the English Royal Family with a higher level of esteem than any other Royal Family in the world. I think the Monarchy is one of the things that continues to make Britain special. Once you do away with the royals, you might as well be Poland.

This is my point. The Royals are far more criticized in the UK an in the Commonwealth, yet the British Empire and how it morphed into the Commonwealth is a good story. The Royal family and the crown are part of this history, and the influence has been more positive than negative. Australia, New Zealand and Canada all toy with getting rid of having the Queen as a head of state, yet it hasn't happened. Without the Queen, Canada is just part of North America that has one less part of its culture to distinguish as not Americans. I love the USA as a neighbour, but don't want to be an American. Take away the Crown and we are one step closer.

Ok, you've said Prince Charles would be a mistake as king. Why? Do his sons still have to marry a royal or has that been dropped?

Charles is seen as a buffoon. His behaviour towards Diana was cowardly. The whole monarchy rests on the fiction/fantasy that the Royals in the end stand for values of security, ethics and rule of law. While we all get they are human, they have to impartial and fill the role of being above the stupidity of society. We want them to have the appearance of being better than average. Cheating as he did on Diana and using her to just provide a heir to the throne was seen as killing his crediblity.

The Monarchy only governs when the majority believe in it...(just like Santa Claus I guess). People don't believe in Charles and his sincerity.

[GridGirl]

Royalty have been marrying commoners for years. Prince Edward for example married a commoner in the now Countess of Wessex. They have even elected to not give their children princess and prince titles.

Hell, Peter Phillips even married a Canadian commoner in Autumn Kelly. Although this was only after she denounced the Catholic faith and swapped to become an Anglican so he could retain his ever reducing line to the throne. I didn't quite understand why she had to do that because alot of royals would have to die before he was even in with a shout of being King anyway.

[Hondo]

Technicaly, couldn't the Queen, in light of the MP expenses fooforawe, dissolve the current Parliament and cause new elections to be held?

I am pleased that y'all know so much about your Monarchy. Over here, you'd be surprised how many people that voted for Obama don't even know where he lives now.

[Drew]

Ok, you've said Prince Charles would be a mistake as king. Why? Do his sons still have to marry a royal or has that been dropped?

People always think that the monarchy is out of touch with real life, Prince Charles would only just prove that and highlight the difference (running an Aston Martin on wine anybody?!) Whereas the 2 princes aren't really seen as massively out of touch with society.

[BTCC Fan#1]

Technicaly, couldn't the Queen, in light of the MP expenses fooforawe, dissolve the current Parliament and cause new elections to be held?

Technically theres nothing stopping her from doing this, she retains the right mainly because we don't have a formal written constitution. However, I suspect if she ever did there would be a fair bit of legal wrangling, and chances of the monarchy being abolished for meddling in the democratic process might increase..

[Hondo]

Technically theres nothing stopping her from doing this, she retains the right mainly because we don't have a formal written constitution. However, I suspect if she ever did there would be a fair bit of legal wrangling, and chances of the monarchy being abolished for meddling in the democratic process might increase..

Or, in this particular adventure, ridding her subjects of the whole corrupt bunch of them and allowing them to choose new ones immediately might endear the Monarchy to the people for 100 years.

[Rollo]

Originally the Septennial Act 1715 limited the standing of parliament to seven years, and the Parliament Act 1911 further limited it to five years - however both of them assume that the parliament itself (through the Prime Minister) would ask for a Writ of Election and thus force a dissolution.

Both Canada and Australia's parliaments have had similar issues dealt with. Once when the Governnor General of Canada refused to dissolve parliament (ie the King–Byng Affair in 1926) and the when the Governnor General of Australia actually did so without consent of the parliament (1975 "Constitutional Crisis")

Perhaps the Queen's secretary's letter to the Australian Governor-General is instructive:
As we understand the situation here, the Australian Constitution firmly places the prerogative powers of the Crown in the hands of the Governor-General as the representative of the Queen of Australia. The only person competent to commission an Australian Prime Minister is the Governor-General, and The Queen has no part in the decisions which the Governor-General must take in accordance with the Constitution. Her Majesty, as Queen of Australia, is watching events in Canberra with close interest and attention, but it would not be proper for her to intervene in person in matters which are so clearly placed within the jurisdiction of the Governor-General by the Constitution Act.

The inference being that in the UK the Queen would be the "only person competent to commission a British Prime Minister"; thus the precedents would come not from within the UK but her children.

[Mark in Oshawa]

The whole thing for Americans to grasp is their Constitution spells out more or less exactly where the power in Washington is found, and controlled. In the Westminister Parliamentry model and its offshoots, the Crown does have some sway that in many ways makes the Queen the living constitution I suppose. At least on which elected officials have how much rope to play with before she pulls it. The reality is tho, the Parliaments work because of their loyalty to the Crown. I agree with many, Charles wouldn't endear that sort of loyalty.

[Hondo]

So should the Queen force the current parliament to dissolve and cause the election of a new one out of love and devotion for her subjects? Would the public see it and understand it that way?

The reason I ask is because reading various English newspapers online everyday leads me to believe that the Brits aren't any happier with their government's excesses than are other people with their's. For most of us we have to wait for the government to reform it's self (yeah, right.), or change it ever so slowly through the ballot box, or take it down by force of arms.

Britain, through it's Monarchy, is in a unique position where the Queen could step in and cause immediate changes. The economy sucks, government is raising taxes on everything, Britain seems to be growing ever less fond of the EU, and jobs that Brits are willing to work are in short supply. Maybe a constitutional crisis is exactly whats needed to shake things up and move in a new direction. The old way of doing things has been made obsolete by population growth and a lack of insistance on personal responsibility. Not only in Britain, but here and other places too.

Could a constitutional crisis be just what is needed to jar people back to reality right now? Would the Queen do it or is her loyalty to the Parliament?

[Rollo]

So should the Queen force the current parliament to dissolve and cause the election of a new one out of love and devotion for her subjects? Would the public see it and understand it that way?

The reason I ask is because reading various English newspapers online everyday leads me to believe that the Brits aren't any happier with their government's excesses than are other people with their's. For most of us we have to wait for the government to reform it's self (yeah, right.), or change it ever so slowly through the ballot box, or take it down by force of arms.

The Queen in order to dissolve parliament would issue a Writ for an Election. Ultimately, the reason given would be for one of no confidence, and then it would be none other than the people who would decide who would make up the next parliament.

Having another election surely must be seen as democratic no? It would probably strengthen the monarchy more than anything else.