The thrust of the article is clear. The Guardian has described Prince Charles many a time as the "Meddling Prince" over the last five years and also uses this today in a related article. Here is a private citizen, using "secretive constitutional loopholes" to stick his nose into matters that he has no right to. More than that, he has actually been using these powers to prevent democracy from functioning properly. He has been doing this by holding up or vetoing laws that would otherwise have been passed by our elected representatives - and *our* government has offered him this! Andrew George MP is quoted saying "Most people will be astonished to learn that [the Prince of Wales] appears to have in effect powers of veto over the government." The article also uses the words "overstepping his constitutional role by lobbying ministers directly".
Bloody hell - no wonder people are concerned - didn't we have a Civil War over this type of thing before?!
Let's Pick it Apart
Except... when you read the article carefully you can pick this all apart and realise the Guardian is chucking quite a lot of mud around here, some of which is not actually connected and none of which is backed up by any evidence.
The first point to note is that the issue of lobbying ministers (for which absolutely no evidence is given here) is quite distinct to the issue of the Prince of Wales's "power of consent" to certain specific pieces of legislation. The Guardian has deliberately muddled the two and thrown them in together to create the picture it wants the reader to come away with.
Next, any level of critical reading of the piece shows that the allegation of having "a power of veto over the government" is not in fact some general power over the business of government as is implied; in fact it is limited to a dozen government bills that the "Guardian investigation" has revealed. The piece mentions the Prince's "pet concerns" of traditional architecture and the environment, but does not provide any evidence that the power of consent was in fact related to them.
Then we come to ever such a critical point. Daniel Greenberg, a lawyer at Berwins is quoted as saying "It is something of a nuclear-button option that everybody knows he is not likely to push".... Ahh - so in fact this power of veto has never been used? I didn't read this piece like that at first. What with Andrew George MP's strident words I had the distinct impression the Prince was stopping laws going through on a regular basis - perhaps a dozen times in recent years, if you just skim read the article.
In fact the allegation (from the director of Republic) is that because this power exists it *may* give the Prince the power of leverage. Reread and note the plentiful use of mays/mights throughout the entire article. The Guardian gives us no proof in any way that the Prince has been seeking to influence matters through the threat of veto (the actual use of which would of course cause a massive constitutional crisis) - it's left to the reader effectively to assume there's no smoke without fire. He *must* have done so, pretty much.
Mind Games
Now for the tone of the article. We kick off with a great picture of the Prince. Remember the nice pictures of Vincent Tabak used in the press before he was found guilty? And then how they changed overnight because a murderer couldn't possibly be portrayed as an ordinary smiling man? Yep, here we have the most unflattering image of the angry Meddling Prince that we can dredge up. Minor point, but it sits with the headline in creating a particular impression the paper wishes to create. All sectors of the Press, of course, do this continually.
The use of the words "secretive" and "loopholes" scares us as readers. We all know what loopholes are - they are things that clever lawyers use to get undeserving guilty privileged clients off things they have done. The language is emotive and absolutely deliberate. We also have the use of "multi-millionaire Prince" in the related article to get some class and wealth envy going. These are pretty crude tools.
Anyway, how secret are these loopholes though and how ever did the Guardian discover them then? Well, let's try looking at Hansard. Yes, do a search on "TheyWorkForYou.com" (many thanks @MrsTrevithick who takes a very different viewpoint on me to this whole subject) and up they all pop - each and every completely publicly available record of the Prince (along with the Queen) consenting to their prerogatives and interests being put at the disposal of Parliament. The language is absurd "the Prince commands" etc- but it's not sinister, it's traditional; and multiple entries in Hansard isn't exactly my definition of "secretive".
Hmm. Okay then, what of the fact that the Guardian says "Since 2005, minister from six departments have sought the Prince of Wales' consent to draft bills on everything from road safety to gambling and the London Olympics". Is this some kind of new power? The fact that 2005 is quoted gave me that impression. The print version of the story went further along this line: it suggested that "ancient powers have been invoked" - the clear implication is to me that somehow these old powers had been discovered and resurrected. The Guardian goes on "Neither the Government nor Clarence House will reveal exactly why he was asked to grant consent to a such a wide range of laws". This is looking like a massive stitch-up and the government is in on it: ministers have handed over powers to Prince Charles in some secret deal to take away from their own power. Except why would they do that? Why would Labour and then the Conservatives have "offered" Prince Charles the power of veto over laws voluntarily? Common sense tells me we're being led up the garden path again here.
If you're prepared to continue digging around the Guardian actually provides a link to another story (by themselves). And here it all is: since the creation of the Duchy of Cornwall, back in 1337, the Prince of Wales's consent has been sought on laws that affect his personal interests as the holder of the estate. The piece actually explains there that the Monarch and Prince's consents are required as a matter of parliamentary procedure and this is fundamentally different from royal assent to a Bill. So this is nothing new. It's in fact been here for almost 700 years. It's not personal to the "Meddling Prince", Charles Windsor. Each and every Prince of Wales has in fact provided such consents as a standard and regular matter of course (or not) down over the centuries. Nor is it limited to him; the monarch also evidently routinely provides such consents, yet the Guardian has not chosen to suggest the Queen is somehow acting improperly - just Charles.
I'm not clear if this is a standard exercise of Royal Prerogative (I'm not a constitutional lawyer and I'm having my doubts about the Guardian's certain obvious lack of objectivity here) but if it is, I do know that since the 19th century this has in practice been vested in ministers, and specifically the prime minister. It's a theoretical historical power that is never exercised by the monarch. Should this power exist? Almost certainly not, but this is a much wider subject for proper debate - not the misleading, personal warfare the Guardian is engaging in.
A Giant Load of Shit-Slinging
So where do we come to? I really believe this is a monumental example of the Guardian driving its own agenda. I would love to know why it decided to run this as its lead story today and wonder why (given years of similar attacks on Prince Charles) its editor or proprietors have this intense personal dislike of the Prince. This isn't a news story. It is a deliberately misleading, innuendo laden, crude piece of propaganda. I suspect there is some pretty strong reason why the Guardian has it in for him, but we're certainly not going to find it out from them.
Did you see the Express last week? There was a piece on Thursday that followed Chancellor Merkel's extraordinary, historic speech to the Bundestag. Dr Merkel said that the EU had guaranteed peace in Europe for 50 years (a widespread view amongst Germans) and that if the Euro fell, the EU fell with it. She warned that another 50 years' peace could not be guaranteed without the EU and that because of Germany's historic failings it had a special responsibility to reach in its pocket and do everything it could to prevent this. After the death of well over 6 million of their citizens, the destruction of their cities, the blood of tens of millions on their hands, and 40 years of division, most Germans have a terror of War that we can not relate to. This was powerful language indeed from a modern day German Chancellor in the Reichstag building and not deployed lightly. The Express took this and chose to go with the headline "Germany Warns of War in Europe". It carefully, deliberately, selectively and utterly misleadingly threw something out there and left it to its own readers to run with it knowing the reaction. Here's a selection of the results:
The Guardian did pretty much the same today, but in a more sophisticated way, with a liberal lefty audience. The effect was the same. My timeline had comments in it such as "Doesn't Charles know what happened the last time a Royal tried this?" and "Unbefuckinglievable!" - we had cries of anger and outrage reacting to a story, that was in fact a different story, that had been dishonestly made and not proven in any way.
There are some serious questions about the position of the Royals in our constitution. I will happily argue them out with a republican and I respect entirely the logic of their position. No one would come up with this system today. I'm told by @Mousehole1 that if you die intestate and without heirs in Cornwall your estate passes to the Duchy of Cornwall. That's bonkers: I completely agree - but it's nothing to do with this Guardian piece. There is also a serious issue in all this about wealthy, powerful people lobbying and the need to have all of such activity properly above board. That is by no means limited to the Prince of Wales and again this article is not in fact about that. There are questions as to why a consent (however formal) is required as a matter of parliamentary procedure - yes, let's talk about that rationally and sensibly, examine whether it is in any way affecting the business of government, and abolish it if there is reason to.
What the Guardian is not doing is conducting an evidence based, objective campaign calling for the abolition of the Monarchy. It is running a personal vendetta against the person of the present Prince and I really am not prepared to respect that or run with it myself. Above all, once again this whole subject is proof to me that we really must be critical of things we read in the papers.
UPDATE: The BBC is now running this story as a result of the fuss caused by the Guardian. It is doing so in a far more balanced way and I believe both Clarence House and 10 Downing Street's statements fully back up what I'm asserting. Note this in particular: "This is not about seeking the personal views of the Prince but rather it is a long-standing convention in relation to the Duchy of Cornwall, which would have applied equally to his predecessors." There are some interesting and important constitutional issues to be discussed here; the Guardian has fallen over itself with its bias and thereby failed to present them in a way that facilitates proper debate.
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