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Comment by Symbiote | Hacker News Reader

Since you mention the royal family: Prince Charles wrote to Blair supporting a badger cull [1].

It's despicable how the royal family interfere in politics like this, and I don't understand why the Labour government tolerated it.

[1] Page 10 https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prince-of-wales-c...

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How is penning a letter to the PM "interfering in politics"? It sounds like Prince Charles is just doing as any other citizen may do when they hold an opinion about government policy.

Whether or not Prince Charles is due any greater degree of consideration is a whole different question. But, it's not like this is a new development, or one that is unique to the aristocracy. Wealthy businessmen of all backgrounds write to various members of parliament all the time.

He's not "any other citizen". He's the future king, a position which is supposed to be impartial.

But the royal family owns a vast amount of land. If they have a badger problem on that land and they would like the government to do something about, how do you think they should do it?

Give the land to the government?

It doesn't seem to me as if they got it through legitimate ways to begin with. Royalty never struck me as fair play.

Now that's a knee jerk solution, not an actual one that would work in the real world.

It would work just fine in the real world. It's just that no entity that ever came by such wealth through whatever means would give it up because it was the right thing to do.

The state owns a vast amount of land, which for historical reasons is used by the sovereign. (Duchies or Cornwall and Lancaster.)

If the Forestry Commission (managing forest land owned by the state) has a problem they write to the government, but their writing is public and they are accountable, ultimately, to the electorate. The royal family should follow the same process, or else return the land to be managed by DEFRA.

Being impartial does not require a lack of opinion. The monarch retains the right to advise the government and express her opinions. Current practice is a weekly meeting with the PM. Once her opinions have been expressed, she must then follow the advice of her government.

I assume this right to express an opinion extends to Prince Charles and the other royals.

If you wrote a letter supporting the opposite side how big are the chances that your letter would be given equal weight as his given that you are both just 'any other citizen'?

Probably not. But how is that any different than any other democracy? The rich and powerful have more sway over government. In this respect, Prince Charles is no different than Soros or the Koch brothers. Is it fair? Nope. But damned if I can dream up a system that works better.

So it seems to me that he's not doing that as 'any other citizen' and given that he's not entirely dumb he must realize this will carry some weight. In other words, he's simply trying to influence the political process to his advantage and is using his position as attached to his name in order to do so.

Yes. I don't believe I ever claimed otherwise. I only claimed that this is hardly an interference. It's a normal part of democracy as we know it in the western world.

> How is penning a letter to the PM "interfering in politics"? It sounds like Prince Charles is just doing as any other citizen may do when they hold an opinion about government policy.

Errr, if the government don't like anyone's opinions, they are entitled to ignore them, but in general I'd say that people are entitled to express their opinions as Prince Charles did.

In terms of "tolerated" the only thing that springs to mind that you'd be suggesting is that the labour government should have somehow stopped Prince Charles from writing the letters? but that seems like an odd thing to suggest, so perhaps I'm missing something

The question is whether his letters were given more weight than any other letter from the citizenry. My understanding is that whilst my fathers letters were responded to with form letters from aides, the princes were responded to with form letters from aides AND the prime minister was informed that a letter was received.

Truly sickening abuse of power.

Surely the decision about what response to make lay with the government (the receiver of the letter) and not Prince Charles (the sender of the letter)?

i.e. They had the choice not to respond or to have a aide respond, but the prime minister chose to respond.

Would you suggest that someone in the monarchy shouldn't express an opinion for fear that the receiver of the letter will pay too much attention to it?

> Would you suggest that someone in the monarchy shouldn't express an opinion

Yes. That's absolutely the point.

Even strong monarchists promote this point [1], but conservative newspapers have (relatively recently) questioned the reality [2].

Until we can vote for the head of state, their opinions on all matters must not influence the government in any way.

[1] http://royalcentral.co.uk/blogs/insight/the-queen-is-the-per...

[2] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/queen-elizabeth-II/11...

From your own links, the monarch has a rights to encourage and warn. How would a monarch go about encouraging or warning about a course of action without forming, and then expressing, an opinion on that matter?

My understanding is the monarch must not become actively involved in government... thus declining to vote, staying out of European Parliament, etc. That's not quite the same thing as never expressing an opinion.

My understanding is that most people would suggest that that only applies to the head of state (currently queen Elizabeth)

But Prince Charles isn't the head of state... So assuming that you're suggesting that this principle doesn't just apply to the head of state, where do you cut the line? Should everyone in the royal family be barred from expressing their opinion privately or publicly?

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