I see from today’s Grauniad that ‘[a] former Tory minister has defended Prince Charles‘s right to have secret meetings with members of the government’. Apparently Tim Loughton says that the unelected parasiteprince had ‘always come across as “well briefed and knowledgeable” in their meetings’.
Is it too much to ask that, in the 21st century, we could have the occasional politician who’s been down to the clue shop and bought a fucking clue?
Mr Loughton, it’s not about how knowledgeable he is (although his support for quackery — sorry, homoeopathy — suggests otherwise); he could be the reincarnation of Solomon for all I care. It’s that Prince Charles is unelected. That, by itself, does not preclude him from having his own views on political matters, but it does mean that he should not have the private ear of members of the government. And certainly not secret meetings at which he can, allegedly, veto laws. If Prince Charles wants to give the Government the benefit of his ‘well-briefed and knowledgeable’ views, then he can bloody well do it in public and let all of us hear and judge his pearls of wisdom. Not that I would ever doubt the veracity of a Tory MP’s utterances, of course…
Now, I’m not rabidly anti-royalist by any means — I’d be happy if they were gone, but I’m not going to man the guillotine — but this sort of access that comes only through an accident of birth is unacceptable in a supposed democracy.
Privilege in its many forms — religious, wealth-based, royal — has been around for thousands of years and it’s time it was rooted out. There is no place for (unelected, unaccountable) privilege in this day and age. Thankfully, there are people who are challenging this archaism, and you can judge how well they’re doing by how loud the screams of ‘oppression’ are from those formerly privileged.
Here’s a free clue: having your unelected right to the reins of power taken away is not oppression, it’s democracy (that means ‘rule by the people’, by the way).
an old grey dog 