Tag Archives: debate

Meghan and Harry’s extraordinary statement sent a shiver down my spine. The language is stilted, cold and legalistic, the sentiments juvenile and angry. ‘The Queen doesn’t own the word Royal,’ they say in this ill-advised intervention – if any advice was taken, which I doubt. It is an expression of …

So that’s clear: it is absolutely unacceptable for anyone with eugenicist views to have a position of the slightest influence within British politics. Last week, a 27-year-old Downing Street adviser, Andrew Sabisky, was forced out when it emerged that six years earlier he had advocated, among other disturbing proposals, various …

Amid angry and emotional scenes in the Commons last week, Labour MP David Lammy tabled an emergency question about the deportation of serious criminals back to their homeland of Jamaica. ‘People watching will see the way the Government holds in such disrespect the contribution of West Indian, Caribbean and black …

No one can truly say they didn’t see this coming. The die, after all, was cast at that historic Sandringham summit when it was announced that Harry and Meghan were forsaking their royal life for a future that may yet prove to be elusive. Even so there was a ruthlessness …

The coronovirus is not going to disappear overnight and there is no chance of a vaccine in the forseeable future. Managing the symptoms might be like experiencing a dose of bad flu or mild pneumonia if you’re fit and healthy, but for the old, vulnerable and the very young it …

Raising a glass of Chinese brand, bottled Jersey milk to the camera, the Queen’s grandson Peter Phillips claims: ‘This is what I drink.’ Is it really? Come off it, Pete, mate. This is what you drink when an advertising agency pays you to do so. We all know it and …

For all the turbulence of recent months, the enduring pulling power of the monarchy is undiminished – as last night’s glimpse of a future ‘slimmed down’ House of Windsor made very clear. Here were the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge hosting their first state occasion at Buckingham Palace on behalf …

There was perhaps just one consolation for the Prince of Wales yesterday — he was at Birkhall in Scotland, just about as far away from the centre of the royal drama over Prince Harry’s departure as he could be. Time and again at moments of crisis and great sadness Charles …

As with any major negotiation, the devil is in the detail.  And the more that we study the new template for 21st century reluctant royalty, the more issues that arise – from heraldry to trademarks and some very odd new titles. The Queen has certainly kept to her side of …

A new passport has just arrived in the post. I remember my first one, more than half a century ago, almost as clearly as I remember the arrival of my first child — with one big difference. The baby demanded responsibility. The passport promised freedom. For a scruffy kid who’d …