Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown – especially if it courts the wrath of Sammy Wilson. The DUP’s Brexit spokesman – never knowingly understated – has accused the King and Downing Street of “jeopardised the Monarchy” by meeting with Ursula von der Leyen after the announcement of the so-called ‘Windsor Framework’. Wilson calls the decision “a very, very dangerous” one that His Majesty will come to “regret”. Has Rishi Sunak found himself in a right royal row?
This argument has been rumbling away since last Friday. Both the DUP and European Research Group members were vexed at the suggestion. A picture of the King and von der Leyen together could be interpreted as a royal seal of approval for Sunak’s deal, a PR coup designed (as they saw it) to bounce them into backing an agreement that hadn’t yet read. This wasn’t helped by a briefings battle between Number 10 and the Palace over whose idea the meeting had been, with each pointing the finger at the other.
Jacob Rees-Mogg suggested the meeting was “constitutionally unwise”, and Wilson called it a “cynical use, or abuse of the King” by “dragging” him into “a hugely controversial political issue”. The charge is one that should be familiar from a hundred diatribes on the nature of constitutional monarchy: Sunak has undermined the King’s apolitical position by cynically deploying him for the Government’s efforts.
As Alexander Larman put it for The Spectator, “the monarch should be above the trivial concerns of everyday politics is one of the most closely observed rules of the British constitution”. By meeting the EU’s big cheese, the King was turning his back on a “guiding principle” of his mother’s reign. The unspoken charge is that His Majesty’s late mother would be appalled.
Spare me the pearl-clutching. A cup of tea between the King and one of Europe’s most important politicians is no Bedchamber Crisis. It is not particularly unusual, a cause for alarm, or something the late Queen would not have been expected to do. A storm is being brewed in a teacup – of Windsor china, one assumes.
As any student of Walter Bagehot will know, the monarchy is a “dignified” part of our constitution. His Majesty exists to open Parliament, ask “and what do you do?” to various earnest-looking charity workers, and ensure he has enough heirs and spares to keep the tabloids busy. Asides from that, he is to shut up. His late mother is the archetype: a national Grandmother, known only to like horses, dogs, and a festive hat-tip to Jesus.
Yet this conveniently forgets the many occasions when the Queen was dragged into politics. A recent example was Rees-Mogg’s decision to fly up to Balmoral and request a propagation of Parliament in 2019. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the legal case, that was a decision that provoked an all-mighty stink and a desperate effort at damage control between a hacked-off Palace and Number 10. Our former podcast guest must have forgotten this, flushed by his televisual success.
Her late Majesty was also forced to endure numerous ghastly state visits at the request of her governments. Jim Callaghan urged her to spend three days with Ceaușescu to push ahead arms sales to Romania. David Cameron deployed her as a useful prop in his efforts to inaugurate a golden era of relations with China. President Zelensky’s recent meeting with the King provoked no ire from the backbenches – but then the state of the war in Ukraine is considered less controversial amongst Tory MPs then the state of sausages in Belfast.
The Queen also had a habit of ‘making her feelings known’ on matters particularly important to her. The Sunday Times famously splashed on her ‘dismay’ at Margaret Thatcher’s opposition to Commonwealth sanctions against South Africa, and she asked Scottish voters to ‘think very carefully about the future’ a few days ahead of the independence referendum. Wilson may also remember Ian Paisley labelling her late Majesty a “parrot” over her willingness to visit Dublin during the negotiation of the Belfast Agreement.
So if the King was aiming to show his support for Sunak’s agreement in a quiet manner, it would hardly be unprecedented. But there is no suggestion that he was doing so on Monday. In practical terms, Windsor was well-placed to enable a meeting with the King, Sunak’s dash back to Parliament and a private meeting with von der Leyen’s son in Oxford. Re-branding something ‘Windsor’ to bolster its popularity is a tactic with which His Majesty can have some sympathy.
If anyone is currently using the monarchy to play a political game, one could argue it is Wilson and co. He has said his anger at the King’s meeting comes from the fact that “no part of the United Kingdom gives adherence to the Monarchy and respects the Monarchy as much as unionists in Northern Ireland”.
Yet as Paisley’s comments showed, the DUP have happily turned on the monarch when they have failed to live up to their expectations. Their current outrage can be written off as displacement activity in their shock at a deal from Sunak that goes beyond most expectations, and which forces them to consider settling for something less than perfection.
One expects that once this Framework has been voted on and passed into law – with or without the DUP’s support – the outrage bus will move swiftly on to the next cause célèbre. But it shan’t be the last time we can expect a row about the King’s role in politics.
Unlike his mother when she ascended to the throne, he has long-standing and well-established views on everything from the importance of beauty in architecture to the merits of protecting the environment and talking to trees. It is there that those who seek a constitutional scandal should pick their battles, not over a brief tea for two in Windsor.