Queens Speech

Glorianny, wealthy people, businesses and organisations such as the National Trust have always lobbied parliament to protect their interests in one way or another. There are loads of lobbyists to approach. It’s by no means unique to the RF.

Of course they have GSM and I have actually lobbied for a charity, but you surely aren't saying that viewing bills before they are submitted to parliament, meeting the PM every week, and having your solicitor suggest alterations which might be advantageous for yourself, or your relatives, is anything like having meetings with MPs, or providing them with a free lunch at conference. How can it be anything other than abusing a position of trust?,A position which is supposedly (and according to all the guff we are fed about the monarchy) a position of public service and not something which enables the holder to amass greater wealth and adapt legislation to their personal advantage.

It’s not abusing a position of trust. It’s exercising a legal entitlement.

Ouf! One of those "speechless" moments.

They have a legal entitlement to secretly interfere with the law to make themselves richer?!?!?

It's worse than I thought.

I agree Glorianny

Why should the royal family have a legal entitlement to interfere with the law to make themselves richer?
Can somebody tell me why this is acceptable?

Germanshepherdsmum

It’s not abusing a position of trust. It’s exercising a legal entitlement.

Exactly GSM. If we wanted this changed, I imagine we could do so. Why not campaign properly rather than coming on here and attacking those who cannot and may not answer back?

I agree. Pointless. Just wanting an argument.

But why is there a legal entitlement to interfere with the law to make themselves richer?
As far as I’m aware no one else has such an entitlement. Is campaigning to change the law seriously the only suggestion as far as this entitlement is concerned? And why will no one say why this entitlement is perfectly acceptable when to anyone with a sense of social justice it should not be.

Germanshepherdsmum

I agree. Pointless. Just wanting an argument.

No I don’t want an argument. I want a reasonable reason as to why this is acceptable.

Perhaps people should read up on Royal Consent to get a rounded view. It’s not all about saving money. Mr Google will help you.

Germanshepherdsmum

I agree. Pointless. Just wanting an argument.

What?

Do you just want people to come on and say they like her hats and everything in the garden is lovely?

Well that's not going to happen.

If a particular family is exploiting their place in the governance of this country to make themselves rich, you better believe somebody is going to argue about it on social media.

But then of course maybe all the threads are pointless. The ones expressing disagreement with the government. The ones complaining about Climate Change. The ones saying some drama series or other is good. Maybe we should all just get off GN and stop expressing our views altogether.

That's not going to happen either.

Don't feel you have to answer this GSM, because obviously all posts on here are pointless, but when the Queen's lawyers wanted to get things changed so that her possessions in Scotland weren't subject to environmental regulations, was that just the exercise of "Royal Consent"?

Germanshepherdsmum

Perhaps people should read up on Royal Consent to get a rounded view. It’s not all about saving money. Mr Google will help you.

Giving a patronising answer isn’t an answer at all, it’s merely patronising. The fact is that people who support this behaviour are saying that it’s fine to have one family in the country who are able to lobby government in order to protect their wealth. I can’t do this, neither can anyone else. And it’s viewed as completely acceptable by many people.

volver 13.37 - I was agreeing with Daisy.

volver 13.40. Yes.

14:30. I know. I'm not stupid. Perhaps you didn't understand the rest of my post

14:32. Time for a revolution then.

maddy I have said above that lobbying is widely done. And I’m not being patronising - if you want to be better informed about the convention of Royal Consent you must look it up. All the information you need is freely available.

I’m not being patronising - if you want to be better informed about the convention of Royal Consent you must look it up.

That's you told maddyone

Is that you Jacob?

So if it's OK for an unelected H of S to interfere in legislation would it also be OK if we had an elected Hof S? Would you expect a H of S to make themselves and their family richer whilst in office and exempt themselves from the law? Or is it just one of those weird things people accept because of birth?

Being consulted in accordance with the Royal Consent convention is not ‘interfering in legislation’ or being exempted from the law. If you are consulted about your neighbour’s planning application are you interfering?

Third of Britons think the Queen should retire
A sharp shift in opinion in new poll.

She was at the Royal Windsor Horse Show this morning and has 14 horses competing at the show. 14 Horses that's a lot.

Campaigners have called for an inquiry into the use of the Royal Consent rule, which allows the Queen and Prince Charles to insist on personal exemptions from the law.

There is absolutely no justification for the Queen and Prince Charles to have this power to demand exemptions from the law.

This represents a systematic abuse of power by the royals that goes back decades, using a little-known parliamentary rule to ensure that laws the rest of us must abide by don't apply to them.

Germanshepherdsmum

Being consulted in accordance with the Royal Consent convention is not ‘interfering in legislation’ or being exempted from the law. If you are consulted about your neighbour’s planning application are you interfering?

No but if I insisted my piece of land shouldn't be subjected to the same laws my neighbours are and I was in a position to do that I would be (and HM is!)
If we are using the planning analogy. If the law said my neighbours couldn't build higher than two storeys and I stuck up a ten storey building because I made sure the law didn't apply to me is that OK?

Well I did as I was told and consulted Mr Google. I'm not a lawyer so I'm not even going to get into a discussion with a lawyer about the rights and wrongs of Royal Consent.

But as the woman on the Clapham Omnibus, I will tell you what I think of a system that allows any resident of this country to exercise rights to view and amend proposed legislation before it is put into law. That person can use their no-doubt vast ranks of solicitors and lawyers to scrutinise the laws and prevent them for being passed into law if they don't like them. They can request that changes are made to them before they allow them to be passed.

Now whether that resident is you or me, or whether they hold the position of Monarch, any system that allows that situation to occur is ripe for corruption. And none of us know how many times, or how much, the Queen has asked for laws to be changed to her advantage. And we will never know.