Today, July 1st, King Charles and Queen Camilla arrived in Edinburgh, Scotland. Charles took part in the traditional welcoming ceremony at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, where he inspected the Guard of Honour and received the “key to the city” for Holyrood Week. This is all “royal tradition” – in QEII’s day, she often invited other royals to join her in Edinburgh for several days of events, including some summer receptions. During Charles’s reign, he generally copies his mother, even if there’s less support for him and for the monarchy overall. If anything, it feels like Charles’s appearances are more stage-managed than ever before, probably because of all of the republican protesters, and because no one wants photos of the increasingly paltry crowds. Speaking of, Republic’s Graham Smith has written a scathng takedown of Charles and Camilla’s visit to Scotland this year: “King Charles is back, and Scotland doesn’t want him. Here’s why.”

Here he comes again. Charles is visiting Scotland for a handful of engagements before heading to Balmoral for the summer. As happens regularly now he’ll face protesters in Edinburgh and perhaps elsewhere too, just as he has in Lancaster, Middlesbrough, Durham and at major royal events in London over the past few months.

Support for the monarchy has dropped sharply over recent years. Across the UK, polls conducted by YouGov and Savanta have put the monarchy on or below 55% – on one occasion below 50% – while support for a republic has jumped to a third. In Scotland a republic is level pegging with the monarchy.

There are lots of reasons for the collapse in support, one of them being irrelevance to ordinary people during a time when so many are struggling to make ends meet. For many people the Queen was the monarchy and they have little interest in Charles or the rest of them. Increasingly people are becoming aware of just how grubby and self-serving the institution is. The cost alone raises serious questions about the standards by which the royals live.

When Charles visits Edinburgh the local council, Scottish Government, police and any other public body they come into contact with will likely incur significant costs. Local costs are just one part of the huge expense of the royals – estimated by Republic to be more than half a billion pounds a year. Yet that’s not the figure the royals will be putting out this week, when they release their latest annual accounts. They’ll ignore the revenues of the Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall, continuing to lead the public to believe they are private estates. The Duchies are in fact Crown lands and the property of the state, their revenues should be going to the Treasury to be spent on public services and local communities. Instead they pay Charles and William personal incomes well in excess of £20m each.

The royals will also ignore the local costs, the bloated security costs and estimates of unpaid taxes and potential revenue lost from allowing them exclusive use of more than two dozen palatial homes. As always the royals will try to pull the wool over your eyes, tell you they’re value for money or suggest the funding comes from the Crown Estate (it doesn’t). They do this because dishonesty, obfuscation and secrecy are how they have operated for centuries, desperate to protect their own interests against the receding tide of deference.

It is no wonder support for the royals is particularly low in Scotland. Because aside from a few visits during the so-called royal week, plus a handful more a short drive from Balmoral, this is an English institution. More to the point it is a London institution and a monarchy for the home counties. They represent the rich and powerful, they spend their days pursuing the hobbies and habits of their class while the bulk of their meagre list of engagements are in London and the south east. The monarchy’s days are numbered, and their demise is likely to have a particularly strong Scottish flavour to it.

[From The National]

Very recently, on Prince William’s birthday in fact, sources basically said that Scotland tolerates Charles because he’s always made an effort and he’s spent a lot of time in Scotland over the years, whereas Scotland considers William and Kate to be virtual strangers who don’t “get” it. I’m also reminded of that comment that the Windsors view Scotland as something akin to a theme park, and they go there to have fun playing dressing up in their kilts and little more. Anyway, it will be interesting to see if Charles & Camilla get protested in Scotland, or if anyone shows up to their events at all. It doesn’t even look like Camilla bothered with the welcome ceremony!

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.