Could Britain End the Monarchy & Become a Republic? The Queen's Royal Controversy - TLDR News

[Music] hello and welcome to another tldr uk video the queen is generally seen as a bystander when it comes to british politics she doesn't get her hands dirty she doesn't decide or dictate government policy and doesn't exercise some of her constitutional rights at least supposedly in recent days revelations have come out that flip those assumptions on their head with the royals accused of meddling in politics so in this video we're going to discuss what's been revealed what powers the queen actually has and whether this brings the uk one step closer to scrapping the monarchy altogether and becoming a republic if you want to support our independent reporting in an increasingly difficult economic time one where journalism is dictated by clicks and algorithms rather than by the importance of stories then consider backing us on patreon in return you'll get a whole bunch of perks including exclusive access to live events early access to videos and thanks in videos also this month only every 10 plus patron backer gets one of these exclusive golden pin badges these will never be available for sale so make sure you've signed up to get yourself one of the exclusive badges thanks for your support so let's go through this in three stages the monarchy's powers the recent controversy and getting rid of the monarchy [Music] the majority of the queen's powers reside in the royal prerogative now there isn't actually a commonly accepted definition of what the royal prerogative actually is mainly because the rural prerogative isn't something that's laid out in law most people agree though that it embodies the wide sweeping powers rights privileges and immunities at the hands of the monarch including the powers to appoint and dismiss the prime minister and other ministers grant a center legislation pro-rogue parliament deploy armed forces and grant mercy i.e a pardon power but the royal prerogative is not absolute in part because it's not properly defined anywhere and because parliament is seen as sovereign in its own right also both courts and parliament can constrain the monarchy parliament can pass laws restricting its scope and courts can rule on its use something it quite famously did nowadays the vast vast majority of royal prerogative powers are exercised on behalf of the queen by government ministers in the rare circumstance the queen does actually exercise rural prerogative powers herself this is on the advice of government ministers advice that she's constitutionally bound to follow although the sovereign is entitled to be informed and consulted to advise encourage and warn ministers with regards to its exercise so when she does use her powers she generally isn't given much choice and is made to use them by politicians like a regal torch in fact certain powers such as giving royal assent to bills that's the queen's final sign-off for all legislation and now considered to be merely ceremonial whether queen or any other future monarch to deny royal assent to a bill blocking it from passing into law it would immediately be seen as them overruling parliament which well hasn't happened since the scottish militia build during queen anne's reign in 1708 so 300 odd years later i think we can safely call this a ceremonial power [Music] but why are people talking about the uk becoming a republic now especially well that's down to a little known aspect of this called the queen's consent when we said that parliament can pass laws to constrain the royal prerogative limiting the crown's power we weren't exactly painting a full picture while parliament certainly can constrain the royal prerogative if a bill's provisions affect or could affect the queen then she must give consent for the issue to be put before parliament in order for the bill to continue as parliamentary guidance states if queen's consent is not signified in a case where it's required the question on the third reading of the bill cannot be put in effect the bill's progress through parliament is stopped dead in its tracks a veto in orbit name in recent days however a guardian investigation has established that the queen's consent procedure led to the queen or prince charles vetting at least 1062 parliamentary bills on everything from justice social security pensions race relations and food policy through to obscure rules on car parking charges and hovercrafts the guardian investigation also allegedly uncovered evidence pointing to the queen lobbying the government to change the law in order to conceal her private wealth from public view [Music] this all begs the question as to what the queen's role should be and whether the monarchy should have a role in 21st century britain in other words whether the uk should become a republic becoming a republic would be no mean feat assuming there isn't a bloody revolution the most plausible route towards becoming a republic would involve a referendum as to whether to even transition to one as well as the election of a replacement head of state a vast number of new procedures and protocols would then have to be written up and the queen's name or influence removed from other avenues of life there'd also have to be an almighty discussion as to who should be the new head of state whether bucky and palace should remain the possession of the royal family and whether they remain free from prosecution and have 24-hour security also as the uk doesn't have a codified constitution no one can really say for certain what would be needed to remove the queen as head of state or exactly what would happen afterwards if a party stood on a platform to remove the monarchy and won at the next general election it could potentially argue that it has the mandate to bring about the monarchy's removal alternatively a referendum could provide the necessary backing the issue being what if the queen or the monarch at the time do not want to leave peacefully although the queen doesn't exercise her constitutional powers as head of the british armed forces members of the forces do swear allegiance to her which begs the question what happens to them a further question would arise as to whether the uk would actually want to remain a parliamentary democracy or bring in some form of semi-presidentialism in other words would the prime minister be the head of state or would it be some other elected figure instead if the uk remained a parliamentary democracy many of the executive prerogative powers would simply be transferred to the government themselves in effect formalizing the status quo but removing the queen from the equation if however the uk wanted to become a semi-presidential democracy a whole new can of worms would be opened as to what powers they should or shouldn't have as you can see the practicalities would be complicated to say the least putting practical issues aside though the uk wouldn't be the first to cast off a monarch in favor of becoming a republic nor would it be the first to do so while not under colonial rule in september 2020 barbados announced that they'd be removing queen elizabeth as their head of state and formally become a republic by november 2021 something that scholars have cited might cause a domino effect of other commonwealth countries ditching the queen is there support for similar moves in the uk however well a yougov poll conducted towards the end of 2020 before all of these revelations came out seemed to suggest a continued support for the monarchy some 67 percent of brits believe that the uk should continue to have a monarchy while only 21 believe that an elected head of state should be brought in instead preference however is skewed massively when we break that down into ages 84 of over 65s are in support of the monarchy while only 42 percent of those aged 18 to 24 still support it but while current figures show that there is support for the monarchy things have been on a gradual decline back in may of 2018 a separate yougov poll put support among younger generations at much higher levels than they stand at now 57 of 18 to 24 year olds backed the monarchy in 2018 with figures rising in all subsequent age groups so it does appear that support has fallen among younger people in the last two years people aren't always optimistic about the monarchy's future though in 1998 when support for the monarchy was at a somewhat high point with three quarters of brits supporting it just 32 percent believed that the monarchy would last another 50 years and just 19 a further 50 years after that so in spite of general support for the monarchy there's far from consensus on what the future of it should look like as things stand now prince charles is the next in line to secede as king but only 37 percent of people actually want to see that 41 of people would rather see the throne jumper generation and see prince william succeed instead this is something that's backed up in general popularity data too among all the population prince william is the most popular member of the royal family with an approval rating of 73 even above the queen herself at 66 percent prince charles by comparison is far far lower at only 45 the picture among millennials shows even greater support in favor of skipping a generation with the duchess of cambridge beating out the queen in some regards prince william and kate hold the mantle for protecting the cause of the monarchy while just seven percent of brits say that harry and megan have the most influence and 12 percent say charles and camilla nearly 70 say that william and kate will have the most influence on the monarchy's future what that future is though is yet to be determined and if the people in 1998 were right about the monarchy collapsing before 2048 we might start seeing some changes soon especially around the inevitable time of the queen's passing but what do you think is it right that the queen's given advanced site and permission to block laws affecting her interests and should the uk become a full republic let us know your thoughts in the comments below be sure to subscribe the channel and hit the bell icon to be notified every time we release a new video special thanks to our patreon backers who make videos like this one possible and if you want to see your name at the end of videos then you too can back us on patreon the link to that's in the description you

Channel: TLDR News

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Length: 11min 3sec (663 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 12 2021