King Charles' Grand Vision For The Royal Family Is On Track To Blow Up In His Face
A nation known for keeping calm and carrying on can't do so when the majority of its monarchy is sidelined due to illness and/or scandal, which makes King Charles III's plan for a slimmed-down monarchy feel like even more of a pipe dream than we first thought.
Upon ascending the throne in May 2023, Charles was vocal about the need to modernize and streamline the royal family. In 2019, The Times reported his grand plan to cull the number of working royals down to seven, a number that feels paltry given how stretched the monarchy currently is. The Windsors were already trimmed down enough after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle opted out of The Firm. Throw in one out-of-favor Prince Andrew, and you've got a monarchy operating on its last legs. With Princess Kate out of commission until Easter as she recovers from a still-undisclosed abdominal surgery and Charles postponing public duties in the wake of his cancer diagnosis, just who is supposed to lead the country? After all, the royal family is known to carry out over 2,000 official engagements a year, and we can't expect Prince William to handle all of them, especially as he's still supporting his wife.
There need to be other changes, too. Charles is apparently dead set on modernizing the monarchy, but that doesn't necessarily mean cutting down on the number of people waving to us from a balcony. Instead, let's see the royals take on more public accountability and spend less budget.
Here's to a new generation of royalty
When King Charles III says senior working royals, he really means senior citizens. At 73, Charles was the oldest monarch to ascend the throne, and he's joined in his sunset years by his wife, Queen Camilla, as well as other working royals like Princess Anne and the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh. The average age of the senior working royals is 68, and the Prince and Princess of Wales are the only two who are under 50. So how does a streamlined monarchy work when nearly all of them are already skewing towards out-of-touch?
Let's forget the whole concept of a skeleton crew (literally), since that plan is already poised to blow up in Charles' face. Instead, what would the monarchy look like with younger working royals to appeal to wider demographics? For example, Princess Anne's daughter, Zara, and her husband Mike Tindall are hugely popular, ranking above Charles and Camilla in a 2024 popularity poll. Prince Andrew's daughters, Beatrice and Eugenie, are both in their thirties and have taken royal engagements in the past to great success. And sure, Eugenie's tight-knit friendship with the estranged Prince Harry has raised eyebrows, but let's not forget there are still those in the U.K. who support him. If Charles wants to lead England forward into a new future, it might be time to take some cues from his kids.
Time for The Firm to change its tactics
Let's talk about King Charles III's claims that a pruned monarchical tree will lead to a more efficient budget, and thus, a more modern ruling group. Sort of. But other European monarchies haven't whittled down the number of rulers on their roster; instead, they just live more simply. Belgium's Queen Mathilde was spotted out on a grocery store visit in 2020, and the Benelux royals don't typically house a staff of servants. According to the U.S. News & World Report, the Danish royal family "spends roughly eight times less than their British peers," making them quite a bit more popular. In contrast, the British ruling family's spending exceeded their income last year, per CNN. No wonder Prince Harry is out here writing memoirs — someone's got to cover the cost of all that security!
For the British monarchy to modernize, it would mean cutting back on the number of royals who need full-time security, as well as the amount of palaces that the Windsors maintain. Then, there are the special privileges that the family enjoys, for example, inheritance and corporation tax breaks, and the secrecy with which the royals have historically gone about their business. To be fair, Charles broke from tradition to candidly share news of his enlarged prostate surgery and cancer diagnosis, so that's at least one way he's getting it right. But a modern era of the crown still feels like it's eluding us ... for now.