This is largely correct, although some of the more senior Orders of knighthood are exclusively the Queen’s gift and she doesn’t need Government ‘advice’ to appoint to them - such as the Thistle, Garter and the Bath.
Not necessarily. Basically there would be a constitutional crisis and either the Queen or the PM would go, and public opinion would be the decider. Think of Edward VIII rather than Charles I. The Monarch is the last bastion against an overweening Prime Minister. QE2 is held in huge esteem and if she were to be against something, people would take her views very seriously; the same couldn’t be said for Charles, and an overweening PM would have a much easier time with him. Things don’t get that far, of course. She expresses her displeasure indirectly. For example, a few years back she was unhappy with some aspect of the Labour Government’s financial policy, so she invited the Governor of the Bank of England to lunch. The mere act of invitation (I’m not sure they actually had lunch) sent the government into a panic and resulted in a swift change of direction.
You’re quite correct of course - I was referring to the hypothetical if the Queen woke up one morning and decided she wanted to rule directly, not the hypothetical that she were making a conscious decision to defend the constitution from a power-hungry PM.
Even then, she’d have to be careful; simply blocking a policy she disliked, even if it was a deeply unpopular policy with the country, would be hugely controversial and I think on principal she’d have to abdicate.
Interesting about the Bank of England thing. Do you have a source for that snippet of news?
The Queen is a symbol of British unity and heritage, is an integral part of the government, and plays a high-profile role in recognizing and honoring the best of British society and culture. From all I’ve read, most (not all) of her prime ministers have valued the chance to draw on her experience and wisdom in their weekly conferences with her. I think it was Harold Wilson who said she was the only person who knew as much about the government as he did, but was also not scheming to win his job.
Three of my favorite stories about the Queen:
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She was once attending a reception in very hot weather and several people fainted. When someone later asked her how it went, she said, “Quite interesting. Bodies all over the place!”
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A British diplomat, just returned to London from the Middle East, was discussing a particular Arab leader with her and trying to tactfully describe him. He went on and on, getting more and more tangled in his syntax, and the Queen finally said, “Are you trying to tell me the man is just bonkers?”
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In this cellphone era, she will calmly say if someone’s phone goes off while speaking with her, “You’d better get that. It might be someone important.”
If you want to learn more about the modern British monarchy, I highly recommend this book: http://www.amazon.com/A-Year-Queen-Robert-Hardman/dp/B006G83GM4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1338389712&sr=8-1. Well-written and richly illustrated.
Probably pocket cowboys.
Sorry, no. Unfortunately the search terms bring up zillions of irrelevant results. Wiki merely says that he was the first Governor to be granted an audience, but doesn’t say when.
King Edward VIII was known in his family as “David”, one of his Christian names. King George VI, his younger brother, was known in the family as “Albert”, one of his Christian names. When David succeeded to the throne, he took the regnal name of Edward, after his grandfather, Edward VII. When he abdicated, his brother succeeded to the throne as George VI, after their father, George V. However, the conversation is erroneous, since there can’t be two kings at once. George should have been referred to as “Duke of York”, as Malden Capel suggested upthread, since that was his title while Edward VIII was kinging.
We pay for her drug binges with our hard-earned tax money :mad:.
The Windsors are famous for having family nicknames that are different from their public names. For example, Lord Louis Mountbatten was known as “Dickie,” and none of his given names was “Richard.”
My wag is that this started with Victoria who insisted that all male children in the family be named “Albert” after her beloved consort.
I’m always amused to hear your little snippets from whatever Alternative-UK you email them in from. Your suggestion that the last government changed economic policy because the Queen invited Mervyn King for lunch is simply laughable and completely unsupported by anything approaching a fact.
And public opinion would play no role whatsoever if the Queen decided to break with the consitutional settlement act like a pre-head-removing monarch.
In that wholly unlikely event the will of Parliament would prevail and at the very least she’d be gone and possibly the monarchy as well.
I suppose Labour were so incompetent and panicky anyway in March 2009 that it would be hard to tell the difference. But just because I can’t find a supporting article - the search terms are far too common - doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
(And have you found out how to review the headlines on a per day basis for the Telegraph, Guardian, etc? I haven’t figured it out.)
Here’s a good slideshow on a year in the life of the Queen, which gives you some sense of all she does: A date with the queen: How the queen spends her year
I hear she has a penchant for auto repair.
Indeed she did, back in the day: http://i1.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article660337.ece/ALTERNATES/s615/Queens+Diamond+Jubilee
One fairly important point not yet addressed is the wide range of things that she by convention does not do, but by holding the right to do or not do then, precludes another from so doing.
To illustrate this with a rather dramatic example, permit me to “anti-Godwinize” here – to contrast something about the U.JK. governmental procedure with Nazi German procedure. As is sometimes pointed out, Hitler came to power in Germany by dem0cratic means – he headed the party with a plurality in the Reichstag, which in coalition with a couple of minor parties had a majority, making him Reichskanzler. Where he deviated from democratic standards was in persuading senescent German President-and-Field-Marshall Paul von Hindenburg to dissolve the Reichstag and allow him to rule by decree.
But with vanishingly few exceptions Elizabeth in each of her realms acts only on the advice of her Government, headed by a Prime Minister appointed by her because he can command the confidence of the House of Commons.
She herself cannot dissolve Commons and rule by decree, as tradition calls for herr to act only on the advice of her Government But equally the P.M. cannot advise her to dissolve Parliament and then advise her on what to decree – because he holds his job at her sufferance because he can command the confidence of the Commons. No Parliament > no Commons > no confidence > no authority for the erstwhile P.M. She need not and may not take his advice; she needs to call an election so the people can choose a Commons which will place its confidence in him or, more likely, another P.M.
There are quite a lot of similar things - the veto has been mentioned in other threads: things she could theoretically do but would only do on advice that she won’t be getting.
Actually, the precedents had already been established before Hitler came to power. One of Hitler’s predecessors as Chancellor, Heinrich Bruening, began running the government by decree when no party could from a majority in the Reichstag. Hitler just took what had been a temporary emergency procedure and made it the normal ongoing routine.
And the Reichstag wasn’t technically dissolved. It just lost all of its powers to legislate. It still met for ceremonial purposes as late as 1942.