国王和首相每周私下“面基”，都唠啥不可告人的？

+

酒馆学院

Hello again欢迎来到Happy Hour英文小酒馆。关注公众号璐璐的英文小酒馆，加入我们的酒馆社群，邂逅更精彩更广阔的世界。

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Britain Under the Microscope.欢迎回来【闲话英伦】Hi, 安澜.

Hi, Lulu. Hi, everyone.

What are we going to talk about today？

I thought, since we’ve discussed about the Queen and her passing, I think it might be a good opportunity to discuss about our new King, King Charles III.

Actually, at the end of that episode, you promised me that we're going to talk about King Charles III.

Well, it's a big topic. So there's lots that we can discuss about this.

Um. Honestly, this is… the whole idea of monarch这种君主制, it's still very, very foreign to me because we don't have a monarch anymore. And your monarch is a constitutional monarch, 君主立宪制.

That's right. Let's start, first of all, what the king actually does or what the British monarch actually does. So first of all, the important role is that they are the head of state for the UK.

Head of state. I see, Prime Minister is the head of government, and the King now is the head of state.

Yeah, same as pretty much every other country that they have a head of state. It's normally the president in many countries, but in the UK, it is the King or Queen.

So he is the head of state of the UK, and also his other role is the head of the commonwealth.

So, basically, the old empire that's the left over…the old empire.

Well. Many of the countries were part of the British Empire. There’re also some countries that weren't part of the British Empire. They've also joined. It's around 56 countries around the world with around 2.5 billion people.

That's actually quite surprising.

It's quite a large organization, and he is the King of 14 of those countries like…

Canada, Australia, New Zealand.

Yeah.

But you say that he is the King of these countries, but these countries they have their own head of government and all that. King himself doesn't really hold a lot of real power, that's like my understanding of it.

Theoretically, he has a lot of power.

The King commands the armed forces, he could declare war and declare peace. He can issue passports; all British passports are given in the name of the King or Queen.

Oh, yeah, I've notice that.

And he also owns a lot of the land in the UK, and he can fire the Prime Minister whenever he wants.

But that never happened, right？

That never happens.

Is that the whole thing that there's obviously checks and balances system. So if as a monarch, he really tries to seize the power, then there will be consequences.

The first King Charles, King Charles I was actually executed for doing exactly that.

I see, so that's constitutional monarch. So he has a lot of, shall we say, symbolic power？

Yeah. He has a lot of authority, but I want to say very much power in practice. And when you say symbolic, that's also an important part of the role because the King has to be politically neutral.

Oh, so he cannot choose sides.

No.

In terms of political parties.

That's because the people choose the government, but the government is technically his government. That's the official title of the British government, it's His Majesty's Government.

I see. So basically, the monarch, no matter if it's king or queen, they cannot openly show who they support, which party to support. They have to be completely neutral.

Yes. The monarch can't actually vote. They're the only person in the UK…

Don't have the right to vote.

… that doesn't have the right to vote. They can't show, as you say any political stance

That's the entire royal family?

Just the king.

Just the king. So the royal family can actually have political standing.

Well, it's probably best they don't.

I see, interesting, but the King or the Queen they actually do meet up with the Prime Minister.

Every Wednesday, every week, the King would meet our Prime Minister.

Basically, this is an opportunity for the Prime Minister to brief the king on what is happening in government and around the world.

But also it's an opportunity for the Prime Minister to talk to somebody who she knows won't actually reveal anything that they've discussed.

Because it's completely confidential.

It's completely confidential, there’re no minutes. If a Prime Minister… in some cases it has happened, if a Prime Minister has actually mentioned what they discussed, that's a big no-no.

It's almost like seeing a shrink.

Pretty much. That's what actually some former Prime Ministers’ve said. It's like to see a psychologist because they know they are talking to the only person who doesn't want their job.

I see. I see. But in terms of power and authority, the monarch, the King now also signs laws, right? That he has to sign to pass certain laws.

Yes. This is called the Royal Assent.

叫“御准”好像我上回查过.

For a law to become the law in the UK, the King has to sign it, once it’s signed, then it becomes a law.

But he always signs it.

He always signs it. The last time a king or queen didn't sign it was in the 19th century. If he refuses that royal assent that seen as an attack against the government.

I see, consequences like we said before.

And the other thing is, it just seems the transition from the Queen who just passed away to the now the new King. It just seems like a seamless transition. It just happened instantaneously.

Yeah, pretty much. If we looked at our previous episode when we talk about the Queen, lots of it has actually been planned.

So her funeral, the transition between her and the King, but also constitutionally, there is no period under our constitution where we do not have a monarch.

I see, so there are absolutely no pauses.

No, there's a very famous saying, the King or the Queen is dead, long live the King.

That is a saying.

That is a saying. and I don't think they actually say it officially, but that's what people regard it as one monarch is dead, then the next monarch automatically becomes the King or Queen.

So for example, the Queen, she became the Queen when her father died. And she was in Kenya, she was in Africa.

She was in her 20s, right？

She was in her 20s. The moment she became Queen, she was actually asleep in a tree house. Nobody told her.

She found out later.

She found out later, but she was still the Queen.

And also the national anthem. Now should be God save the King.

Yeah. So that also happens automatically. Our national anthem changes, lots of the titles change as well.

And your passport is going to change?

Our passport will change. It's still valid now, but it will change.

I bet they have special organizations or councils to take care of that whole process.

Pretty much, it just happens automatically. One of the things that non-British people tend to get a bit confused with is around the coronation.

就是加冕礼, coronation.

So lots of people think that he doesn't become King until his coronation, which is not true. The coronation is just a ceremony. He is the King now, and the coronation is just a more religious ceremony.

I see. That's just religious ceremonial, but in fact, he's now the King, he is the monarch.

But there is one ceremony that's quite important and happened as soon as he became King, that is called the Accession Council.

Accession meaning?

Accession means basically to take over.

To take over the throne.

To take over the throne. So the accession council happens the day after the Queen's death, or the monarch's death. It's a council with former politicians, common politicians, representatives around the country, they all gather together so that they can announce we have a new King.

I see, like a declaration.

It is a declaration.

A few weeks ago, it was actually the first time we've seen it on television, the previous one was in 1950s. But the King declared that this should be televised, and dates back to the time when we didn't have mass media.

Yeah, actually, in the old days, how did people find out about they had a new king or queen？

That's also part of the ceremony. The ceremony is actually a little bit confusing, because lots of it is in 18th century English, it's not in modern English.

And it’s remained that way.

And it's remained that way.

I see.

After the council meets, this is at St James's Palace, so one of the loyal palaces in London.

Heralds, so people that wear very, very colorful clothes, kind of held like medieval times, they'll go around with trumpets, they would go on a balcony and declare that we have a new king.

So a lot of these are still the traditional procedures.

These are still the traditional procedures.

Once it's declared in London, is declared in other cities around the country, normally in market places at town halls, hold in a very, very similar ceremony. So this normally happens a day or 2 days after the death of the monarch. It dates from the time when there was no such thing as newspapers, mobile phones, TV… this was the first time that people would actually hear that the monarch is dead.

I see, but even now with mass media and when people can easily find out about the new King, but the King still has to travel to like where I would assume like Scotland, Wales.

Normally and traditionally, they don't have to, but because it's so much easier to travel around the country this time. He also held very, very similar events around the country. So he went to the four nations.

England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland.

Yeah, he went to their parliaments, and he spoke to their parliaments. So in Scotland he spoke to the Scottish Parliament. In Wales, he spoke to the Wales Senate, and actually in Wales because he speaks Welsh, he delivered quite a bit of the address in Welsh

I watched a bit of that. That's a lot of information. And earlier on you mentioned there'll be many changes for just an ordinary British person, your passport will change, and does that mean your money will change？

Our money will change. Stamps will change, because obviously our money has the picture of the Queen on it. But that's going to change to the King.

His Majesty.

His Majesty.

国王陛下, 这样.

How do you actually address the monarch, if you, like, meet the King?

If you meet the King, you would start with saying Your Majesty, and then after that, Sir.

Your Majesty. I see, so not always Your Majesty.

No, no, not always Your Majesty. The first time you meet the monarch, it'll be Your Majesty, and then Sir; and for the Queen, when she was still here, it'll be Ma’am.

I see, as we're approaching the end of this episode, I just want to be a little bit gossipy.

Now we talked about Queen being very well respected, well liked. But Charles, I don't know when he was younger with the whole Diana thing and Camilla thing, do people have more negative opinions of him?

In the past, I would say there was a lot of negative opinions. He wasn't very popular. Now I would say he's changing a little bit. He's been seen more like a grandfather figure because he is in his 70s. There was also the concern that he's very vocal about the causes that he supports.

Like environment, right? He does a lot of things for organic, farming that sort of thing.

But it's one of those strange things because maybe 20, 30 years ago when people didn't really worry about the environment that much, they all thought he was a bit eccentric.

OK.

But now he's almost seen as okay, you were right about the environment, you were right about climate change.

So will he be doing anything related to those causes as the King？

He would have to be very, very careful. One of the complaints around him is that he tends to make his opinions very well known, which for a constitutional monarch is not the best thing.

He shouldn't.

But he has actually said that now I'm King, I'm going to support causes, I'm going to support charities; but as a monarch, he's not going to express any strong opinions.

Yeah, like we talked about a constitutional monarch is not supposed to have strong opinions about anything.

No.

I see. Hopefully after listening to our discussions today, you would know a little bit more about the constitutional monarch in the UK. If you have any questions, leave us a comment in the comment section. Thank you, 安澜.

Thanks, Lulu. Bye, everyone.

We'll see you next time.

Bye/Bye.