King Charles receives mixed welcome Down Under
“What a great joy it is to come to Australia for the first time as sovereign and to renew a love of this country and its people which I have cherished for so long,” King Charles has said in a speech at the New South Wales parliament.
Earlier on Sunday Charles and Queen Camilla attended a church service led by Anglican Archbishop of Sydney Reverend Kanishka Raffel during a visit to St. Thomas’ Anglican Church. The BBC reported that Charles and Camilla met many well-wishers outside church; there was a small but vocal number of protesters shouting “not our King” too.
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Charles and Camilla touched down on Friday at Sydney airport, and was sighted briefly on Saturday walking in the garden of the governor’s mansion.
The so-far mostly genial and unremarkable visit began with three avowed Republicans meeting the royal plane when it touched down—Anthony Albanese, the Australian prime minister, Sam Mostyn, the governor-general, and Chris Minns, the premier of New South Wales. For their drive into the city, the sails of Sydney Opera House were illuminated with images of Charles and Camilla’s former trips Down Under.
Charles is expected to attend an official reception hosted by the government on Monday in Canberra where he will meet Prime Minister Albanese at the national parliament and visit the Australian War Memorial. But a pall has already been cast on this event by the decision of all six state governors to stay away, presumably for fear of aggravating republican voters in their constituencies.
Republicans greeted Charles with a mock dinosaur rock band video, with the fictional tour slogan: “Wave Goodbye to Royal Reign with Monarchy: The Farewell Oz Tour.”
It’s a long way from the ecstatic reaction Charles received when he visited Australia with his first wife, Princess Diana, in 1983 (in an Orwellian touch, no images of that trip were among images of Charles in Oz that were projected onto the Opera House sails).
The historian A.N. Wilson has a column in the Daily Mail making the deliberately provocative suggestion that Charles should put it up to the Aussie republicans by resigning as head of the Australian state, but more noticeable for those schooled in the subtextual ways of the British media—who are heavily restricted in what they can say about Charles’ health by privacy legislation and rules—is Wilson’s heavy handed emphasis of just how ill the king is.
The well-connected Wilson writes, for example, that the king has made the trip “at considerable risk to his health,” and later adds: “We do not know the advice of his physician but one cannot imagine he or she is best pleased their patient has paused his cancer treatment to fly almost 24 hours around the globe—albeit with not one but two doctors in tow and armed with a supply of the monarch’s blood were a transfusion needed.”
Princess Diana’s brother has a new love
The complicated love life of Earl Charles Spencer, the brother of Princess Diana who became a household name after his combative eulogy at her funeral, continues. Charles has revealed he is now in a relationship with Cat Jarman, his co-host on a history podcast he presents, just a few months after announcing he was splitting from third wife, Karen.
Speaking on Good Morning Britain to promote a new book spun-off from the podcast, entitled, The Rabbit Hole Book: 99 Adventures Into the History of Stuff, Spencer called Jarman his “partner” and said of how they met, “I know this sounds rather bizarre, but she came to dig up a Roman villa on some land I’ve got.’”
Spencer has attributed the collapse of his third marriage in part to the trauma of writing about abuse he suffered as a child in his memoir, A Very Private School.
Just to make things even more complex, the Telegraph, reports that Jarman has initiated legal action against Karen Spencer, alleging “misuse of private information.”
Harry and Meghan want their kids to be friends with Eugenie’s
The Daily Mail’s Alison Boshoff quote sources saying that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s purchase of a home in Alentejo, Portugal, near a property owned by Princess Eugenie and husband, Jack Brooksbank, is about maintaining a bond with his cousin’s family.
Boshoff sources say it’s important for Harry that Archie, 5, and Lilibet, 3, will get to spend time with Eugenie’s children August and Ernest who are about the same age.
The source says: “Harry must know his children are not going to grow up as friends of William’s children, George, Charlotte and Louis. A bond for Lilibet and Archie with Eugenie’s kids will be the only royal friendship they will have. Most likely, August and Ernest are the only cousins they are going to ever spend time with. So time in Portugal, even just for holidays, means that Harry is keeping the only door to the Royal Family just a little bit open for himself and for the next generation, and raising them as royal children, at least in some way.”
Royal Christmas plans
The Daily Beast’s Tom Sykes was in New York, this week and stopped in for a chat with Paula Froelich on NewsNation. Their interview starts at the 27-minute mark, and sees Tom discussing royal Christmas plans, including rumors that Christmas at Sandringham this year will be a little more chill than in years gone by. And no, Harry and Meghan aren’t coming.
This week in royal history
Princess Beatrice, the last surviving child of Queen Victoria, died on Oct. 26 1944.
Unanswered questions
How will Charles and Camilla fare in Oz? And, later in the week, coming face to face with lawmakers from other Commonwealth countries demanding reparations for slavery?
