The beginning and the end. For Charles III it was the king's first speech, the centenary ceremony that marks the inauguration of the British legislature and in which the monarch reads to Parliament the bills proposed by the Government; For Prime Minister Rishi Sunak – with a general election scheduled for next year – it was quite possibly the last.
With the polls immovable and an advantage of around twenty points for Labor (not surprising after thirteen consecutive years of Conservative mandate, with the wear and tear that this implies), Sunak pressed the reset button for the umpteenth time, like when the computer crashes. or the cell phone, in an attempt as desperate as it is vain to excite voters into giving him another chance.
But a speech – read by the king – of 1,223 words (the longest since 2005) and 21 barely revolutionary bills could not have had much impact. To change the dynamic, the premier would have needed to pull a rabbit out of a hat, or launch an electric shock of enormous power, or go on stage with a chainsaw like that of the ultra-Argentine candidate Javier Milei.
What he did, instead, was propose harsher sentences for the most serious crimes, additional powers for the police, the granting of new licenses for the exploitation of gas and oil in the North Sea, gradually increasing the age at which allowed to smoke so that those who are 14 years old today can never do so legally, lay the foundations for the United Kingdom to join the Indo-Pacific trading bloc, improve transport in the north of England and prevent municipal authorities from applying boycotts of Israel.
Sunak and the conservatives are like a gambler who has lost all the money he had on him in the casino, but refuses to call it a night and rolls the dice one last time in search of a miracle. With the economy in bad shape and no prospects for a spectacular recovery, immigration at record levels and queues at public medicine longer than ever (eight million), the strategy consists of deepening the cultural differences with Labor and presenting itself as the Party of the defense of victims instead of criminals, that of common sense on environmental issues (many people believe that the calendar for the elimination of the carbon footprint and cars with combustion engines is somewhat hasty), which is not ashamed of the imperial and colonial legacy, even if it has its shadows, the one who has no doubts about what a man and what a woman is. The speech also included a message about “the need to seize the opportunities of Brexit”, support for Ukraine and a purely theoretical exhortation to “facilitate humanitarian aid to Gaza and the search for a peaceful and lasting solution to the Middle East conflict.”
Little impact, but pomp and circumstance to give and take, in the great annual staging of the separation of powers in British democracy, each one in its place, which respect each other and do not interfere with each other (the executive proposes laws, the legislature approves or rejects them, and the judges do not set the political agenda). Charles III and Camilla made the journey from Buckingham Palace to Westminster in a golden carriage that looked like something out of One Thousand and One Nights, but with an aluminum body instead of wood, and with all the comforts: air conditioning, electric windows and a bump-proof suspension, so that the royal bottoms do not suffer. On the tour, a group of republicans booed the monarchs and showed banners saying “He is not my king” (something had not happened with Elizabeth II).
Charles III was a three-year-old boy the last time a king (George VI) read the opening speech of the legislature. It was the first of what he hopes will be many, and he celebrated by appearing before lords and deputies with an imperial crown of 2,868 diamonds. Rishi Sunak, on the other hand, realizes that the laws of politics are inexorable and his role is ending. Much better to be a king than a commoner.
