Jack Straw goes down on bended knee to the Windsors
Union Jack Gordon bows the knee to House of Windsor
by Ken Ferguson - 30th June 2009
It was the first Labour Prime Minister and later Tory collaborator Ramsey
McDonald who set the tone.
As Labour formed its first government in 1922, in the afterglow of the
Bolshevik revolution just five years previously, London society trembled.
They trembled unnecessarily.
McDonald and his cabinet moved rapidly to reassure the powerful that
their world was safe in Labour’s hands and within a short time McDonald’s
social fawning earned him the title of the “Duchesses ‘s Delight”.
And so it has remained.
Come economic slump, world war, loss of empire, cold war or banking
bail out the Peoples’ Party remains firmly wedded to the Windsors.
Latest evidence of this is the move by ex socialist Gordon Brown to agree
to cover up key information about the monarchy by exempting much of it
from Freedom of Information.
Meanwhile the Windsor’s have rubbed salt into the wounds with a spin
offensive to tell us how hard up they are and feeding the open mouthed
media the fairy tale that the only cost us 69p a year.
It is beyond doubt that with hidden security costs, local council spending
on royal visits and cash pillaged from publicly owned supposed “Crown”
estates the cost is vastly greater than the loose change claimed by the
Palace spin machine.
Clearly we are being softened up for a pay claim - at a time when workers
are facing pay cuts and sackings - from what is one of the richest women
in the world.
However interesting as it is the debate we need is not mainly about the
cost of the royal circus but its very existence.
Do we really need a monarch and such key workers as the scarlet clad,
gold key carrying, Lord Great Chamberlain, the Earl Marshal, whose ceremonial
duties include organising royal funerals ,the Master of the Horse or
a Queen’s piper who moonlights as a Honorary Page of the Presence?
The answer of course is an emphatic NO. The entire world of pages, flunkeys
, palaces and royal patronage is undemocratic, unnecessary and overdue
for the chop.
In many ways the acceptance of the entire monarchical charade tells us
all we need to know about the reality of the major parties including
Labour and the SNP.
By accepting the continuation of the monarchy they are consenting to
a system which allows some tinkering around the edges but leaves the
elitist edifice of hidden power, vast wealth and privilege intact.
And it is why the Scottish Socialist Party argues that the monarchy
should be swept away and replaced by a democratic independent Scottish
Republic to clear the way for the creation of society built on human
need not elitist greed.