King Charles is supposed to be a mere figurehead for the United Kingdom. Sure, he ultimately has to sign off on new laws passed by Parliament, but this is a symbolic act and he’s not supposed to lay a finger on the nation’s politics.
But something weird is going on in Wales, as Buckingham Palace courtiers have quietly been putting a lot of pressure on the Welsh Government to make it impossible for Charles to be prosecuted for certain crimes. Saying “you can’t investigate me if I commit this crime” is obviously kinda sus, so what is he hiding?
The King’s free pass to commit crimes
Wales has a devolved government that can pass laws affecting the country, and last year formulated what’s known as the Agriculture (Wales) Act. This governs what’s illegal to do in rural areas, granting police the ability to investigate potential crimes on private property, or request that anyone under suspicion disclose information.
As per The Guardian, Royal courtiers “put pressure” on the government to ensure that the King can’t be prosecuted under this act, putting him beyond the reach of the law. Buckingham Palace casually dismissed this as “a matter of legal correctness” but otherwise has remained tight-lipped.
Faced with this Royal pressure the Welsh government had no choice but to bow down to Charles and exempt him from the law, though the chief legal advisor was apparently “not happy” that Charles can now do whatever sick stuff he wants on his estates and the cops can’t lift a finger.
What’s he up to?
Reading through the act several provisions raise eyebrows. The Act governs carcass disposal on estates and appears to prevent cops from investigating the nature and disposal method of any carcasses on Charles’ property. Naturally, this primarily applies to animal carcasses, but you have to admit that having strict legal protection that prevents cops from so much as peeking inside your backyard bone heap would give you a lot of leeway if you want to get rid of certain, uh, other awkward problems.
The act also deals with animal cruelty. Here Charles presents something of a conundrum. He talks a big talk about campaigning against animal cruelty, going so far as to ensure the oils used in his Coronation didn’t originate in animals. However, Charles also enjoys wandering around with a shotgun blasting animals to bits, and in 2002 threatened to leave the country if the government banned fox hunting with dogs (they did ban it, he didn’t leave).
As you’d expect, Charles doesn’t want the public to know about this hypocrisy and in 2017 he even sent police to interrogate a photographer who saw him hunting, though at least in that instance he couldn’t use his privileged legal position to stop publication. But, under this law, Charles can do whatever he wants to animals on his estates and nobody can stop him.
We should underline that just because someone has ensured they are exempt from a law doesn’t mean they have an interest in breaking it, but we have to wonder why this “pressure” was applied by an unelected monarch to interfere with a democratically elected government on this specific set of laws.
