Agreed. I mean no offense to Commonwealth citizens, but the idea that certain people are entitled to an elevated position in society because of their lineage is repugnant to me. I can't fathom how that belief persists in modern, democratic societies.
Sure, we Americans have our Hilton's and our Rockefeller's. But whatever advantages these people enjoy comes from voluntarily-given admiration, not any legal precedent.
Australia's leadership may be turning in the wrong direction in every other area, but I think they have it right when it comes to becoming a republic.
Australia's most socialist Prime Minister Gough Whitlam has spent the last few months violating Australia's constitutional conventions by refusing to call a general election in a situation where he is unable to effectively govern. Because he knows he will lose the election, he's not willing to call it.
He presents a plan by which the Australian Government will compel the Commonwealth Bank - the bank the vast majority of ordinary Australians have their savings invested in - to make an unsecured, interest free loan to perpetuate his government.
The Queen's representative in Australia, His Excellency Sir John Kerr, Governor General of Australia, summons the Leader of the Opposition, Malcolm Fraser and asks him what he would do if he was Prime Minister. Fraser informs the Governor General that his first act would be to pass the money bill held up in the Senate, and his second act would be to call a General Election.
The Governor General commissions Malcolm Fraser as Prime Minister, and shortly thereafter dismisses the Whitlam government from office. Parliament is dissolved later that afternoon so an election can be held.
The worst constitutional crisis in Australia's history is averted because at the head of our system of government is a figure who is outside politics, who never has to run for office, and whose powers are almost entirely ceremonial - except in an emergency.
This is why a large number of Australians are monarchists.
If someone can come up with another way of giving us a largely apolitical Head of State, with a long tradition of allowing the government to govern without interference, except in times of major crisis, we'd be interested in hearing about it.
As for the idea that the Royal Family are on some sort of 'permanent dole' at the expense of the taxpayer, that's not true of most of them. The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh do receive money from the Civil List. They receive that money as a result of a 1760 agreement by which George III transferred the hereditary revenues of the Crown, to the state, on condition that certain expenses would be paid by the government. He gave up his family's money to his country, in exchange for expenses being covered. If the Royal Family had kept those revenues, they'd be far higher than the money paid out under the Civil List. It's called the Crown Estate, and it's worth about £7,000,000,000. But it's true that they do get some money. About £10,000,000 a year - so in about another 500 or so years, the British government will have paid back the value of the land George III gave them in payments to the Royal family. Put it another way, the British government gets about £180,000,000 in revenue each year from the Crown Estates, and gives the Crown £10,000,000 in exchange for that.
And it's only those two get money from the taxpayers. Other members of the Royal Family are largely funded by monies gathered in rent from the Duchy of Lancaster - rent paid on properties that the Royal family owns in the same way, anybody else can own property. They've owned it since before they became the Royal Family, in fact, since 1265, with it first being held by a monarch in 1399. So unless you want land and property to be simply seized from this family by the state, it's their cash. Their property. It's worth about £300,000,000.
Want to steal it from them?
I can understand people thinking the idea of a Royal Family is old fashioned. But economically, it's a pretty good deal for British taxpayers.
And an even better deal for those of us in the rest of the Commonwealth - we only pay for them when they visit.
(Declaring a bias, I'm a friend of the Duke of York, and I know the Prince of Wales as well. I like these people, and I know they do a great deal of hard work to serve their nation, and their people.)