How a royal encounter turned the head of a republican journalist

This Green and Surprisingly Pleasant Land - Monarchy

There was a time when I would have been rather exercised by the massive pay rise given to the monarch who is in line to receive a 45 per cent boost, more than 7 times more than the amount going to people like nurses. Back then I was a functioning republican and could not see the point of having a royal family.

I held rigidly to this belief right up to the point in 1996 when, much to my surprise, I meet the late Queen. Meeting royalty can turn your head. From then on I went from being a republican to royal agnostic, not virulently against the monarchy but not so sure what would be gained by getting rid of it.

 At the time I was working for The Independent newspaper which had a policy of not covering overseas royal visits. Somehow I managed to convince the paper’s foreign editor that an exception could be made for a rare royal visit to Thailand, one of the few countries presided over by a King whose longevity on the throne matched that of the Queen but where the power and standing of Thai royalty was in marked contrast to that of the British crown.

The Thai monarchy has had, to put it mildly, a turbulent history. The late King Bhumibol Adulyadej, Rama IX, managed to transform the monarchy from a situation of great weakness to one of considerable strength, making him a revered figure whose image was displayed in shrine-like fashion in homes, workplaces and, of course, in every official building throughout the nation.

He was a remote and decidedly elliptical person (unlike his son, Rama X, who is far from revered and seems to like Thailand so much that he preferred to spend his time in Germany). Thai citizens are expected to literally crawl in the King’s presence and, unless summoned, they are required to keep their distance at all times. The British monarch is surrounded by rigid protocol and hardly makes a point of mixing freely with subjects yet their remoteness comes nowhere near the chasm that separates Thailand’s king from his subjects.

I was attached to the 1996 royal visit as a local correspondent, as distinct from the royal hack pack who travelled from London to follow the Queen. They behaved in a most superior fashion towards us ‘locals’––maintaining what can be best described as a regal distance.

We were instructed by Palace officials on how to behave in the presence of the monarch. It was a wonderfully British piece of instruction as we were told that on first encounter with the Queen some kind of bow for us males and maybe a curtsy for females would be in order, nothing too deep or excessive, of course. Should Her Majesty care to address you, we were advised that a first response might (nothing stipulated but heavily suggested) consist of addressing the Queen as ‘Your Majesty’ which subsequently could be transformed into a form of address using the word ‘Ma’am’.

This briefing was required because the Queen had a practise of holding a small reception for the accompanying media where she was introduced to all of us standing in small groups clutching liquid refreshment. The royal hacks knew the drill like the back of their hands and tended to be in select groups of their own.

It was also a practise to include really local locals from the media of the country the Queen was visiting. In my group were some English speaking Thai journalists, mainly women as I recall, who would also be introduced to Her Majesty.

Their nervousness was palpable because none of them had or would have dared speak to King Rama IX, yet here they were meeting the Queen. Ordinary Thai citizens do not expect to talk to the monarch. Little wonder that when these Thai journalists were in the Queens’ presence, they were dumbstruck and quite unable to respond as introductions were made.

The Queen, who is famous for taking everything in her stride, chose not to notice their extreme embarrassment and inability to even respond to a request for the Thai journalist’s names. Instead of becoming impatient or seemingly annoyed she behaved in a manner that suggested that nothing out of the ordinary was going on and although I am still not sure how, somewhat put the Thais at their ease while chatting with those of us who were not dumbstruck.

All I remember of this brief encounter was that the Queen expressed interest in the fact that I was based in Hong Kong and mentioned that she had memories of her visit there and the imminence of the Chinese takeover, then just a year away. I do not pretend that we had what might be described as a real conversation but she was clearly well aware of what was going on in the colony, where she was still head of state and it was hard to ignore the skill with which she dealt with this somewhat delicate situation.

Her dignified handling of this delicate encounter with the Thais was both reassuring and rather marvellous. Maybe, after all, there was some point in having a constitutional monarchy. Maintaining republicanism in the wake of this encounter became harder to sustain.

However all critical faculties have not been abandoned and I am far from convinced that us taxpayers need to be forking out some £125m per year to add to the coffers of one of the kingdom’s richest families. Nor is it a given that subsequent monarchs, including the incumbent, will be quite as reassuring as the late Queen. The Windsor gene pool is not reassuring in this respect.