It’s been six years since I last vented about the English monarchy, so it’s high time for an update as the 70th anniversary of Elizabeth II’s accession to the throne approaches. The gazillionaire has now reached the ridiculous age of 96 and, although rather unsteady on her fetlocks and clearly stricken by galloping senility, she shows absolutely no sign of doing the decent thing. Mind you, one can hardly blame her for not being quite ready to depart a life of cosseted privilege, staggering wealth and indescribable luxury, her every whim being catered to by armies of forelock-tugging flunkies as she wallows in one of her 10 vast palaces. After all, why rush to enter an eternity of nothingness when there’s going to be another delicious platter of freshly plucked pheasant to gorge on tomorrow? And, more to the point, why loosen her grip on the orb and sceptre when bonkers, power-hungry Charles and his vulgar mare would be the main beneficiaries? In her always ruthlessly pragmatic calculations, she probably reckons that if she hangs on grimly she might just outlive the priapic charlatan yet!

It’s no wonder she’s become a bit of a vapid regina; she’s had a lot to put up with lately. Last year her husband for 73 years, Philip Battenberg Mountbatten (1921-2021), kicked the bucket just two months short of his century. They were made for each other, ever since she first caught the 18-year-old Royal Navy officer’s attention when a 13-year-old child in 1939. To lose her second cousin’s curmudgeonly companionship, unstinting racist bigotry and facility with a shot-gun on the grouse moors must have been such a wrench. I wish I could add that he bit the dust just to save ‘er indoors the hassle of dispatching the centenarian’s congratulatory ‘message from the Queen’ – but having worked in the civil service issuing the bloody things many moons ago, I can reveal that they’re just churned out by the DWP computer. It grieves me to say it, but she never had to lick her own behind.

Then there’s Andrew, her favourite son. Quick recap. Earlier this year the notoriously greedy, brutish, sleazy parasite settled accusations of the sexual assault of a teenager out of court for a sum of £12million, having spent over two years vehemently denying them via his team of expensive lawyers. He dodged court papers, tried every legal technicality, and resorted to insinuations about his accuser’s greed, morals and false memory. In an infamous interview on BBC’s Newsnight he stated that he can’t sweat, always wears ties, only hung out with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein (1953-2019) to “show leadership”, that he had no recollection of meeting Virginia Giuffre despite photographs of him groping her with another convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell smirking in the background, and that he only mixed with such people because “my judgement was coloured by my tendency to be too honourable.” Only after reaching the settlement did he express any concern for the welfare of Epstein’s sex trafficked victims and any regret about his close, long-term friendships with Epstein and Maxwell (he was a regular guest on Epstein’s private Caribbean island and the pair stayed at Balmoral and visited Buckingham Palace as far back as the 1990s). The grudging retractions were obligatory under the terms of the multi-million deal (the source of the money remains unexplained) which saved him from facing sexual assault charges in a public trial that would have well and truly ruined darling mummy’s Platinum Jubilee.

Beyond the pale, a persona non grata, his reputation damaged beyond repair, ‘randy Andy’ was hastily stripped of his ‘HRH’ designation and suspended from royal duties and any sort of public role “for the foreseeable future”. Then his social media accounts were erased, his page on the royal family website was rewritten in the past tense, all his military affiliations, honorary titles and patronages were terminated, York racecourse renamed the Duke of York Stakes, York City Council voted to withdraw his ‘Freedom of the City’, and now there are calls for his ‘Duke of York’ title itself to be removed. All this is wholly unprecedented in the long, horrible annals of the British monarchy.

So it came as something of a shock when Andrew was selected by his mother to be her escort at Prince Philip’s memorial service just a month after the settlement, especially as she’s hardly lacking in a host of alternatives among the teeming ranks of children and grandchildren in the Windsor clan. He played a central role to fanfares of trumpets in a front seat at the Westminster Abbey service, addressed as ‘your grace’ by bowing Anglican clerics – and that can only have happened because of his mother’s insistence. As a massive public display of contempt for the women raped by Epstein, not to mention a callous twisting of the very purpose of the memorial service to her supposedly beloved Philip, this disgraceful performance showed the real Elizabeth II in all her sour, cruel, arrogant, ignorant, unanswerable, undemocratic, unaccountable true colours. Her much-vaunted dignity, probity, dedication, integrity, etc, etc, turns out to be just bullshit propaganda put about by Britain’s battalions of brown-nosing creeps. Who would have guessed?

Actually, given that she bestowed an MBE, an OBE and then a CBE on Rolf Harris and awarded a knighthood to Jimmy Savile (1926-2011), two special favourites who were regular guests at Buckingham Palace, we should not be at all surprised at her laissez-faire attitude to a flesh-crawling sexual predator like her son. Likewise, the abuse of power she displayed in the Abbey is just part of the job description of a ludicrously medieval monarchy based on feudalism, hierarchy, deference and inherited power, a monarchy that derives its immense assets from violent conquest, war, land-grab, colonialism, slavery, exploitation and theft. Only last year this baked-in utter contempt for democracy was exposed by a Guardian investigation into something called “Queen’s Consent” (a practice quite separate from the equally archaic but strictly symbolic ‘royal assent’ procedure) which gives her an absolute veto, to be exercised in secret, over any proposed legislation that might affect “the royal prerogative, the hereditary revenues, the Duchy of Lancaster or the Duchy of Cornwall, and personal or property interests of the Crown”. This unique right of veto has been used repeatedly over the decades – for instance, in 2020 she vetoed a law that would have made her reveal the true scale of her private wealth, and over and over again heir-in-waiting Charles has obtained exemptions from laws that apply to everyone else. This degree of involvement in the legislative process has survived only by being carefully obscured and is a wholly inappropriate and outrageously illegitimate perversion of a supposed parliamentary democracy in the 21st century. What’s more, the UK government imposes a sweeping ban on all discussions about the royal family and its affairs in parliament. So, in fact, with the absurd unwritten ‘constitution’, with the ‘royal prerogative’, with the entirely unelected House of Lords, with the electoral dictatorship of the voting system, and with all the people being the monarch’s “subjects” rather than equal citizens, the UK is not a democracy at all. And her legacy after 70 years as head of state has simply been to entrench and consolidate this obscene state of affairs. Who, in their right mind, would celebrate such a person? There is nothing to celebrate.

With the ghastly King Charles III hovering like a vulture in the background, things could get even worse. One only has to look at his choice of friends. Jimmy Savile, for instance, was a close confidant who he repeatedly turned to for advice and who actually compiled him a public relations handbook; while South African writer Laurens van der Post (1906-1996), his best pal, mentor, guru and godfather of Prince William, was a serial sexual abuser of young women and a paedophile who impregnated a 14-year-old girl. What impeccable judgement of character by the future King! Looking on the bright side, with soon-to-be Queen Camilla on his arm at least no-one can accuse him of paedophilia – gerontophilia more like!

The latest scandal involving Charles was ignored by the rightwing media and brushed under the carpet in the backwash of brother Andrew’s disgrace, meaning many are unaware of it. Card-carrying Tory Michael Fawcett, Charlie’s senior valet, closest confidant, personal aide, “indispensable” right-hand man and chief arse-licker for 40 years as well as the head of the dodgy Prince’s Foundation ‘charity’, was forced to resign in 2021 when he was exposed as having offered a knighthood and British citizenship in exchange for great wads of cash to Saudi billionaire Mahfouz Marei Mubarak bin Mahfouz (mmm, nice), in brazen breach of the 1925 Honours Prevention of Abuses Act. Charles, of course, knew nothing about any of this – meaning he’s either a liar or an idiot – and, having comfortably evaded any criminal enquiries by pleading ignorance, he declared that the whole matter was closed, and that he would be “drawing a line” under the scandal as he “prepares to be King”.

In case anyone tries to find comfort in the thought that the ruddy-faced 73-year-old won’t be King for very long and that ‘nice’ son William will soon be on the throne, the excruciatingly embarrassing ‘royal tour’ of the Caribbean by William and wife Kate earlier this year shows that the problem goes way beyond the personnel; the problem is the institution of monarchy itself. Planned for years, the tour to mark the Platinum Jubilee was spectacularly misjudged. Everywhere the immaculately groomed, ostentatiously well-heeled and blandly complacent couple swanned, from Belize via Jamaica to the Bahamas, they were not greeted by the adoring, grateful crowds anticipated, welcoming them with open arms, but with furious, passionate, sustained protests against the continuing Windrush scandal and against Britain’s countless colonial crimes. Government leaders across the Caribbean informed the dull duo that they intended to follow the lead of Barbados, become a republic and ditch the monarchy. Meanwhile there were formal calls for comprehensive slavery reparations and “a full and formal apology for Britain’s crimes against humanity”. Only the stratospherically out-of-touch Windsors could have got it so wrong with their throwback imperialism, their patronising hauteur, their offensive presumptuousness and their reactionary Little England delusions of grandeur. Nothing symbolised the disaster better than the photos of the Duke and Duchess robotically smiling while shaking hands with Trench Town children through gaps in 6ft high wire fences. They just don’t get it.

But then, neither do lots of their pitiful British “subjects”, the servile, tabloid-reading, brainwashed, know-nothing, grovelling, small ‘c’ and big ‘c’ conservatives who sustain and prop up the whole wicked farce, currently emerging from their rat-holes as the Jubilee approaches. In thoroughly colonised Wales we get the absolute dregs of the dregs: the slavering stooges, the awestruck lackeys, the might-is-right minions, the Quisling apologists, the out-and-out whores, the treacherous collaborators and the legions of lobotomised pea-brains who have never had an original, independent thought in their lives. The inbuilt awfulness, naffness and mediocrity of anything remotely connected to royalty, union jacks, ‘Britishness’ and UK Government-organised celebrations is confirmed by a glance at the line-up for the capital city’s showpiece event organised by the reliably royalist, conservative and British nationalist Labour Council. The ‘Platinum Jubilee Concert’, is being held on June 4th at Cardiff Castle (tickets: £32.50 each, only food and drink bought from commercial operators on the Castle Green allowed). Like virtually everything in this corporate-controlled city, the ‘event’ has been hived off by the Council to the private sector – in this case to cripplingly conformist and conventional ‘music theatre producers’ Live Under The Stars. My toe-nails curl over and make sharp incisions in the carpet reading through the “host of iconic Welsh stars” appearing in “iconic Cardiff Castle”…

HOSTS
Aled Jones MBE & Shân Cothi: In 2017 a woman accused Jones of inappropriate behaviour and sexual harassment. The BBC suspended the “committed Christian”, angelic family man and Songs of Praise presenter and he categorically denied the allegations for a few moths until half-admitting them, saying he was “deeply sorry” for any “juvenile” transgressions. The BBC allowed him back so he could continue his TV career baring his teeth to camera while reading an autocue and giving a fairly plausible portrayal of somebody ‘nice’, and also return to his radio career talking asinine – indeed juvenile – drivel. As for Cothi, a pillar of S4C, Radio Cymru and the ‘Light Classical’ genre, one can only presume she wants an MBE like what Aled’s got. I’ve got some news for her. Pay attention cariad: the ‘E’ stands for ‘Empire’; Imperialism is wrong, it involves extreme violence, mass murder, grand larceny and cultural genocide; have you heard of Ukraine…?

PERFORMERS
Mike Peters MBE: Billed as ‘Mike Peters from The Alarm’ in case his name doesn’t ring a bell.
Bonnie Tyler: Blimey, she’s knocking 71 and playing the cruise ships. Cor, take a look at her huge property porfolio! I just pray the filler doesn’t melt.
John Owen-Jones: Billed as ‘West End and Broadway star John Owen Jones’ in case his name doesn’t ring a bell. When that doesn’t help, a quick Google reveals that he’s best known for singing in The Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserables – information that causes one’s buttocks to instinctively clench in a visceral, Pavlovian reaction.
Owain Wyn Evans: Billed as ‘everyone’s favourite drumming weatherman’ in case his name doesn’t ring a bell. ‘Everyone’ in this case means a few hundred gormless TV addicts on social media. He’s spoken out on homophobia and has acquired a gross hair-do and a husband. I’ve got some news for him. Listen, ducky: the whole point of being gay is to reject the phoney, thoroughly discredited, fucked-up values of the mainsteam hetero template, not cravenly imitate them in a pathetic search for ‘acceptance’.
Mike Doyle: Billed as ‘funnyman Mike Doyle’ in case his name doesn’t ring a bell.
The Pendyrus Male Voice Choir: Almost certainly going to be the highlight of the afternoon.
The Welsh Pops Orchestra: I must stop this – I hit up, not down…

In conclusion? STUFF THE JUBILEE! ABOLISH THE MONARCHY! BUILD AN INDEPENDENT WELSH REPUBLIC!