I doubt I will ever describe myself as a royalist, but if the royal family does want to win me over to the cause (and I can imagine they have no greater desire), then Prince William’s announcement at the weekend of his plan to build social housing on the Duchy estate is possibly the best gateway to monarchism they could offer me.
A patron of two homelessness charities, the Prince of Wales spoke of his wish to end hidden homelessness in an interview with The Sunday Times.
Cue the usual suspects grumbling about how a man with that many bedrooms should just open up Kensington Palace.
I’ll admit the optics have their ludicrous element — a man with a lot of homes professing concern for people who have none. And yet his position also makes the prince particularly well placed to deliver a viable solution.
Even better, rather than harping on about charity initiatives (warm and fuzzy but more useful for firefighting than preventing fire in the first place) William seems willing to acknowledge the roots of the problem: family breakdown, domestic violence, care leaving and, yes, a crummy and precarious private rental sector.
The Everyone In initiative introduced during Covid lockdowns showed it is possible to stop to rough sleeping with adequate resources.
The rest of the time our housing safety net falls far short, pushing thousands of people into sofa surfing and other insecure shelter.
If the problem can be fixed in a long-term, sustainable and effective way, I’m not sure I care who is fixing it.
