ALMOST 4000 people have signed a petition calling for the abolition of adaptations and exemptions to legislation requested by the monarchy.
Our Republic launched the Scottish Parliament petition less than a week ago but it has quickly gathered pace as the campaign group hurtle towards their 5000 signature target.
It garnered 2000 signatures in just 24 hours before climbing to more than 3600 just a couple of days later.
It further calls for all details of instances where the monarchy has lobbied for changes in Scottish law to be made public, and for them to be reversed, and for any future communications between the monarchy and government or parliament to be “fully transparent” to prevent any such alterations to Scottish laws being implemented in the future.
It comes after reports that the late Queen was given advance sight of Holyrood bills, allowing her to secretly lobby for changes, on at least 67 occasions. These included bills dealing with property taxation, protections from tenants, and planning laws.
Tristan Gray, convener of Our Republic, said the timing of the petition may have been fortunate given the current furore around the royal family but he has not been surprised by the level of support shown.
He told the National: “This is the sort of response I expected, honestly.
“I suppose it was quite fortunate timing-wise because it’s the new year and people are paying attention to the news a lot more as they come out of their holidays and the royal family is having a royal breakdown just now.
“It’s perhaps been in the news cycle a bit more than it should be too given how much people are struggling just now.
“But I don’t think this is an issue people are split on really. Our organisation as a whole has the backing of about half the population but when it comes to whether the monarchy should be able to alter laws, that’s not something that splits voters. I think it’s something everyone is agreed on [that they shouldn’t be able to] and I think most people see it as a common sense change to the way our system works.
“We will easily get past 5000 at this rate which would put it in the top five or six petitions being considered which just shows how strong the feeling is on how much more transparent our democracy should be.”
A constitutional mechanism called Crown Consent sees the monarch given an opportunity to look over prospective laws that could affect her property and public powers. It is not the same as Royal Assent, which is given to bills to make them acts of Parliament.
The petition comes amid a rocky period for the royal family following a string of revelations from Prince Harry ahead of the publication of his book Spare – including claims his brother William physically assaulted him.
Campaign group Republic said last week this has caused the “magic” of the monarchy to disintegrate.
Gray said he agreed with this and described the institution as nothing more than a “real life incarnation of the cast of Succession”.
He said: “For a very long time now, the monarchy has been an edifice for ideas to be projected onto about Britain and that was largely because of the character of Elizabeth and her complete silence on policy.
“That has now crumbled because – while a lot of people are not alive to remember the start of Elizabeth’s reign - people know Charles as a person and his flaws and those flaws and the flaws of his successor are being revealed to the public on an almost weekly basis at the moment and people are starting to see they are just a real life incarnation of the cast of Succession.”
You can view and sign Our Republic's petition to "end legal loopholes for the monarchy" here.
