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18 February 2022

What will happen when the Queen dies?

Britain's apathy will keep Charles on the throne, for better or for worse.

By Eleanor Peake

What will happen when the Queen dies? The BBC will announce a timetable of mournful national television. Labour will probably go down in the polls. Prince Charles will be crowned. But after that? 

Commentators like to toy with the idea that the monarchy will end; perhaps not quickly, but eventually, a painful jog to the finish line. They will be doing so again now that it has been announced the Queen will miss the state opening of parliament because of mobility issues. They predict that the UK’s tolerance for a system that makes no logical sense in a democracy will, rationally, cease to be.

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