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Fears of Queen Being Dragged into Brexit Saga

Jamie Dettmer

   The Victorian sage and essayist Walter Bagehot once explained Britain's
   unusual constitutional arrangement as consisting of a "dignified"
   aristocratic branch, which mainly existed for show, and an "efficient"
   branch of professional politicians, who did the real governing.
   Britain's figurehead monarchs, he said, should offer advice and counsel
   and nothing more to the politicians governing in their name.

   But the political fight over Brexit, Britain's pending exit from the
   European Union, risks blurring the demarcation, say royal advisers and
   the country's top civil servants.

   They worry Queen Elizabeth II may end up in the middle of the toxic and
   polarizing political struggle over whether Britain should leave the EU,
   wrecking an unwritten constitutional arrangement that has evolved over
   centuries and kept sovereigns above partisan politics.

   The monarch has privately expressed dismay with the quality of her
   country's current crop of politicians and their "inability to govern
   correctly," according to newspaper reports.

   The Sunday Times reported the 93-year-old queen made her views known at
   a private dinner shortly after the 2016 Brexit referendum. Her
   exasperation reportedly has only grown since the polarization of the
   country over the issue, which risks breaking up the union of Great
   Britain.

   Opinion polls suggest a majority of Scots now favor Scotland becoming
   an independent state and would vote to break away if a plebiscite were
   held.

   Queens wants stability

   The queen, who has reigned for 67 years, rarely comments even in
   private on party politics, and normally focuses any remarks more on the
   personal foibles of her prime ministers. Her comments are shared only
   within a very tight circle of relatives and trusted courtiers, a former
   aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told VOA.

   The queen prizes political stability and predictability "above all
   else," the former aide said, and was frustrated with Prime Minister
   Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s during a violent confrontation between
   her government and the country's coal miners, who shut down the British
   coal industry in a bid to prevent the closure of mines and their
   associated buildings and equipment.

   Britain's new Conservative prime minister, Boris Johnson, has pledged
   to lead Britain out of the EU on Oct. 31 -- a Brexit deadline agreed to
   earlier this year with Brussels.

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