One consequence of the Queen’s long reign is that other European royals have become somewhat isolated from the Windsors.
The Queen — long accepted as the Grand Dame of the European crowned heads — rarely attends the weddings or jubilees of her royal cousins these days.
It used to be the convention that the Prince of Wales would go in her place. But no longer. With some monarchies — notably the Belgian, Spanish and the Dutch — adopting a policy of abdication, Charles is said to prefer to avoid the company of young kings, such as Felipe of Spain, 47, Philippe of Belgium, 55, and Willem-Alexander, 48, of Holland, who all have the chance to make their marks as monarchs in middle age.
‘The Prince detested what he took to be sympathetic looks and comments that occasionally reached his ears when he appeared in such company,’ says a long-standing official.
‘He doesn’t want sympathy — he hates it. So, by agreement with Buckingham Palace, he no longer has to attend such occasions.’
This can lead to some tricky situations.
For example, at the glittering 75th birthday celebrations for Queen Margrethe of Denmark there was no British royal presence.
‘With so many crowned heads present, it meant that only Charles would have been of appropriate senior royal rank to attend,’ says an insider. ‘But he didn’t go.’
The Royal Family’s only Dane, the Duchess of Gloucester — the former Birgitte van Deurs, who worked as a secretary at the Danish embassy — would have been the obvious other choice, but sources say she was not of sufficiently senior rank to represent the Royal Family.
But he's still in the line of succession and he is the Queen's son.
Why on earth would this be an issue? What are people worried about?
