The guessing is that the Queen’s astute palace staff would have at least questioned the Canadian prime minister’s office or privy council office about any issues with the Sussexes coming here, and I’m sure they were given a very Canadian answer: “That’s wonderful, we’re happy to help and have them here.” But there are other implications—security costs, (which are transparent in Canada and opaque in the United Kingdom), potential constitutional conflict with the Canadian vice-regal world and potential immigration concerns.
The Queen and Prince Charles have constitutional status here. But the rest of the family doesn’t—the rest of the family are foreigners.
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And all royal family visits are done with the understanding that the royals will depart to the U.K. in due course and not become a fixture in Canadian life. That’s how the system works—what Ryerson University’s Professor David Smith, one of Canada’s leading scholars on the constitutional monarchy, calls “the invisible Crown.”
Harry and Meghan are popular in Canada, according to polls. But the excitement about them coming to live here overlooks the fact that Harry’s interest in Canada is thin. He’s a nice man, but he has declined every attempt over the past decade to take on Canadian patronages, head up Canadian charities and accept appointments as colonel-in-chief of various Canadian military units, including the Canadian Rangers. His website shows no connection to any specific Canadian patronage or charity or organization. He does not speak French. He has limited—if any—understanding of the country.
There has been breathy talk of appointing him governor general to replace the uncharismatic Julie Payette. It could be done but it would take us backward into our colonial past when members of the royal family and other British grandees came over the Atlantic to represent the sovereign. The optics of replacing a francophone woman and astronaut from Quebec in Rideau Hall with a unilingual British prince and an American movie star are worse than awful.
The Sussexes, when they move here, must come as private citizens. And rather than being enamoured with the fleeting star power of the Sussexes, Ottawa should be focusing on helping Canadians get to know Charles, the Prince of Wales, the man who will one day be their king. He cannot make private visits to Canada. He only can come here at the invitation of the federal government. Most Canadians’ knowledge of him is filtered through the British press, which has its own bizarre agenda and viewpoint on the royal family.
