Now Charles can get his bus pass

Here we are then November 14th and the heir to the Throne is 60 today. Congratulations to Prince Charles. It was good I thought that the Queen publicly praised Charles a day or two ago regarding his good works, praise that I thought was well merited.

No doubt now that Charles has reached this particular milestone there will be renewed speculation about whether the Queen should abdicate in favour of her son. But why should she? She is well respected around the World, she appears to be as physically fit and mentally alert as ever and in a world of constant change it is great to have a sense of continuity somewhere along the line. Apart from this she demonstrates very clearly how much of a contribution a seriously older person can make in society.

With the speed of change that is happening around us it is good to have an intelligent voice that is in a position to be listened to, someone who is prepared to think out of the box, someone who will say "Whoa, hang on a moment, you might be going down a route you will ultimately regret". The political system is such that government decisions are geared to short terminism whereas a person like Charles will have a much longer perspective. Apart from the fact that Charles has a good insight into the history of both this country and others (politicians are notoriously bad at learning from history it seems) another point in his favour is that he has a good grasp of inter- relationships in the natural world. Again this is an area in which our politicians are often found wanting. In our helter-skelter world where damaging actions can happen, in geological timescales, in the blink of an eye, hacking down rain forests being a classic example, then we need wise minds to understand the problems to come. Charles gives some evidence that he does understand these things.

From what I've written it might be thought that I think Charles has no faults. Not at all. He has certainly inherited the short fuse of his grandfather, George VI. As to his much discussed first marriage he found himself in the impossible position of not being able to wed his true love until much more recently. The body language between himself and Camilla speaks volumes for their relationship. I have the feeling that they are particularly comfortable when they visit either of my two counties. And so they should be of course!