..dollars a year to launch ships, entertain foreign dignitaries, tour the colonies and open fetes. The Royals worth as an English tourist attraction is greater than Stonehenge - which has endured a lot longer - or Big Ben - which has the benefit of being somewhat more timely than the House of Windsor. Perhaps there maybe value for money?
When Princess Diana died the outburst of what was accurately described as ‘recreational mourning’ by people who obviously didn’t know the deceased in any way but vicariously - was enough to keep the colour magazines – henceforth known as ‘The Trashies’ - laughing all the way to the bank for several months. Not to mention the London florists who are no doubt hoping for another high profile royal fatality before too long. And, like the endless speculation about the death of Marilyn Munroe, the conspiracy theories about the involvement of the secret service, Prince Phillip and two ill-tempered corgis in Diana’s death, will survive for as long as there are people with time on their hands. But will her memory really last? After all, Rodolfo Alfonso Raffaello Pierre Filibert Guglielmi di Valentina d'Antonguolla, also known more simply as Rudolf Valentino, the handsome, silently smouldering star of ‘The Sheik’, whose funeral caused suicides and riots, still has a mysterious ‘woman in black’ putting a solitary red rose on his grave nearly 90 years after his death. Somehow I suspect that Ms Spencer’s naff little Greco-Roman Temple memorial by the pond at Althorp will soon be unvisited and untended before too long.
This outcry and pointless hysteria of her death was nearly matched when Charles married his mistress ……….or was it his polo pony? That he actually married his mistress and that the general public knew of her existence is a modern phenomenon. It has long been a tradition of various Princes of Wales to have flotillas of mistresses in tow, but the latest heir to the throne is almost modest in his flirtations. I certainly don’t care as long as the poor long-suffering man is vaguely happy and can keep gardening.
But it brings to mind the new age of public prurience that we live in, the cheerful outrage that we find that our public figures, politicians and other newsworthy individuals have been caught with their underpants around their ankles. Whilst the peccadilloes of Australian politicians have gone generally unremarked I still chuckle over the headline June 1987 of the soon to be defunct scandal rag ‘The Truth’. ''Snedden Died on the Job - Police Seeking Deathbed Girl''. I suspect that, as Australians have such a low regard for politicians, the betrayal of trust implicit in the infidelity to their partners is generally regarded as par for the course for the pond life bottom dwellers that they are.
The British Prime Minister at the outbreak of the First World War, Herbert Henry Asquith, 1st Earl of Oxford and Asquith, KG, KC, PC was totally obsessed by a young lady named Venetia Stanley, and his romantic obsession was considered, even in those days, something of a security risk. He sent over 560 letters to her, often written during cabinet meetings. Often her advice was instrumental in determining government policy – and in fact we probably owe the dubious distinction of being one of the reasons that Winston Churchill’s idiotic idea of capturing the Dardanelles was adopted. Stranger still when one considers that Asquith was an opponent of giving women the vote.
I’m sure that politicians of any sex, bent or persuasion enjoy a good root now and then. And good luck to them as it keeps them off the streets (we hope) and away from politics for a while. I am not that interested in what they do with what they’ve got as long as they do it in the privacy of their own bedroom, circus tent or limousine and not on the internet or other social media. Let’s be honest, it is bad enough looking at their faces without being confronted with their photo-shopped genitalia on the mobile.
But apparently we are in a minority if the media are a reliable guide. Even the French, who have had a very laissez faire attitude to their politicians’ peccadillos, part-time pulchritudinous partners and practical perversities, have suddenly become more prurient.* Of course they are being titillated by the current Premier of France, Francoise Hollande, and his three ladies. Firstly there was Ségolène Royale who was ditched after 30 years of respectable concubinage and four children in favour of another woman, Valérie Trierweiler, now being humiliated by his affair with yet another younger woman, Mme Julie Gayet..
Perhaps in revenge Valérie Trierweiler published a book ‘Merci pour ce moment’ (Thank You for This Moment), Valérie that details her relationship with Hollande and their breakup. It may have been tosh but it sold by the millions.
Monsieur Hollande probably thinks it all a bit unfair as he would easily be able recall the twenty-first Premier of France, François Mitterrand, whose behaviour towards his long-suffering wife, Danielle never became public knowledge and thus merited no censure way back in 1995. He had a second family and a daughter by his mistress. If you were in the know you were in the know.
So whilst the new moralism is essentially a way for the media to titillate the public, certain attitudes seem hard to change. It occurs to me is that I have never seen a man tearing into the newsagent to see if the latest copy of ‘No Idea’ has arrived, nor do I see the male of the species in the supermarket queue leaning over for a surreptitious read of the ‘Women's Weekly’. Conversely I don’t see many women buying ‘Popular Mechanic’s, ‘Wheels’ or ‘PC and Tech Authority’.
If you looked at the television news at the crowds outside St Mary’s Hospital I don’t think that there were a significant number of men in business suits anxiously waiting for cannons to be fired, the first royal nappy to be hung out the window, or speculating whether the poor girl was to be christened Alice, Charlotte, Elizabeth, Frances, Alexandra, Mary, Diana or Stardust Tweezel.
So why is it that women, who are generally so sensible, fall for this romantic royal fiddle-faddle so easily? I dare not speculate on the cause, although I am sure that there will be a genetic test for it. I can imagine the day when the doctor will come into the room and says - “Unfortunately your child has celebrity syndrome and will be condemned to a lifetime of Brad and Angelina, Caramel Cream wafers and Kim Kardashian’s battle with her breasts.”

*Incidentally it alliterates in French as well “peccadilles, les partenaires pulchritudinous à temps partiel et les perversités pratiques”.