UK Prime Minister Liz Truss has rejected a request by King Charles to attend the COP27 conference on climate change, reports Radio New Zealand. This is not unexpected.

Pure fantasy - we’re not sure if this account is a parody or not!

What’s been interesting to see is some of the fantasy claims that the governments of New Zealand or Australia or Canada could request Charles go to the conference on behalf of our countries, rather than the UK.

This is fantasy, based on the idea that the British monarch is “shared’ in more than a legal sense between the various Commonwealth realms. Practically, the UK taxpayer carries the cost of the Royals, and control access to the Sovereign and Royals. Yes, New Zealand, Canada or Australia can make requests for the Royals to represent our interests, but such events are very rare. For example, as far as we know while he was Prince of Wales, Charles only attended one event on behalf of New Zealand, the 100th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme in 2016.

This is because ultimately, the access and control over the Royals sits with the British government. For the sovereign to leave the UK, they need the permission of the British government. If New Zealand requests a Royal tour of New Zealand, permission must be sought from the British government. The idea that the Royals are an autonomous part of Britain’s constitutional structure is, sadly, another persistent myth.