With just about a month to go until the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan, the country is gripped in controversy and debate about whether or not there should be a public holiday. ‘Of course there should!’ cries every ultra-royalist, anti-royalist and just about everybody else outside of those extremes and in-between. What’s not to like about a public holiday?
Government has in fact downplayed the idea, stating that ‘there is no precedent in this area’. That’s funny! The dictionary definition of the word ‘precedent’ is in fact ‘an earlier event or action that is regarded as an example or guide to be considered in subsequent similar circumstances’. Therefore there IS recent precedent for a public holiday, to celebrate a Royal Wedding, given that there was a public holiday to celebrate the wedding of Prince William and Kate, in 2011. Britons also enjoyed a day off when Prince Charles and Diana married in 1981, and for Princess Anne’s wedding in 1973. By contrast, there was no Bank Holiday for the weddings of Prince Andrew in 1986 and Prince Andrew in 1999.
The claim for the country to have a day off when Harry gets married is somewhat strengthened by the fact that this is what happened for his older brother, William’s marriage. That’s the usual family logic isn’t it?
The decision about whether or not there should be a public holiday to celebrate Royal nuptials is in fact one of those ‘family-type’ decisions which defy logic. Every normal, atypical, dysfunctional or indifferent family in the Realm will at some stage or another have refused to offer or even withdrawn a relative’s wedding invite, on the basis of some real or imagined transgression. Good to see that the Royal Family is as dysfunctional as any other when it comes to that question!
Bastian Lloyd Morris LLP is a Limited Liability Partnership and is authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. Registered in England under company no: OC329737.