Queen and Vidal Sassoon exchange pleasantries

More information:
Daily Telegraph - Queen has nice hair

Tory call to strip the queen of powers

New Conservative Party leader David Cameron has called for the Queen to be stripped of many of her traditional powers.

Although the Queen still legally retains many "prerogative" powers, many of these are now exercised on her behalf by the elected government.

However the Queen retains a number of powers that she exercises personally. These include
- the power to dissolve Parliament
- the power to appoint a Prime Minister
- the power to award some honours

Mr Cameron has recently formed a "democracy task force" which will exam the use of some of these powers by the monarch, as well as the use of other prerogative powers (such as the power to declare war) by ministers.

More information:
The Guardian - Queen's powers should be removed, says Cameron

Queen bashes pheasant to death and becomes patron of ThroneOut

There's no better way to enjoy wild birds in their natural environment than saying hello to them with both barrels of a shotgun. Its a beautiful thing to see a bird in flight ripped to pieces by hundreds of pieces of high velocity lead shot. But sometimes you don't quite manage to finish the little buggers off.

In such circumstances there is only one thing the humane, kind, caring bird killer can do - finish your feathered pal off promptly by clubbing the remaining life out of it with your walking stick. And this is exactly what our caring Queen was photographed doing. Reportedly it took our ailing monarch some 5 whacks to despatch the little blighter, but her persistence paid off. What a lovely lady, an inspiration to all of us who enjoy killing animals for fun (without them suffering too much, naturally).

Some would say that such behaviour was inappropriate for our head of state, especially as HM the Queen is also patron of the RSPB - The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. But no, apparently the best way to protect birds is by firing at them whilst shouting "hoorah" with your inbred friends.

As a tribute to our Queen, and her absolute hypocrisy, we've decided to appoint her Royal Patron of ThroneOut. We are honoured that a woman, whose views and position might initially appear to be contrary to the aims of ThroneOut, should so courteously permit us to use her name on our letterhead, alongside our other great Patrons, Diana "Princess of People's Hearts" (and shagger of arab heart surgeons), and of course our first patron, King Charles I.

For more information:
Daily Mail - Queen clubs bird to death
Daily Record - Pheasant Clubbing Defended

Queen bans Mirror from palace

One of the major problems with our constitution is the inevitable confusion between the Queen as an individual and the Queen as sovereign. The Queen is now barring the Mirror Newspaper from state functions as a result of a report it made about her and her family's private life.

A Mirror reporter had secured a job working as a footman at Buckingham Palace prior to the visit of President Bush. Not only was this highly embarrassing from a security viewpoint, the journalist also gave intimate details of life at Buck House and Windsor Castle including the fact that:

• Prince Andrew is universally detested, he shouts "fuck off" at staff when they come into his room in the morning, and gets upset if they don't bow low enough when he emerges from his Aston Martin.
  
• Prince Edward has teddy bears on his bed
  
• the Queen uses "Tupperware"
  

The Queen later gained an injunction to stop further publication of the Mirror journalist's reports and both parties came to a settlement.

However, the Queen has now blocked the Mirror from sending journalists to public events at the palace.

A journalist who arrived at the palace to cover David Beckham's OBE was refused entry.

Asked if the Beckham exclusion was revenge for the Mirror story, the Queen's press secretary Penny Russell-Smith replied: "I think that would be a logical assumption, yes."

In effect the Queen is taking revenge for the Mirror's reports on her personal life, by blocking access to events that are carried out by her as Head of State.

These are public events paid for by public money. It is not for the Queen to decide who attends, especially not if that decision is based on her personal problems. Once again the Queen is treating this country like her personal property.

The Mirror - Queen Bans Mirror from Palace
The Mirror - Our Man in the Castle: Still Wide Open
The Mirror - Our Man in the Palace: My Life as a Footman

Oath to Queen is discriminatory

An Australian anti-discrimination tribunal has ruled that requiring an oath of allegiance to the Queen is effectively discrimination based on political beliefs. It ruled the decision by the RSL (Returned and Services League, Australian veterans organization) to reject an 81 year old applicant purely because of his refusal to swear the oath was illegal.

The ruling has huge implications for the official status of the monarchy in Australia and potentially in other countries too.

The Age (Australia) - Veteran wins RSL fight over swearing loyalty to Queen

Another royal house in flames

It's a well known scientific fact that only the most volatile and combustable materials known to mankind are used to construct the Windsors' many houses.

Latest in this long line of Royal bonfires was the Queen's personal beach hut at Holkham, near to one of the Queen's other houses at Sandringham, Norfolk.

Unfortunately no pictures of the fire appear to exist, so you will have to make do with looking at the burned-out remains.

No doubt it can be rebuilt with some more tax payers money.

More information:
BBC News - Arson attack on Queen's beach hut