The British know best the new King Charles III, whose thinking has been scrutinized during the long wait for the throne, unlike his mother Elizabeth II, proclaimed queen at just 25 years old and who in 96 years has never given interviews. â € ‹â €‹ â € ‹â €‹ â € ‹â €‹ â € ‹
When he inherited the crown, which he will formally receive this Saturday, King Carlos III assumed the imperative of political neutrality and promised not to intervene in matters in which he has shown great interest over the years, such as environmentalism, architecture and art.
Here are some essential points of the thinking of the new British monarch about his personal interests:
+++ Environmentalism +++
Carlos is a pioneer of environmental activism. In 1970, he spoke for the first time publicly about the impact of plastics in the world, in a speech where he warned about the problem of pollution in general.
“If we think that each person produces about two kilos of garbage a day and that there are 55 million people on this island who use non-returnable bottles and indestructible plastic containers, it is not difficult to imagine the mountains of garbage that we will have to deal with at some point. way," he said at the time.
In 1986, he was ridiculed for saying that talking to plants helped them grow, according to the Daily Mail newspaper, but he continued to share a taste for gardening and promote nature conservation initiatives.
When he turned 70, an official list of facts about the then prince indicated that, after each tree planting ceremony, he “gives a friendly handshake to a branch to wish it well”.
Ahead of the COP26 summit in Glasgow in 2021, Carlos revealed that his branded Aston Martin car uses a blend of bioethanol made from cheese and wine waste as fuel.
+++ Architecture +++
In 1984, Carlos shocked the project for the new wing of the National Gallery museum, in the middle of Trafalgar Square, in London, as a “monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much loved and elegant friend”.
The speech at the 150th anniversary dinner of the Royal Institute for British Architects (RIBA) was seen as an attack on modern architecture, but also a questionable intervention in public works.
The initial project was abandoned and a neoclassical building was built in its place. The same happened after criticism of modernist buildings next to St Paul's Cathedral, near the Bank of England and in a former barracks in Chelsea.
In 2009, he tried to use a conciliatory tone, apologizing and assuring that he did not want a return to the XNUMXth century style, recalls the Evening Standard.
However, he argued that, while interior decoration is up to each one, “architecture and the built environment affects everyone”, so he claimed the right to express opinions about real estate.
+++ Badgers and alternative medicine +++
In 2015, The Guardian newspaper won a decade-long court battle to gain access to letters from Carlos to ministers in the Tony Blair government between 2004 and 2005, in a case that became known as the “black spider”. ]
According to the newspaper, the then heir to the crown demanded better equipment for the troops in Iraq and called for the culling of badgers to prevent the spread of bovine tuberculosis, whose opponents he described as “intellectually dishonest”.
In the notes, he also weighed in on the school curriculum, the construction of hospitals or the decline in agricultural production, and urged Blair to block a European Union directive that limited the UK's use of alternative herbal medicines.
+++ The role of the King +++
When he turned 70, in 2018, he did not deny, in a documentary for the BBC, that he had “meddled” in issues such as living conditions in cities, but admitted that he would have to change.
“I'm not that stupid, I realize that it's a separate exercise, being sovereign. Of course I fully understand how it should work,” he said.
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