The new government repeatedly stressed economic growth, saying that “securing economic growth will be a fundamental mission.” Britain is the sixth largest economy in the world, but has been plagued by low productivity, stagnant wages and limited investment.
The new administration will also “reset the relationship with European partners,” a turning of the page from the Brexit years that so dominated the Conservative era.
The State Opening of Parliament on Wednesday began with the pomp, with the tradition and theatrics of the constitutional monarchy on full display, designed to awe the public and bestow legitimacy during transitions of power.
The British monarch — King Charles III accompanied by his wife, Queen Camilla — arrived via the Diamond Jubilee State Coach, pulled by six white horses. They entered Westminster through the Sovereign Door and proceeded to a gold throne in the House of Lords, with the king’s head heavy under the 2.3-pound Imperial State Crown. BBC commentators noted that it weighed more than a big bag of sugar.
This was quite a dramatic transition. A relatively new monarch reading out the plans of a new government.
The King’s Speech is written entirely by the government. The king is just the messenger. Although head of state, he has little real power beyond his ceremonial roles.
Starmer listened to the words while standing beside his defeated political opponent, the former Conservative Party prime minister Rishi Sunak, who will now be relegated to the opposition benches in the House of Commons. Walking into the Lords chamber, the two appeared to share some animated small talk.
Starmer and his cabinet picks officially started on July 5, after a landslide win in the general election. Already, Starmer has represented Britain at NATO and shaken hands with President Biden in the Oval Office. But Wednesday was when his government laid out its legislative priorities, defining what “change” meant, the slogan at the heart of Labour’s winning election campaign.
Because Labour won such an overwhelming majority of seats in Parliament, there is really little to the party back in its mission to rebuild Britain — except the country’s coffers. As incoming Finance Minister Rachel Reeves put it, this government inherited “the worst set of circumstances since the Second World War.”
By tradition, the king’s speech is not high oratory, but a laundry list of goals and objectives. Starmer’s government outlined 40 bills it wants to pursue. Sunak’s government mentioned 21 bills last time.
“Even just the crude number of bills” speaks to the “level of ambition” of this new government, said Anand Menon, a politics professor at King’s College London.
The first lines of the King’s Speech began: “My government will govern in service to the country. My government’s legislative program will be mission led and based upon the principles of security, fairness and opportunity for all.”
That may resonate with this king, who has framed his own job as being in service to the people.
Charles read the speech in a dispassionate voice. He is expected to remain nonpartisan. But he is also known as a lifelong climate advocate — which created some awkwardness during the last King’s Speech, when he had to read out the Sunak government’s plans for a new system for awarding oil and gas licenses.
This time, Charles read, “My government recognizes the urgency of the global climate challenge.”
Center-left Labour argues that economic growth and a green energy transition don’t need to be in tension. As part of its “Green Prosperity Plan,” it has pledged to help create 650,000 jobs by 2030, as well as to work with the private sector to double onshore wind, triple solar power, and quadruple offshore wind.
Labour wants to create a public-owned green energy utility. It wants to boost the economy by encouraging the construction of homes and infrastructure. It wants to stop local governments from blocking new building.
“Now is the time to take the brakes off Britain,” Starmer said in a statement released before the speech. “For too long people have been held back, their paths determined by where they came from — not their talents and hard work.”
Starmer is the most working-class leader of Britain in a generation. As everyone who listened to his stump speeches knows, his mother was a nurse and his father was a toolmaker. Starmer was the first in the family to attend a university. He went on to become a human rights lawyer, and was knighted for his service as the Britain’s chief prosecutor, before entering politics at age 52.
There were other signs of change. Labour has appropriated “take back control” — a motto for Brexiteers — as a slogan for reducing the “chaos” of Conservative Party leadership, as well as for a plan to decentralize power, away from Westminster.
Labour’s agenda promised new powers to metropolitan mayors, while giving local leaders control over bus routes, a source of much grumbling about dismal service and hours-long waits in the rural districts.
Starmer already scrapped his predecessor’s plans to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, but Wednesday’s speech added that the new government would establish a new “border security command” to tackle “immigration crime” and “smash the gangs” behind the small boats crossing the English Channel.
Wednesday was of the most high-visibility days for Charles since he revealed in February that he was beginning treatment for cancer. (What kind of cancer and what kind of treatment we have not been told.)
The rituals of the State Opening of Parliament involve many oddities. Before the king’s arrival, royal bodyguards searched the cellars for explosives. This is a nod to Guy Fawkes’s 1605 “gunpowder plot,” a botched attempt by English Catholics to blow up Protestant King James I and Parliament.
Also by tradition, Black Rod, a senior official in the House of Lords, had the door to the House of Commons slammed in her face — representing the House of Commons’ independence from the monarch.
Another lawmaker was held “hostage” at Buckingham Palace during the ceremony, which is meant to guarantee the monarch’s safe return.
