Edouard Philippe, France's new prime minister, is relatively unknown

Associated Press

French President Emmanuel Macron has appointed Edouard Philippe, a relatively unknown 46-year-old lawmaker, as prime minister, making good on campaign promises to repopulate French politics with new faces.

Alexis Kohler, Macron’s new general secretary at the presidential Elysee Palace, made the announcement Monday.

Philippe is the mayor of the Normandy port of Le Havre, a trained lawyer and an author of political thrillers. He’s also a member of the mainstream-right Republicans party that was badly battered by Macron’s victory in the presidential campaign.

Philippe’s appointment ticks several boxes for the 39-year-old Macron, France’s youngest president, who took power on Sunday. Philippe’s age reinforces the generational shift in France’s corridors of power and the image of youthful vigor that Macron is cultivating.

Philippe could also attract other Republicans to Macron’s cause as the centrist president works to piece together a majority in parliament to pass his promised economic reforms.

Emmanuel Macron sworn in as president of France, promises economic focus

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She's 64. He's 39 and could be France's next president

Gabriel Attal: Who is France's new prime minister?

Gabriel Attal became France's youngest ever and first openly gay prime minister on Tuesday.

Attal, 34, replaced Élisabeth Borne following her resignation on Monday.

“I know I can count on your energy and your commitment,” French President Emmanuel Macron said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, following the announcement.

Macron added that the appointment was reminiscent of the "spirit of 2017," the year when he became France's youngest president.

“I could read and hear it: The youngest president of the Republic in history appoints the youngest prime minister in history. I want to see it only as the symbol of boldness and movement. It is also, and perhaps above all, a symbol of confidence in young people," Attal said during a ceremony.

In a speech on Tuesday, Attal said his goals as prime minister include making security an "absolute priority" and promoting values of "authority and respect of others."

He also vowed to strengthen public services, including schools and the health system, and push for “better-controlling immigration.”

Attal's position makes him one of the highest-elected LGBTQ politicians. Attal, who most recently served as the education minister, will now lead the French government into the European Parliament elections this June.

World news:Blinken: Mideast nations have 'real' interest in working with Israel postwar

Who is Gabriel Attal?

Attal has been a rising star in France's politics for the past decade, the BBC reported. He began his career as an adviser in the health ministry and as a member of the Socialists party. NPR reported that he left the Socialists to join Macron's newly created political movement in 2016.

He became a member of parliament in 2017 and quickly caught Macron's attention for being a strong debater, the BBC reported.

He served as a government spokesperson during the pandemic in 2020 and briefly served as a budget minister after Macron was re-elected in 2022. In July of 2023, he became the education minister, NPR reported.

In his role as education minister, Attal banned abaya's, long robes, mainly worn by Muslim women from schools. He said the garments were testing secularism in schools, NPR reported.

He also attempted to introduce uniforms in schools and led an anti-bullying campaign. Attal said he was bullied when he was at the elite École alsacienne in Paris, the BBC reported.

Attal becomes first openly gay prime minister

Attal will be the country's first openly gay prime minister. He is in a civil partnership with Stéphane Sejourné, a member of the European Parliament since 2019, the BBC reported.

He came out as gay in 2018. Reuters reported that an old school associate in had outed him shortly after he was named a junior minister.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Elisabeth Borne: France names first female Prime Minister in 30 ...

Paris CNN —

Elisabeth Borne has been named the new Prime Minister of France, the first time in 30 years that a woman has held the position.

Borne will replace Jean Castex in the role, the Elysée Palace said in a statement on Monday, becoming only the second woman ever to serve as Prime Minister since the end of WWII. The country’s first was Édith Cresson, who served between May 1991 and April 1992 under Socialist President François Mitterand.

Borne formerly served as minister of the environment, transportation and labor.

She will lead a French government likely to be tasked with delivering on President Macron’s election campaign priorities: retirement reform and the scaling up of policies designed to combat climate change.

Borne pictured at the end of the handover ceremony. Thomas Samson/AFP/Getty Images

Her appointment follows President Emmanuel Macron’s reelection on April 24.

Borne has been “entrusted with forming a government,” according to the Elysée.

She dedicated her nomination to “every little girl,” during a ceremony on Monday marking the transfer of power.

“Follow your dreams all the way,” Borne said in a speech. “Nothing must hold back the fight for the place of women in society.”

Earlier Monday the Elysée Palace announced that Castex had tendered his resignation.

The former mayor of his small hometown of Prades in southwest France, Castex was a little known figure when he became Prime Minister in July 2020. He went on to lead France’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Emmanuel Macron: France's new president will be country's youngest

Kim Hjelmgaard

USA TODAY

Emmanuel Macron becomes France's youngest president, after the 39-year-old former investment banker and economy minister defeated anti-immigration nationalist Marine Le Pen in Sunday's presidential runoff.

Macron's precocious achievement erases a record held since 1848 by Louis Napoleon Bonaparte — Napoleon’s nephew. He won the French presidency at age 40.

Macron has never held elected office.

France’s Emmanuel Macron beats Marine Le Pen in presidential runoff

She's 64. He's 39 and could be France's next president

France's 25th president is a business-friendly centrist who emerged from relative obscurity only a year ago, when he launched an independent political movement called En Marche! that promised to break with decades of French political tradition and rule neither from the left nor right.

He quit incumbent President François Hollande's Socialist government to run for office as an independent after Hollande decided not to seek a second term.

Macron's victory represents a forceful repudiation of a European backlash against Muslim immigration and unity across the continent, both threatened by Le Pen, who favored letting France leave the 28-nation European Union.

He is a charismatic and confident speaker who is married to a former high school teacher who is 24 years older than he is.

"The task ahead will be difficult but I will always tell you the truth. I will protect you against threats," Macron said in a victory speech to supporters outside the Louvre museum in Paris. "I want to unite our people and our country. I will serve you with humility and force in the name of liberté, égalité, fraternité."

Macron has promised to invest in public health and infrastructure, cut corporate tax rates and modernize workplace rules in a country that cherishes its time off. The "Macron Law" is a bill he introduced as economy minister — an appointed position — that allowed more stores to open on Sundays.

During his time working for Hollande, Macron attempted to shake off negative perceptions of France as a place to do business.

"In France, we have always (been) afraid and upset by the positive destruction of past jobs," Macron told USA TODAY in 2015 ahead of a trip to the United States to promote his country as a destination for technology startups. "Really, creation and innovation are part of the French DNA."

"The surge of support for Emmanuel Macron shows that liberal, pro-EU centrists may yet have a future in European politics. This would be good for the EU," said Charles Grant, director of the Center for European Reform, a think tank.

In a last-minute endorsement, former U.S. president Barack Obama publicly announced he favors Macron, saying in a video that he was "not planning to get involved in many elections now that I don’t have to run for office but the French election is very important to the future of France and the values that we care so much about."

Obama said he supported Macron because he appealed to "people’s hopes and not their fears."

In his speech to supporters Sunday, Macron promised to unify the country "with love."

But Macron remains untested on security in a country that has seen a series of terrorist attacks in recent years. And he may struggle to implement his ideas unless his party wins many seats in the June parliamentary elections.

"With a new party, he doesn't have a party machine, he doesn't have any party funding yet, and he has a mountain to climb in selecting 577 candidates to challenge sitting parliamentarians in the National Assembly," said Francoise Boucek, a French-born political expert at Queen Mary University of London.

Macron is also not technically France's youngest-ever ruler. King Louis XIV was just 4 years old when he started to rule France in 1643.

Macron's centrists edge ahead of left in French first round vote | CNN

French President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist alliance won the first round of lower house elections on Sunday by a razor-thin margin over the left bloc of Jean-Luc Melenchon, but is likely to extend its lead in next weekend’s second-round runoff.

Macron’s Ensemble! alliance of centrist parties won 25.75% of the popular vote on Sunday, according to the interior ministry’s final tally, while Melenchon’s New Ecologic and Social People’s Union (NUPES) bloc came in second with 25.66%.

With rampant inflation driving up the cost of living and eroding wages, Macron has struggled to build on his re-election in April, with Melenchon casting him as a free-marketeer more intent on protecting the wealthy than hard-up families.

France’s progressive-leaning Le Monde newspaper said on Monday its own tally showed the left bloc had won the nationwide popular vote, and some leftist politicians said the official result had undercounted their vote.

“Artificially, the interior ministry seeks to show the candidates of Macron at the top,” Manuel Bompard, one of Melenchon’s most senior allies, who is himself running for a seat in Marseille, told LCI television.

He said some candidates, including in overseas territories, who had publicly said they supported NUPES but were not officially running as part of the bloc should have been included in the official tally.

Budget Minister Gabriel Attal dismissed Bompard’s comments, saying: “They (the left) always call into question the figures … it’s their speciality.”

Bompard had earlier said on Twitter that some 200,000 votes for NUPES had not been accounted for in the official result. He did not present any evidence.

Although the first round result is a significant gauge of the political temperature, France’s two-round voting system – designed to bring stability – is ultimately expected to favor Macron’s bloc.

“I think you need to see the end of the match before drawing any conclusions,” Olivia Gregoire, the government’s spokeswoman, said on Monday. “The campaign is not over yet.”

The president’s alliance is well-positioned to secure the largest number of seats in Sunday’s run-off. But main polling institutes said Macron could still lose his grip on parliament.

According to a forecast by pollster Elabe, Ensemble is set to win between 260 and 300 parliament seats – with an outright majority secured at 289 – while the left would secure 170-220 seats, a big increase from its 2017 result.

Rival pollster Ipsos expected Ensemble to win 255 to 295 seats.

'Dignity and integrity': France rocked by government disability rape ...

A minister in Emmanuel Macron’s new government has denied claims that he raped two women, on the grounds that his physical disability would make it impossible for him to sexually assault anyone.

Damien Abad, the French president’s newly appointed minister for solidarity and disabled people, released a statement denying the allegation after two women accused him of raping them in 2010 and 2011.

The 42-year-old, who suffers from a disorder called arthrogryposis that affects his limbs, said he contests “with the greatest force the accusations against me”, adding: “All the sexual relations I have had in my life have always been consenting.”

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‘Complete consent’

Abad is now facing “intense scrutiny” after the allegations surfaced in an investigation published by French news outlet Mediapart, Politico reported. The claims also “cast a shadow” over the first meeting of Macron’s new cabinet, which took place on Monday.

One of the women alleged that she went for dinner with Abad in October 2010, drank a glass of champagne and woke up in a hotel room in her underwear with him. The second, who was unknown to the first, claimed she spent an evening with him in 2011 and consented to having sex but then asked him to stop, which he failed to do.

Responding to the claims, Abad said that he has “always avoided making an issue of my disability” but was “forced to do it now to defend myself and even talk about intimate matters in detail to explain that the acts I am accused of were materially impossible”.

Arthrogryposis “is a term describing a number of conditions that affect the joints”, according to Johns Hopkins University. It often affects “both the arms and legs”, as in the case of Abad, and is “typically discovered in utero or at birth”.

Symptoms include “muscle contractures” of joints “in the wrist, hand, elbow and shoulder on either side of the body”, as well as “lower extremity involvement” including “the hips, knees and ankles”.

“There is also muscle weakness throughout the body,” the university said, while “spine curvature may develop in some patients”.

Abad’s defence rests on his claim that “the acts he was accused of were implausible” as “he did not have the physical ability to perform them”, The New York Times (NYT) said. His statement described how he “could not have sex” without a partner’s “full and complete consent”.

“My dignity and integrity have been attacked,” he said. “I have never raped a single woman in my life. To address these subjects in public is extremely painful for me so now I am going to concentrate on my job as a minister.”

Asked days later by reporters if he would resign, he said: “Should an innocent man resign? I don’t believe so.”

National reckoning

The allegations against Abad come “amid a growing reckoning over sexism and sexual abuse by French political figures”, the NYT reported. The claim has also fed “longstanding recriminations” against Macron by feminist groups who “accuse him of not living up to his vow to make crimes against women one of his top priorities”.

Nous Toutes, a feminist collective, responded by posting on Facebook: “How many men accused of rape are we going to see appointed under this term?”

The claims also come soon after a report by The High Council for Gender Equality, an official watchdog, that stated the French “political world still hasn’t experienced a real #MeToo”, despite a string of scandals in recent years.

Asked whether she believed Abad should step down, France’s new Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne told reporters that she was “obviously” not “aware” of the allegations before they appeared in Mediapart.

“If there are new elements, if the case is brought before the courts again, we will draw all the consequences of this decision,” she added.

Asked whether Macron was aware of the allegations before they surfaced in the media, new government spokesperson Olivia Grégoire said “to my knowledge, no member of the government was aware of these facts”.

Pushed on whether his position was under threat, she added: “The issue here is the establishment of the truth. It is for the justice system to establish the truth. It is not up to me, and I don’t think it is up to you either.”

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'Anti-woke' crusade has come to Europe. Its effects could be chilling ...

London CNN —

If 2020 renewed calls for racial equality as Black Lives Matter protests exploded throughout Europe, 2021 brought in the backlash as parts of the political establishment waged a so-called “war against woke.”

Stripped of its original meaning of a person being awake to progressive issues, “woke” has been appropriated from the Black vernacular and turned into a political lightning rod in the West’s culture wars. It is now used pejoratively by lawmakers and pundits from both left and right, criticizing the perceived excesses of social and racial justice movements.

The politicization of the word, which has seen degrees of success in the United States, has bolstered political resistance to calls for more equality in Europe. The amorphous term has also been interpreted differently, depending on where it is deployed.

In the United Kingdom, woke is used to “describe anything that could previously [be] described as ‘politically correct,’” Evan Smith, a visiting fellow at Australia’s Flinders University and author of “No Platform: A History of Anti-Fascism and the Limits of Free Speech,” told CNN. The term is “used to describe a broad range of ideas [and] movements concerned with social justice,” including anti-racism, intersectional feminism, trans rights and critical histories of the British empire, he said.

Cultural institutions and academics have been targeted by members of the ruling Conservative Party for supporting those movements. In September, Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s spokesperson accused a charity set up in the name of Winston Churchill of trying to “airbrush” the “giant achievements” of the former wartime leader.

The charity’s mistake? Being accused in rightwing tabloids of being “woke,” for changing its name from the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust to The Churchill Fellowship and acknowledging that Churchill’s views on race would not be accepted today.

“The Prime Minister has always been clear that whilst it’s legitimate to examine Britain’s history and we should aim to educate people about all aspects of our complex past, both good and bad, and not erase them,” the spokesperson said at the time according to PA Media. “We need to focus on addressing the present, and not attempt to rewrite the past and get sucked into the never-ending debate about which well-known historical figures are sufficiently pure or politically correct to remain in public view.”

These anti-woke government interventions have power. They “sharpen the public’s sense of moral purpose and help to galvanise voters in a country they perceive to be under siege,” wrote Nesrine Malik in the left-of-center newspaper, the Guardian, in October. “They include the defunding of academic institutions and museums, and even interfering in the appointment of senior personnel at the BBC.”

Many in the French establishment view “woke” as a heinous US import of theories on race, post-colonialism and gender, which they say pose a risk to French values and identity, Samuel Hayat, a politics research fellow at French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), told CNN.

A protester holds a banner on Champ de Mars, in Paris on June 6, 2020, as part of Black Lives Matter protests in the city. GEOFFROY VAN DER HASSELT/AFP/AFP via Getty Images

The term gained traction among French politicians and its press in 2021, say French observers. In May, Elizabeth Moreno, French President Emmanuel Macron’s party diversity minister, told Bloomberg that “woke culture is something very dangerous, and we shouldn’t bring it to France.” When asked in August whether “wokism [is] a just cause, in your opinion” by weekly political magazine Le Point, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, who is the socialist candidate in the upcoming presidential elections, said: “it is very important that journalists shed light on these emerging movements, but I will not be campaigning on them.”

When a major French dictionary included a gender-inclusive pronoun in its online edition in November, French lawmaker François Jolivet, from Macron’s party, called the dictionary’s authors on Twitter “militants of a cause that has nothing to do with France: #wokisme.”

“Woke is seen as a threat that comes from a society thought to be multicultural and violent and does not have the same values on secularism that France does,” Hayat said.

The word plays against the French egalitarian, anti-elitist mindset, said Hayat, placing all the theories someone might struggle to understand, such as intersectional feminism, “into a single phenomenon that came from outside France.”

As Franco-American relations plunged to new lows this fall over a security deal the US forged in secret with the UK and Australia, French Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer opened a think tank to uphold French values against what he described as “wokeism.”

Speaking to France’s Le Monde newspaper about his think tank, Blanquer said “wokeism” is an ideology that “fragments and divides, and has conquered certain political, media and academic circles.” He added that the backlash to “wokeism” helped “bring Donald Trump to power; France and its youth must escape this.”

New bogeyman

According to Rim-Sarah Alouane, a French legal scholar from Toulouse Capitole University, woke’s arrival in France’s culture wars is part of a wider reaction among members of Macron’s party, La République en Marche (LREM), against left-wing and progressive views, rearing its head after the brutal murder of teacher Samuel Paty in October 2020.

Paty’s death followed multiple Islamic terrorist attacks on French soil. But the French government’s response to his beheading opened up a full-scale culture war over secularism, freedom of speech and Islamophobia as the country’s interior minister closed a Muslim group that tracked anti-Muslim hate crime.

That period also saw “Islamo-leftism” – a controversial yet ill-defined far-right term accusing left-wing academics and activists of enabling Islamic extremism or terrorism – enter the mainstream political discourse as Education Minister Blanquer blamed it for “wreaking havoc” in universities.

He was backed by 100 academics who, in an open letter to Le Monde, blamed imported “indigenist [sic], racialist, and ‘decolonial’ ideologies,” in French universities for “nourishing hatred of the ‘Whites’ and of France.”

France's President Emmanuel Macron is seen at a December 13, 2021, press conference, months before the country's presidential election. Atilla Kisbenedek/AFP/Getty Images

By the start of 2021, France’s Minister of Higher Education Frédérique Vidal announced the launch of an investigation into French academic research on CNews, a French channel that has been compared to Fox News. It would look “at everything through the prism of wanting to fracture and divide,” while singling out colonialism and race studies, according to Agence France-Presse.

The French research organization Vidal tasked with launching the inquiry agreed to carry out the research. It however noted that Islamo-leftism was not a scientific term and condemned “attempts to delegitimize different fields of research, such as postcolonial studies, intersectional studies,” Centre national de la recherche scientifique [CRNS] wrote in a press release.

Conflating academics and researchers with Islamic extremism amounts to McCarthyism, said Alouane, referring to the anti-Communist crusade in the early 1950s by US Sen. Joe McCarthy.

Weaponizing woke is another attempt at bringing academics, researchers and human rights activists to heel, say critics.

“This is a witchhunt against people who question the status quo,” Alouane added. “Instead of trying to make things better, to tackle issues related to discrimination, racial profiling, and the history of French colonization … these academics [and] researchers are considered to be a threat to so-called Republican values.”

It also raises questions about academic freedoms, Hayat told CNN. France only needs to look at how Hungarian leaders chipped away at its education sector, banning gender studies in colleges and forcing the Central European University (CEU) out of the country for failing to comply with their nationalist worldview.

While crude racial stereotypes over genetics and skin color are frowned on in mainstream contemporary discourse, terms like wokeism and Islamo-leftism serve to reinforce dog whistles such as, “they do not belong to our culture. They do not abide by our Christian values,” Alouane told CNN. “It is just neo-racism.”

The anti-woke discourse comes just months ahead of France’s presidential election, where the main ideological threat to Macron comes from the right and far right, not the supposed woke left, said Alouane.

According to some polls, Macron may end up facing off against either far-right National Rally leader Marine Le Pen or the rightwing Les Républicains candidate Valérie Pécresse in the second round of voting.

Anti-woke rhetoric may be part of an effort to neutralize Macron’s right-wing opponents. It is an effort Alouane finds ironic. “The funny thing is, if a far-right candidate makes it to the second round, we will [be told] to save the Republic against the far right – even though this administration has been playing with far-right ideologies the whole time,” she said.

Chilling effect

As in France, many experts say the British government’s anti-woke crusade is aimed at making electoral gains.

Aided by right-wing elements of the British media, Johnson’s government has used the so-called “war on woke” as an opportunity to score points with their mainly English and Brexit-supporting electorate – some of whom switched allegiance from the opposition Labour Party at the 2019 general election.

“It is fertile territory for the Conservatives as they are pressing a button that has been pressed a few decades now in regards [denouncements of] political correctness,” Tim Bale, professor of politics at Queen Mary University, told CNN.

It also places Labour in a difficult position as its leader, Keir Starmer, attempts to “shake off the ‘far left’ tag” the party gained under his predecessor, Jeremy Corbyn, author Evan Smith said.

Johnson’s culture war tugs at the split in Labour, between its socially conservative members, who think the party is too preoccupied with identity politics, rather than class, and its younger and more diverse base, who are happy for Starmer to do more, say experts.

History has been the main battleground, where the Conservative government pits patriotism against any attempt to reckon with Britain’s colonial past.

It is a narrative that has played out in the education sector, which has seen a government-picked commission release a race report that fended off calls to “decolonize” Britain’s schooling curriculum. Instead, it advocated for “a new story about the Caribbean experience which speaks to the slave period not only being about profit and suffering but how culturally African people transformed themselves into a re-modeled African/Britain.”

“British history is not solely one of imperial imposition – Commonwealth history and literature reveals a more complex picture, in which ideas traveled in multiple directions, cultures mixed and positive relations formed that today underpin diaspora around the world, which many ethnic minority children in the UK will feel part of,” the report wrote. Critics accused the report of being a whitewash that puts a positive spin on slavery.

Speaking to the House of Commons last year, Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch said “any school which teaches these elements of critical race theory as fact, or which promotes partisan political views such as defunding the police without offering a balanced treatment of opposing views is breaking the law.”

Boris Johnson's government has announced plans to combat so-called "cancel culture" in universities. Leon Neal/Getty Images

The government has not shied away from threats of intervention when cultural institutions follow progressive causes. If they “go too woke, they risk going broke,” Conservative Party chairman Oliver Dowden said in October, reiterating his warning that such institutions could be defunded if they cave to “an aggressive brigade” of social justice activists.

In the last 18 months, heritage charity the National Trust faced threats to its funding from Conservative lawmakers for exploring its properties’ links to slavery and colonialism, and the Royal Museums Greenwich, in London, found itself under the microscope when the government reportedly refused to reappoint a trustee who advocated decolonizing school curriculums.

The Museums Association, which represents thousands of people working in the sector, warned of “a climate of fear” among “museums and museum staff, especially those working on subjects relating to Britain’s imperial past,” in response to a February meeting between museums, heritage bodies and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport [DCMS], which Dowden headed at the time. “We support the rights of everyone working on these issues to do so free of interference, threats and intimidation,” the Museums Association added.

The BBC has also come under scrutiny from Conservative lawmakers calling for the license fee, which funds the broadcaster, to be scrapped.

“A lot of Conservatives don’t like the state funding of a media company, and they think the BBC crowds out sympathetic broadcasters,” Bale said. “The whole anti-woke agenda to some extent is cover to move BBC from a license fee model to a subscriber-based one.”

This atmosphere can have a chilling effect on cultural institutions that may feel compelled to think twice about what programs they support or which people they hire. This is alleged to have played out at the BBC, when media executive Marcus Ryder’s job application was reportedly blocked due to his support of anti-racism initiatives. The BBC has strenuously denied those reports.

Supporting anti-racism causes should not be an impartiality issue, Ryder told CNN. “What the BBC needs to do is re-examine its [impartiality] guidelines and decide how it should define ‘controversial’ and whether that can be independent of party politics,” he said. “And it needs to see how this framing works with people whose very existence sits outside the ‘normative standards’ – and this can apply to gender, race, sexuality, etc.”

A BBC spokesperson told CNN that “impartiality is a core value of the BBC and something we apply to all our news coverage.” The spokesperson added: “The BBC plays an important role in informing and facilitating debate about subjects of public interest, some of which are divisive. That being said, the BBC is not impartial on racism or any other characteristics protected by law.”

The policing of institutions by culture warriors acts as a way to undermine the real, lived experience of minorities. It allows for concerns about racism, transphobia or violence against women to be framed as not being of material concern to ordinary people, Neema Begum, a British politics professor at the University of Nottingham, told CNN. The long-term effect of this is just “more polarization,” she added.

Changing demographics

Britain’s anti-woke crusade sometimes borders on the farcical – from a “woke watch” segment on GB News, a British television news channel critics say was set up to find an audience amid the culture wars, to a lawmaker bemoaning that civil servants are still “woke-ing from home.”

Nor has every skirmish against social justice movements been a win for the government. UK Home Secretary Priti Patel accused England’s national football team of engaging in “gesture politics” for taking the knee before its matches in a protest against racism, and refused to condemn those who booed the players for doing so.

British Home Secretary Priti Patel accused the England football team of "gesture politics" for taking the knee before matches. Mike Egerton/PA/Getty Images

But the tactic backfired when the country rallied around the team after some of its players experienced racial abuse online in the aftermath of England’s Euro 2020 final defeat in July. By the end of the Euros, polling showed most England football fans supported the team taking the knee.

“You don’t get to stoke the fire at the beginning of the tournament by labelling our anti-racism message as ‘Gesture Politics’ & then pretend to be disgusted when the very thing we’re campaigning against, happens,” England footballer Tyrone Mings wrote in a Twitter post responding to a tweet by Patel condemning the post-final racism.

“It is clear the British public cares quite a lot [about] the equalities agenda, and it is quite easy for that kind of [government] mobilization to backfire,” Christopher Bertram, emeritus professor of social and political philosophy at Bristol University, told CNN.

It also shows that while the anti-woke messaging works with their base, British society is getting more multi-ethnic, tolerant and woke, Bale said.

“The Conservatives are going to have to make a decision if they carry on railing against the way society is going,” Bale said. “There is a long-term risk for them as it alienates [younger] future voters who they need to keep on side,” Bale added. “There is a limited number of grumpy, older White men to get off on this kind of stuff.”

Even the 73-year-old grandson of Winston Churchill, Nicholas Soames, has heard enough, calling the furor over the Churchill Trust “so sad and so pathetic” in an interview with the Times. “Apparently anyone who modernizes anything or does anything to remotely bring it up to date is ‘woke.’” he said. “It’s absolute b****cks.”

Royal family: As King Charles III takes the throne, big changes lie ...

CNN —

God save the Queen, long live the King. The second Elizabethan age has come to an end and the royal family will now regroup around a new monarch for the next era in British history.

What will change for each of the royals?

Charles

Britain's King Charles III poses for a portrait in Buckingham Palace's Throne Room after his official coronation in May 2023. Hugo Burnand/Royal Household 2023/AP Charles was born at Buckingham Palace on November 14, 1948. His mother was Princess Elizabeth at the time. Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Princess Elizabeth and her husband, Prince Philip, sit on a lawn with their children Prince Charles and Princess Anne in August 1951. Eddie Worth/AP Charles attends his mother's coronation in 1953 with his grandmother, left, and his aunt Margaret. Hulton Deutsch/Corbis Historical/Getty Images Charles, right, shakes hands with Sir Gerald Creasy, the governor of Malta, as he and the rest of the royal family visit Malta in May 1954. Paul Popper/Getty Images Charles rides with his mother and grandmother as they travel to Westminster Abbey for the wedding of Princess Margaret in May 1960. Keystone-France//Getty Images Charles prepares for takeoff during a flying lesson in 1968. In 1971, he earned his wings as a jet pilot and joined the Royal Navy. Hulton Archive/Getty Images Queen Elizabeth II presents Charles to the people of Wales after his investiture as the Prince of Wales in July 1969. Popperfoto/Getty Images Charles walks at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he earned a bachelor's degree in 1970. He was the first royal heir to earn a university degree. Hulton Deutsch/Getty Images Charles, left, rides go-carts with his brother Prince Edward and his sister, Princess Anne, circa 1969. Keystone-France\Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images Charles meets US President Richard Nixon during a private visit to Washington in July 1970. Popperfoto/Getty Images Charles attends a conference with his father in November 1970. Bettmann Archive/Getty Images Charles goes on a safari in Kenya in February 1971. William Lovelace/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Charles prepares to fire a bazooka while visiting military barracks in West Berlin in October 1972. Popperfoto/Getty Images Charles fishes with a wooden spear circa 1975. Serge Lemoine/Hulton Royals Collection/Getty Images Charles poses for sculptor David McFall in December 1975. Keystone-France/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images Charles smokes a peace pipe during a visit to Canada in July 1977. Anwar Hussein/Getty Images Charles rides a horse during an equestrian event in Cirencester, England, in April 1978. Tim Graham/Getty Images Charles, as colonel-in-chief, visits the Cheshire Regiment in Canterbury, England, in November 1978. He served in the Royal Navy from 1971 to 1976, and in 2012 his mother appointed him honorary five-star ranks in the navy, army and air force. Tim Graham/Getty Images Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles are seen together circa 1979. They dated in the 70s and would eventually marry in 2005. It was the second marriage for both. Their first marriages ended in divorce. Tim Graham/Getty Images Charles poses outside the Taj Mahal in India in 1980. Anwar Hussein/WireImage/Getty Images Charles kisses his first wife, Lady Diana Spencer, on the balcony of Buckingham Palace in July 1981. Their wedding ceremony was televised. Bettmann Archive/Getty images Charles and Princess Diana leave a London hospital with their first child, William, in July 1982. Anwar Hussein/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Charles and Diana dance together at a formal event. Tim Graham/Corbis Historical/Getty Images Charles shares a playful pie in the face while visiting a community center in Manchester, England, in December 1983. David Levenson/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Charles walks with people in traditional dress on a visit to Papua New Guinea in 1984. Anwar Hussein/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Charles and Diana sit together in Toronto during a royal tour in October 1991. A year later, they were separated. Charles' affair with Camilla Parker Bowles became public in 1993. Tim Graham/Getty Images Charles, Diana and their two sons, William and Harry, gather for V-J Day commemorations in London in August 1995. The couple divorced one year later. Johnny Eggitt/AFP/Getty Images Charles visits a mosque in London in March 1996. Tim Graham/Getty Images South African President Nelson Mandela talks with Prince Charles in London in July 1996. David Thomson/AFP/Getty Images Charles poses with the Spice Girls in 1997. Tim Graham/Corbis Historical/Corbis/Getty Images Charles and his sons spend time together at the Balmoral Castle estate in Balmoral, Scotland, in August 1997. Tim Graham/Getty Images Charles, second from right, and Princess Diana's two sisters meet in Paris after Diana was killed in a car crash there in August 1997. She was 36 years old. Jayne Fincher/Getty Images Charles and his sons follow Diana's hearse in London in September 1997. Thomas Coex/AFP/Getty Images Charles stands beside his grandmother's coffin while it lies in state at Westminster Hall in London in April 2002. Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images Charles carries a specially painted football through the streets of Ashbourne, England, in March 2003. Tim Graham/Getty Images Charles watches a parachute regiment during a D-Day re-enactment in Ranville, France, in June 2004. Chris Ison/AFP/Getty Images Charles married Camilla Parker Bowles in April 2005. Hugo Burnand/Pool/Getty Images Charles, the Prince of Wales, poses for an official portrait in November 2008. He became King after the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II. Hugo Burnand/Anwar Hussein Collection/WireImage/Getty Images Queen Elizabeth II presents Charles with the Royal Horticultural Society's Victoria Medal of Honor during a visit to the Chelsea Flower Show in London in May 2009. WPA Pool/Getty Images Charles and Camilla were on their way to a performance at the London Palladium when their car was attacked by angry student protesters in December 2010. The students were protesting a hike in tuition fees. Matt Dunham/AP Charles and Queen Elizabeth II were among those on the Buckingham Palace balcony after Prince William wed Kate Middleton in April 2011. James Devaney/FilmMagic/Getty Images Charles reads the weather while touring BBC Scotland's headquarters in May 2012. Andrew Milligan/AP Charles meets with US President Barack Obama in the White House Oval Office in March 2015. Chris Radburn-Pool/Getty Images Charles and Camilla react as Zephyr, the bald-eagle mascot of the Army Air Corps, flaps his wings at the Sandringham Flower Show in July 2015. Chris Jackson/Getty Images Members of the royal family pose for a photo at Buckingham Palace in December 2016. From left are Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall; Prince Charles; Queen Elizabeth II; Prince Philip; Prince William; and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. Dominic Lipinski/WPA Pool/Getty Images Charles visits the Italian town of Amatrice in April 2017, after an earthquake had hit. Alessandro Bianchi/AFP/Getty Images Charles and Camilla ride on a raft while visiting the island of Borneo in November 2017. Mohd Rasfana/AFP/Getty Images Charles leads three cheers for his mother as the Queen celebrated her 92nd birthday at a London concert in April 2018. Andrew Parsons/AFP/Getty Images From left, Prince Charles, Prince Andrew, Duchess Camilla and Queen Elizabeth II watch a Royal Air Force flyover in July 2018. Chris Jackson/Getty Images Charles accompanies his future daughter-in-law, Meghan Markle, as she is married to Prince Harry in May 2018. Jonathan Brady/AP Charles lays a wreath at the Cenotaph in London to commemorate Remembrance Day in November 2018. It was also the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I. Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images Charles poses with family members for an official portrait to mark his 70th birthday. He's holding his grandson Prince George as Camilla sits next to his granddaughter, Princess Charlotte. In the back row, from left, are his grandson Prince Louis; his daughter-in-law Catherine; his son Prince William; his son Prince Harry; and his daughter-in-law Meghan. Chris Jackson/PoolAP Charles speaks at an event in London in March 2020. Later that month, it was announced that he had tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Tim P. Whitby/Getty Images Charles and Camilla attend the funeral of Charles' father, Prince Philip, in April 2021. Dominic Lipinski/Pool/AFP/Getty Images Camilla looks on as Charles reacts to a bad pour of beer he made at a brewery in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, in May 2022. They were on a three-day Canadian tour. Paul Chiasson/Pool/AFP/Getty Images Charles sits by the Imperial State Crown at the opening of Parliament in May 2022. His mother, the Queen, missed the occasion for the first time since 1963. The 96-year-old monarch had to withdraw due to a recurrence of mobility issues. Ben Stansall/Pool/AP Charles is shown skulls of victims during a visit to the Nyamata Church Genocide Memorial in Nyamata, Rwanda, in June 2022. In 1994, Hutu extremists targeted minority ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus in a three-month killing spree that left an estimated 800,000 people dead, though local estimates are higher. Chris Jackson/Getty Images Prince Louis, the Queen's great-grandson, holds his hands over his ears as jets roar over Buckingham Palace during the Trooping the Colour parade in London on in June 2022. From left are Prince Charles; the Queen; Prince Louis; Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge; and Princess Charlotte. Hannah McKay/Reuters Charles has his first audience with Prime Minister Liz Truss after becoming King in September 2022. Yui Mok/Pool/AP The King speaks in the Throne Room at St James's Palace during the Accession Council in London in September 2022. He was formally proclaimed as King. Joining him were his son Prince William and his wife Camilla, the Queen Consort. Jonathan Brady/Pool/AP Charles delivers his first address as King from Buckingham Palace. "As the Queen herself did with such unswerving devotion, I too now solemnly pledge myself, throughout the remaining time God grants me, to uphold the Constitutional principles at the heart of our nation," he said. Yui Mok/Pool/AP Charles records his first Christmas speech in December 2022. The speech would be broadcast on Christmas Day throughout the United Kingdom. Victoria Jones/Pool/AP The King meets Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was visiting Buckingham Palace in February 2023. Zelensky made a surprise visit to the UK and gave a speech to the joint houses of Parliament. Aaron Chown/Pool/Reuters The King greets the band Lords of The Lost during a reception in Hamburg, Germany, in March 2023. The King spent three days in Germany for what was his first overseas state visit as monarch Chris Jackson/Getty Images The King sits in Buckingham Palace's Blue Drawing Room in March 2023. Handout/Hugo Burnand/Buckingham Palace/Getty Images The King attends the 200th Sovereign's Parade at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in April 2023. Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Charles receives the St. Edward's Crown during his coronation ceremony at Westminster Abbey in May 2023. Andrew Matthews/Pool/AP Charles and Camilla travel to Buckingham Palace after the coronation ceremony. Sarah Tilotta/CNN The King and Queen stand on the balcony of Buckingham Palace after the coronation. They are joined here by pages of honor who attended them throughout the day. One of the pages was the King's eldest grandson, Prince George, who can be seen second from left. Toby Hancock/CNN Charles and Camilla are pictured with members of the working royal family in May 2023. Hugo Burnand/Royal Household 2023/AP Charles is presented with the Crown of Scotland during a service of thanksgiving that was held at the St. Giles' Cathedral in Edinburgh, Scotland, in July 2023. Scotland was celebrating the King's recent coronation with a day of festivities Jane Barlow/Reuters French President Emmanuel Macron and Britain's King Charles toast during a state dinner in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles on the first day of Charles state visit to France , in Versailles, France, on September 20. Benoit Tessier/Reuters In pictures: Britain's King Charles III Prev Next

The moment Elizabeth II died, her eldest child, Charles, automatically became monarch. As sovereign, he has chosen to take the name King Charles III.

All rights and responsibilities of the Crown now rest with King Charles III.

He becomes head of state not just in the UK but in 14 other Commonwealth realms including Australia and Canada. He will become head of the 56-member Commonwealth, although that is not a hereditary position, after his succession to the role was agreed by Commonwealth leaders at a meeting in London in 2018.

He has become head of the British Armed Forces, the judiciary and the civil service, and he is the Supreme Governor of the Church of England. He is the Fount of Honour, which means all honors, such as knighthoods, will now be given in his name.

The United Kingdom does not have a codified constitution, so the role of monarchy is defined by convention rather than law. He has a duty to remain politically impartial, which means he will come under greater scrutiny if he continues to express the views he is known for.

He has championed alternative medicines and organic farming techniques. In 1984, he hit out at the “glass stumps and concrete towers” of modern architecture. He has spent decades warning of the dangers of climate change. In the so-called “black spider” memos, he raised the issues he was concerned about directly with ministers.

In a BBC documentary to mark his 70th birthday, Charles acknowledged having ruffled feathers with his past interventions. But he promised not to meddle in controversial affairs once sovereign, saying he would operate within “the constitutional parameters.”

Elizabeth stayed “above politics” and never expressed herself in any way on any issue and as a result she rarely divided opinion. She managed to retain popular support and cross-party support in parliament, which was the one body with the power to dethrone her.

We will never know what she discussed in her regular audiences with her prime ministers, beginning with Churchill, but Charles is a more outspoken character. Will he go quiet on policy matters in public but continue to lobby in private? Will the prime minister act on it?

The prime ministerial audiences are one of several constitutional duties to which King Charles III will be expected to step up and they will bring him in regular contact with policymakers. He appoints the prime minister, opens parliamentary sessions, approves legislation and official appointments, receives the credentials of foreign ambassadors and hosts world leaders on state visits.

Charles has also adopted the symbolic position as Head of Nation, meaning he becomes the symbol of national identity, unity, and pride. He represents continuity and celebrates excellence on behalf of the country. That’s why we see the monarch opening national events and leading commemorations.

People would look to Elizabeth in times of crisis, but will they rally around King Charles III in the same way? He is more divisive not just because of his honest views but also because of the bad taste still left from his acrimonious divorce from his immensely popular first wife, Diana.

All the official royal residences including Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle will now be under his control. There are also other residences such as Balmoral in Scotland and Sandringham in Norfolk which the Queen owned privately – and the nation will have to see to whom she leaves them in her will.

Either way, Charles’ wealth has ballooned. By far the biggest slice of the family’s fortune, the £16.5 billion ($19 billion) Crown Estate, now belongs to him as reigning monarch. But under an arrangement dating back to 1760, the monarch hands over all profits from the estate to the government in return for a slice, called the Sovereign Grant.

The estate includes vast swathes of central London property and the seabed around England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It has the status of a corporation and is managed by a chief executive and commissioners — or non-executive directors — appointed by the monarch on the recommendation of the prime minister.

The grant, which covers the cost of his official duties and amounted to £86.3 million ($99.2 million) for the 2021/2022 financial year. He will take charge of the Royal Collection, which includes one of the most valuable art collections in the world. He also picks up the Duchy of Lancaster, a private estate dating back to 1265, which was valued at about £653 million ($764 million) according to its most recent accounts. Income from its investments cover official costs not met by the Sovereign Grant, and helps support other Royal family members.

King Charles III has become one of the richest men in England overnight.

Camilla

Charles and Camilla attend the Order of the Garter Service at St George's Chapel on June 13, 2022 in Windsor, England. Toby Melville/Getty Images

For years, the big question around Charles’ wife surrounded her title. At the time their wedding was announced in February 2005, the official statement said: “It is intended that Mrs Parker Bowles should use the title HRH The Princess Consort when The Prince of Wales accedes to The Throne.” That was a very clear signal that Camilla would not use the title of Queen. Her office at Clarence House distanced itself from that statement in the intervening years, however, saying it was a matter for the reigning monarch.

Then, in February 2022, the Queen expressed her desire for her daughter-in-law to be known as Queen Consort when Charles became King in a message marking the start of her platinum jubilee year – a statement that appeared to resolve the issue for good.

The Queen’s wishes were welcomed by the couple themselves. That same weekend, a statement released by a spokesperson said they had been “touched and honoured by Her Majesty’s words.”

Where will the couple live? Well, traditionally the new monarch would move into Buckingham Palace but in 2011, the BBC reported that Charles was considering moving his entire court to Windsor and turning Buckingham Palace into an events center. That would be a dramatic and controversial shift but might also assert King Charles III as the new boss.

William and Catherine

William and Catherine are pictured with their children, George, Charlotte and Louis, and the Queen, Charles and Camilla at Buckingham Palace during platinum jubilee celebrations on June 5, 2022. Toby Hancock/CNN

Up until now, Charles has been responsible for covering the costs of his heir, Prince William.

William has now inherited his father’s titles of The Duke of Cornwall, which comes with an estate which last year delivered an income of £23 million ($26 million). That money now goes straight to William and he becomes independently wealthy.

His new title is HRH The Duke of Cornwall and Cambridge and tradition dictates that, as first in line to the throne, he also becomes Prince of Wales. And Catherine becomes Her Royal Highness, The Princess of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall and Cambridge.

William and Catherine will be able to solidify their own independent court, which is currently based at Kensington Palace in west London, in an apartment that was refurbished shortly after their marriage. It seems unlikely that William would want to move, so the King’s former residences, including Clarence House and Birkhall in the Scottish Highlands, will likely remain vacant until Charles offers them to other members of the family, or finds an alternative use. The family resides at Adelaide Cottage in Windsor during school term time.

Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis will follow their parents’ titling. They are now Their Royal Highnesses Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis of Cornwall and Cambridge. Colloquially they are likely to be known as George, Charlotte and Louis Wales.

Harry and Meghan

Meghan, Duchess of Sussex and Prince Harry react as they attend the annual One Young World Summit in Manchester, north-west England on September 5, 2022. Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

It’s unlikely that Charles’ second son, Harry, will be offered a royal office unless he and wife Meghan return to their royal duties, and the King would also need to confirm that they can continue to use Frogmore Cottage on the Windsor estate, which is part of the royal estate. They currently live with son Archie and daughter Lilibet in California but were allowed to continue using Frogmore as their official residence during the Queen’s reign.

When Harry and Meghan announced in early 2020 that they were stepping back from royal duties, they said they would “work to become financially independent.” The terms of the split stipulated that while the pair would always remain part of the family, they would no longer use their HRH titles.

As grandchildren of the monarch, Archie now automatically becomes Prince Archie of Sussex while Lilibet will be Princess Lilibet of Sussex. Whether they use those titles will only become known the first time their parents refer to them publicly.

Prince Andrew and other family members

King Charles III also becomes responsible for distributing roles, responsibilities and resources to other members of the royal family.

Charles has never been close to his brother Andrew, who stepped back from royal duties over his links to the late disgraced financier, Jeffrey Epstein. In January 2022 he was stripped of his HRH title, as well as others associated with the military and charity roles. That raises the question of whether the new King continues to allow Andrew to use his Buckingham Palace apartment and offers financial support.

Then there are his other siblings, Princess Anne and Prince Edward, and more distant relatives such as the Gloucesters and Kents who retain royal residences at Kensington.

Princess Anne attends a service at St Giles' Cathedral on June 30, 2022 in Edinburgh, Scotland. Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Charles will need to decide how much family support he needs to carry out his duties and who he wants to offer it. Then he can reveal what support he offers in return. Many of these decisions would already have been taken and the first telling signs of where his loyalties lie will be seen in who gets to keep which residences and especially who gets an upgrade.

Anne and Edward, and his wife Sophie, The Countess of Wessex, are expected to continue with their public duties following decades of dedicated service but the new King needs to balance that against pressure for a slimmed down monarchy in austere times.

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Prince William just inherited a 685-year old estate worth $1 billion ...

London CNN Business —

Royal wills are never made public. That means what happens to much of the Queen’s personal wealth following her death last week will remain a family secret.

Forbes estimated last year that the late monarch’s personal fortune was worth $500 million, made up of her jewels, art collection, investments and two residences, Balmoral Castle in Scotland and Sandringham House in Norfolk. The Queen inherited both properties from her father, King George VI.

“[Royal wills] are hidden, so we have no idea actually what’s in them and what that’s worth, and that’s never ever made public,” Laura Clancy, a lecturer in media at Lancaster University and author of a book on royal finances, told CNN Business.

But the vast bulk of the Royal family’s wealth — totaling at least £18 billion ($21 billion) in land, property and investments — now passes along a well-trodden, centuries-old path to the new monarch, King Charles, and his heir.

Video Ad Feedback CNN reporter predicts what we'll see from King Charles 05:17 - Source: CNN

The line of succession makes Prince William, now the first in line to the British throne, a much wealthier man.

The future king inherits the private Duchy of Cornwall estate from his father. The duchy owns a sprawling portfolio of land and property covering almost 140,000 acres, most of it in southwest England.

Created in 1337 by King Edward III, the estate is worth around £1 billion ($1.2 billion), according to its accounts for the last financial year.

Revenue from the estate is “used to fund the public, private and charitable activities,” of the Duke of Cornwall, its website says. That title is now held by Prince William.

Balmoral Castle in Scotland is part of the late Queen Elizabeth's private fortune. Andrew Milligan/WPA Pool/Getty Images/File

By far the biggest slice of the family’s fortune, the £16.5 billion ($19 billion) Crown Estate, now belongs to King Charles as reigning monarch. But under an arrangement dating back to 1760, the monarch hands over all profits from the estate to the government in return for a slice, called the Sovereign Grant.

The estate includes vast swathes of central London property and the seabed around England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It has the status of a corporation and is managed by a chief executive and commissioners — or non-executive directors — appointed by the monarch on the recommendation of the prime minister.

In the last financial year, it generated net profit of almost £313 million ($361 million). From that, the UK Treasury paid the Queen a Sovereign Grant of £86 million ($100 million). That’s equivalent to £1.29 ($1.50) per person in the United Kingdom.

Most of this money is spent on maintaining the Royal family’s properties and paying their staff.

The Sovereign Grant is usually equivalent to 15% of the estate’s profits. But, in 2017, the payment was bumped up to 25% for the next decade to help pay for refurbishments to Buckingham Palace.

King Charles also inherits the Duchy of Lancaster, a private estate dating back to 1265, which was valued at about £653 million ($764 million) according to its most recent accounts. Income from its investments cover official costs not met by the Sovereign Grant, and helps support other Royal family members.

Restrictions apply

Despite the vast sums, the monarch and his heir are restricted in how much they can personally benefit from their fortunes.

The King can only spend the Sovereign Grant on royal duties. And neither he nor his heir are allowed to benefit from the sale of assets in their duchies. Any profit from disposals is reinvested back into the estate, according to an explainer published by the Institute for Government’s (IfG).

The UK Treasury must also approve all large property transactions, the IfG said.

Still, unlike the Sovereign Grant generated by the Crown Estate, both duchies are private sources of wealth, meaning their owners are not required to give any details beyond reporting their income, the IFG said.

Regent Street in London during a pandemic lockdown. The prime retail location is owned by the Crown Estate. Vuk Valcic/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images/FILE

Last year, King Charles, then the Duke of Cornwall, paid himself £21 million ($25 million) from the Duchy of Cornwall estate.

Neither Prince William nor King Charles are obliged to pay any form of tax on their estates, though both duchies have voluntarily paid income tax since 1993, according to the IfG.

That move came a year after the Royal family faced strong criticism for planning to use public money to repair Windsor Castle, which had suffered damage in a fire, Clancy said.

“Of course, voluntary income tax [is] not a fixed rate, and they don’t have to declare how much income they’re making their tax on. So actually it’s just like plucking a figure out of thin air,” Clancy said.

Buckingham Palace did not immediately respond to CNN Business when reached for comment.

5 things to know for April 11: Ukraine, Covid, French elections ...

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The federal tax filing season is underway. And even though the IRS still hasn’t processed millions of returns from last year due to Covid-19 and a lack of funding, there are still ways to help ensure your tax filing experience is hassle-free.

Here’s what else you need to know to Get Up to Speed and On with Your Day.

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1. Ukraine

Mourners gathered in Tokyo today for the funeral of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, four days after he was assassinated in broad daylight. Photos captured the outpouring of grief as people gathered to pay their respects to Abe with flowers, notes and green tea – symbols of help in the afterlife. The private funeral was hosted at the centuries-old Zojoji Temple by Abe’s widow, Akie Abe. Millions around the world have reacted with shock and anguish at how Abe was gunned down during a campaign speech in the central city of Nara on Friday. According to police, the 41-year-old suspect accused of killing Abe had a “grudge” against a church he believed Abe’s grandfather – another former leader of the country – helped to expand.

2. Supreme Court

The House select committee plans to show at a hearing today how right-wing extremist groups, including the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, prepared to attack the US Capitol in the days leading up to January 6, 2021. According to committee aides, the hearing will also focus on the roles of former President Donald Trump’s associates, including Roger Stone and Michael Flynn, who both received presidential pardons after being charged with various crimes. Separately, former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne, an ally of Trump, is expected to meet Friday with the January 6 committee, three sources familiar with the matter told CNN. Byrne played an active role in supporting efforts to push baseless claims about the 2020 election, including attending a meeting at the White House to discuss strategies to overturn the election results.

3. Coronavirus

Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen are projected to advance to the second round of the French presidential election, an analysis of early results showed, setting up a rematch of the 2017 contest. Macron, France’s current president, is in first place with 28.6% following a preliminary count of the votes from the first round of the election yesterday. Le Pen, a long-time standard-bearer for the French far-right, is on track to come in second with 23.6%. Twelve candidates ran for the top job. Since none of them received more than 50% of the ballots in the first round, the top two candidates will face each other in a runoff on April 24. Macron is seeking to become the first French president to win reelection since Jacques Chirac in 2002, but Le Pen’s support has steadily risen in recent weeks.

Video Ad Feedback What role does the Ukraine war play in the upcoming French elections? 03:11 - Source: CNN

4. Burkina Faso

5. Boris Johnson

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TODAY’S NUMBER

61%

That’s how many passengers Georgia’s Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport saw in 2021, reclaiming its title of world’s busiest airport. The Atlanta airport was knocked from its No. 1 spot in 2020 by Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport in China. The 2021 rankings released today by Airports Council International show the Atlanta airport is back on top, a sign of recovery from the plunge in air traffic when the pandemic took hold two years ago.

TODAY’S QUOTE

“Elon is our biggest shareholder and we will remain open to his input.”

– Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, on Elon Musk’s decision to not join the social media company’s board. Musk recently disclosed he had purchased a more than 9% stake in Twitter, making him the company’s largest shareholder. When the news of his board appointment broke, Musk tweeted he was “looking forward to working with Parag & Twitter board to make significant improvements to Twitter in coming months.”

TODAY’S WEATHER

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AND FINALLY

Here comes the sun

Cruise into the weekend

Check out this parrot’s rendition of a classic Beatles song! (Click here to view)