What did Charles make of his King’s Speech?

The protesters were out, as usual, but nobody was paying them a lot of attention. For all the angry bellowing and sign-waving of ‘Not my King!’ and ‘Down with the Crown’, most observers were not focusing on a small, disaffected rabble outside parliament, but instead on the constitutional and historical significance of the occasion. The first monarch’s speech setting out the agenda of a Labour government for nearly 15 years; the first King’s Speech in eight decades; the first time that a king had delivered a speech for a new – and, allegedly, transformative – Labour administration since 1945. It was an occasion rich in ceremonial and political symbolism alike, and King Charles, a ruler closely attuned to the power of both speech and gesture, could not have been better placed to deliver it. 

Of course, the pageantry of the State Opening of Parliament dazzles and beguiles.