I would consider myself a monarchist with possibly the smallest ‘m’ imaginable. I can see pros and cons on either side of the debate, but am probably just too lazy to really have thought about it and come to a conclusion other than “oh, let’s just leave things as they are”.

That said, today’s Queen’s Speech to Parliament is, to my mind, one of the most pointless things in our great democracy. We know she has written it, we suspect she disagrees with parts of it so why should she be made to read it out? I can’t imagine she feels particularly empowered by it – do you think she woke up this morning and thought “great, I am off to see Gordon Brown and his chums” or hit the snooze button and pulled her pillow over her head at just the thought of it?

If we want to engage our young people in politics, why not have a competition for one of them to read it out instead? Or an on-line vote to see which celebrity people would like to undertake the task? I can’t say that I would be any more interested this year if it was David van Day (although KBE obviously would…) or John Barrowman (trouser snake in or out could be an additional voting option), but at least it would be a change.