O Canada! Charles cements ties in face of US aggression

As Donald Trump rants about making the country a 51st US state, the King’s latest visit demonstrates the power of this special transatlantic relationship, writes Tessa Dunlop

- Tessa Dunlop

Charles travelled all the way to Ottawa to open the 45th Canadian parliament and address a packed Senate from his throne. His time and effort were not wasted. The new King, modestly dressed in a lounge suit, speaking in English and French, didn’t mince his words in a country where the sovereign has some wriggle room with the script.

Pertinently, he reminded his audience that the monarchy “represents stability and continuity from the past to present. As it should, it stands proudly as a symbol of Canada today, in all her richness and dynamism.”

The extensive meet-and-greets, the lengthy bilingual speech, the transatlantic travel... it can’t have been easy for the monarch. That 76-year-old Charles is still undergoing cancer treatment after 14 months is a reminder that his time is precious. Powerful, then, that Charles has spent 24 of those precious hours in Canada, where a little bit more of the country “seeped” into the elderly King’s “bloodstream”.

According to Canada’s new premier Mark Carney, the spectacle was a “historic honour” that “matches the weight of our times”, or, in layman’s terms, it is a “visit which clearly underscores the sovereignty of our country”. Like his monarch, the anglophile leader found words to match the moment, with Charles’s arrival in Ottawa another victory for this accomplished Bank of England governor turned premier.

Back in Britain, Donald Trump’s bullish heft has won the American president an invitation to a second state visit, but only as a guest. This week’s performative Anglo-Canadian love-in is a reminder that Charles is Canada’s monarch. No amount of brouhaha can erase that royal truism. Until recently, many Canadians had felt at best equivocal about their foreign monarch. Not any more.