It could be worth something

​How curious in this age of Brexit that the succession to be the next head of the Commonwealth has been relegated to a second order news issue. Maybe this is because nobody knows what the Commonwealth is anymore (and of course we don’t talk in terms of the British Commonwealth these days, and nor of course does anybody want to talk about the death of Her Maj.). Here is an international entity in which we Brits have a major stake – but perhaps have a somewhat ambiguous relationship with these days. If we were China we wouldn’t be so coy. They are developing their own economic commonwealth as fast as railways, port facilities, highways, runways and development programmes can muster. I suspect that in Whitehall, there is a residual feeling – unstated – that where we have ‘High Commissioners’ as opposed to common or garden Ambassadors, we still somehow commission things. Imperial hubris still lurks in the shadows. This perception will probably be perpetuated if Prince Charles stumbles into being the next head of the Commonwealth. I for one hope that he doesn’t take that step. I am expecting at any moment that Liam Fox will throw his hat into the ring, and will immediately pull off a vast free trade agreement with, with, with well errrrr . . . .somebody maybe. I have to correct something I heard on the news though, which is that the Commonwealth has no teeth. If I recall, Fiji was suspended from the Commonwealth for anti-democratic behaviour.