Now that the world’s most expensive game of musical chairs is out of the way, it’s worth picking up on a report that did the rounds before Chuckles’ coronation.
YouGov polling on attitudes towards the monarchy was reported as showing that Wales is – to quote The i – a “republican heartland”.
However much I’d like to believe that, it didn’t quite ring true. So I decided to look at it myself, my chin growing ever itchier.
The i headline quoted polling from March (pdf), but there were two more recent polls I want to focus on – one being a YouGov royal family tracker (pdf), the other a poll for The Times (pdf) – both taken towards the end of April 2023.
The sample size for Wales for all three of them was only around 100 people (ideally it would be around 1,000) – so from the start, there’s a health warning.
The headline findings (for Wales) that support the republican argument:
- Between 21-27% of people in Wales support replacing the monarchy with an elected head of state.
- 53% said they were unlikely to watch any of the coronation on television.
- 75% said they had no intention of attending a coronation-related event or party.
- 34% think that King Charles won’t do as well as his mother in the role (though this is the lowest proportion of the three GB nations).
The headline findings (for Wales) that contradict the republican argument and the headline:
- A clear majority across both polls (57-62%) support retaining the monarchy.
- 42% of people in Wales are proud of the monarchy, with 24% embarrassed and 32% neither proud nor embarrassed.
- There are strong net approval ratings for all senior members of the royal family, except for Camilla (a low net positive), Harry, Meghan and The Sweaty Nonce.
- The “Prince and Princess of Wales” have stronger net approval ratings within Wales (+50 to +60) than Charles and Camilla.
- Around 59% think King Charles “will be good for the monarchy”.
- Scotland is the only GB nation to have a net negative view of the royal family in general (-3); attitudes in Wales (+25) and England (+23) are similar.
- 45% believe the royal family provides value for public money; only in Scotland did more people think that they don’t compared to those that think they do.
- 56% think the monarchy will still exist in 100 years; only in Scotland did more people think it wouldn’t than would.
- 44% thought it was appropriate for the King to speak out on political issues (the highest proportion of the three GB nations).
