COMMENT | Two truths - first, in a constitutional monarchy, a monarch’s role is to stay above politics. Second, hypocrisy is when someone’s words do not match their actions, regardless of who that person is.

The invention of constitutional monarchy has helped keep monarchies around the world extant as the concept of allowing some family to arbitrarily maintain absolute rule and control over their subjects has certainly fallen out of favour around the world.

A constitutional monarchy is a compromise that achieves a number of objectives. For one, it allows a sense of continuity and tradition for some extremely old institutions.

More significantly, in many cases, constitutional monarchies have performed a practical, useful function by being a government institution that provides a check and balance by virtue of being above politics.

There are many countries without monarchies that still have an office that performs a similar function, notably parliamentary republics which elect a largely ceremonial president alongside the prime minister which functions as the head of state. Germany, India and Singapore are among the examples that fall into this category.

Such parliamentary republics also recognise the value of having an office and institution that is part of the government, but apart from the more partisan nature of electoral politics.

In most constitutional monarchies, the rule of non-interference in politics is treated as something sacred.

One gets the sense that any member of most royal families around the world commenting in any way that could possibly be construed as partial is a taboo of the highest order...