Buckingham Palace has announced that King Charles will be returning to ‘public-facing’ duties on the advice of his medical team – but it won’t quite be business as usual just yet
King Charles will be returning to “public-facing” duties after taking time away to focus on his treatment for cancer, Buckingham Palace has announced.
With his medical team “pleased with the progress” the King has made, the palace is able to start filling up the monarch’s diary again. Although Charles has continued with work of state behind closed doors – like his weekly audiences with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak – the only public royal event he has been able to attend since embarking on his cancer treatment has been the annual Easter church service in Windsor.
One of the first events that have been scheduled for the King is a state visit from the Emperor and Empress of Japan to the UK in June, and reports have claimed that the King is also “raring to go” for a foreign tour to Australia later in the year. However, that doesn’t mean that Charles will be back to full business as usual just yet.
The state visit in June will see the Emperor and Empress of Japan return to the UK after last visiting to attend the state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II. The formal state visit was initially scheduled to take place back in, but it had to be postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic and it’s understood that Charles is looking forward to hosting the Emperor and Empress.
Charles’ nephew, Peter Phillips, expressed recently that the King was “frustrated” to be away from public duties, and keen to get back to work. With the number of royal able to conduct official engagements seriously depleted with both Kate and Charles off work as they focussed on their recoveries, the monarchy found itself shorthanded, and Charles’s return to work is likely to bring relief to the other royals.
As reported in The Sun, King Charles is also keen to undertake a long Commonwealth tour later in the year, all being well. He and Queen Camilla are due to visit Australia, New Zealand and Samoa, which would see the 75-year-old King undertake an intense overseas visit, travelling over 20,000 miles all in.
“The King is raring to go after a significant amount of time off due to his cancer diagnosis,” a source told The Sun. “Although his doctors are keeping an eye on his health, he’s itching to take the reins and get back to his public role as Head of State. He’s over the moon with the way treatment has gone and supercharging plans for Australia, New Zealand and Samoa.”
However, despite the optimism of King Charles’s medical team about how is treatment is going so far, it’s not likely that the monarch’s diary will be as jam-packed as it once was, and it is understood that any engagements he undertakes will be managed on a case by case basis and “remain subject to medical advice” per a palace spokesperson.
Equally, “forthcoming engagements will be adapted where necessary to minimise any risks” to Charles as he continues to recover and “nothing can be confirmed or guaranteed at this stage” about his upcoming schedule over the next few months. However, Charles is “greatly encouraged” by his progress so far, and being able to get back to some public-facing duties.
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