Taxpayers fund study of monarchy in Caribbean that will be ‘valuable for agitators’

Over £800k spent on project that claims ‘immense value’ to those ‘agitating for constitutional reform’

British taxpayers have footed an £800,000 bill for a study on the monarchy’s future in the Caribbean that claims to be of “immense value” to activists “agitating” for its abolition.
The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) has given The Visible Crown, which is examining the legacy of the late Queen in the West Indies, £825,417 in taxpayer funding.
The research project’s website claims it will be “of immense value to academics, but also to all those engaged with, advising on or agitating for constitutional reform in the Caribbean, and in the Commonwealth realms more generally”.
The principal investigator of the study claimed last year that Britain’s monarchy “sustains white inherited privilege”.
Prof Anna May Whitelock, of London’s City University, wrote in a newspaper column that the monarchy “owes its wealth and power to colonial violence and that by its very nature, sustains white inherited privilege and so institutional inequality”.
Andrew Griffith, the Conservative shadow science secretary, told The Telegraph that the AHRC had a history of “spending taxpayers’ money on Left-wing nonsense at odds with British values”.
“There are vast amounts of money wasted by public-sector research councils who too often focus on what matters to their woke staff than to the taxpaying public,” he said.
“As minister, I had cause to write to the AHRC about spending taxpayers’ money on Left-wing nonsense at odds with British values.
“Any more of this and they should be living on borrowed time.”
The AHRC is sponsored by the taxpayer-funded UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), which has been handed a budget of £207 million for 2022 to 2025.
The study, whose full title is The Visible Crown: Queen Elizabeth II in the Caribbean, 1952 to the present, began in 2021 and “seeks to better explain the durability of monarchy in the Caribbean since the end of empire”.
Prof Whitelock wrote in May 2023 that the King could delay the “demise” of the monarchy by opening some of the Royal family’s palaces to the homeless.
“There is a need for a vocal constitutional monarch and Charles might be ideal given his credibility on topics like climate change and the environment,” she wrote.
The academic added: “What if the King used his reported £1.8 billion fortune to make a real difference – spending it on community projects, on education around racial inequality and social injustice?
“He could open up some of his palaces for the homeless. Such a radical reinvention of a welfare monarchy could halt – or at least delay – its demise.”
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) is also listed as a “partner” on the project’s website, which says researchers will “present the survey data and oral history findings to an audience of British diplomats, relevant personnel in government and the civil service”.
It is understood that the FCO has not given any funding to the project but in 2019 agreed to host a workshop for current and retired diplomats to discuss their experience of working in Commonwealth countries. The workshop is yet to be held.
A spokesman for UKRI said: “UKRI invests in a diverse research and innovation portfolio.
“Decisions to fund the research projects we support are made via a rigorous peer review process by relevant independent experts from across academia and business.”
A spokesman for City St George’s, University of London, said: “The Visible Crown is an important research project which explores the political and cultural significance of Elizabeth II in the Caribbean.
“The project emphasises previously neglected Caribbean sources and perspectives in order to advance knowledge about the continued role of the British Crown in former colonies, and to inform debates about its future.
“It combines archival work with oral history interviews and a unique, region-wide survey.”
Last month, The Telegraph reported a study into how the “sustainable” lifestyle of Romani Gypsy communities can help combat the environmental crisis has been given £810,703 of taxpayer money.
The three-year project at the University of Glasgow claims Romani people “are often portrayed as the source of environmental degradation”.
But researchers claim that Romani people have contributed to “sustainability thinking and practice” – from “recycling, reuse and repair” to the “use of plants and herbs for health and hygiene”.
Almost £1.5 million in taxpayer funding has been awarded to a research project at the University of Sheffield that aims to “decolonise” folk singing.