Nearly 200 organizations will be losing their royal patronages after palace review
At the time of Queen Elizabeth II's death in 2022, the royal family had over 1000 organizations which they were patrons of. And the queen herself had 492 organizations that she supported as a patron. As the then Prince of Wales, King Charles was the patron of an equally impressive 441 organizations. (And if you were wondering, at the time Queen Camilla was the royal patron for 100 organizations.)
However, following the queen's death, Buckingham Palace apparently decided to do a review of all of the royal patronages that were being handled by the late queen, her son and and her daughter-in-law. It was a chance to examine all of the organizations being supported up until that time (and I guess make some decisions about those patronages).
According to Reuters, that review is finally complete and it seems that nearly 200 organizations will now be losing their royal patronages. "Following the assessment, just over 830 have been retained by the king and queen, or passed to other members of the royal family."
The royal family will no longer be the patrons for nearly 200 organizations
No explanation has been shared about why these 200 organizations will no longer have a royal patronage or even why other members of the royal family couldn't take on those responsibilities. At the same time, Buckingham Palace is still working on reaching out to the organizations getting cut to alert them of this news, so it may be some time before we learn more about this review and its results.
However, while we don't know all 800 plus organizations retaining their patronages, we do know of a few that are getting to keep their royal patrons, including the Dogs Trust, the Royal British Legion, and the Wildlife Trusts, which makes sense considering the king's environmental stance.
Although this review may have cut down the number of royal patronages at this time, that doesn't mean that the organizations can't reapply for a patron. In fact, any organization can apply for a patronage in an effort to spotlight their achievements and the work that they do.
It will be interesting to see what happens in terms of organizations revealing whether or not they have lost their patrons. Plus, we would love to see some of these groups reapply for royal support. And it would be nice to learn more about other members of the royal family and their work with these organizations.
Are you surprised by this news? What do you think of so many groups losing their royal patrons?