THE GREAT TITLE ROBBERY
Among all the excitement over the Royal baby, the talk about monogrammed bootees and guessing the godparents, we mustn’t forget that this is a significant constitutional time. For our laws were changed recently to ensure that the child would be monarch, regardless of its gender, and with no chance of a younger male sibling stepping over an elder sister.
Our monarchy has progressed into the 21st century in a manner that is both modern and yet stately. The Succession To The Crown Act 2013 has been a piece of elegant and yet robust legislation that we should be proud of. But while it has brought equality to the crown, the law was not able to include other women of title. So while a Royal princess in direct line of succession will now always be equal to her brother, the daughters of Britain’s dukes, marquises, earls, viscounts and barons, of baronets too, have been left behind, trapped in the past, unable to inherit from their fathers, even if there are no other siblings.
Because of this system of primogeniture, where males automatically trump females when it comes to inheritance, my own daughter Rowena, now just eight, currently cannot inherit her father’s earldom of Clancarty, a title dating back to before the Napoleonic wars. Instead, when the time comes, the title will sink back into abeyance, as our family has run out of male heirs.
Sad, but not as devastating as the case of Amanda Murray, whose father’s ancient title, Baron Braybrooke, will pass on his death to a cousin many times removed. The estate where Amanda and her seven siblings grew up will go with it, as will the family treasures and portraits, and the estate business that she is now running for her father in his advanced years.
Other families have seen homes pass to cousins, too. Five Sackville-West daughters watched with sadness when Knole, their home – notoriously one of the loveliest houses in England, half of which is owned by the National Trust – was handed to a male cousin.
Only a generation before, Knole had been home to Vita Sackville-West. When she had to leave it (no brothers either) in 1947, she signed a document relinquishing any claim on the property, and wrote ‘the signing... nearly broke my heart, putting my signature to what I regarded as a betrayal of all the tradition of my ancestors and the house I loved’. The current Lord Sackville is sympathetic and lets his cousins visit their old home.
But not all families are left intact. Witness the ongoing feud among the Lambtons. Here, the youngest child, son Ned, scooped the pool when his fabulously wealthy father, the Earl of Durham, died. Instead of making sure his five sisters, including the broadcaster and writer Lady Lucinda Lambton, wife of Sir Peregrine Worsthorne, were financially secure, he took possession of three stately homes, and cut off the women altogether. The family is now embroiled in a painful legal case.
So what is to be done? Shall we continue to give way to the gentlemen, whether they be our brothers, cousins, or indeed strangers from across the world?
Think back to Downton Abbey. For brotherless Lady Mary Crawley, the solution was simple – she fell in love with distant heir Cousin Matthew, and gave birth to a son, ensuring the title, house and fortune stayed intact, and in direct line from her father. Most of us could not hope to be so lucky.
Instead, we are gathering support for a change in the law to back up the work of the Succession Act. Our law – perhaps we must call it Downton’s Law – will be debated in the House of Lords next autumn. It has been introduced by the Conservative Party peer Lord Lucas, one of the few English peers whose title descends through the female line by right. But it has cross-party support, and a keen following among younger MPs in the Commons, especially the Conservative Mary Macleod, who brought in a Ten Minute Rule Bill on the subject last month.
Among the families affected, a group of campaigners called the Hares has sprung up; we have produced an online petition to gather support. Will we get equality? I believe so. It is impossible to justify any baby girl being considered less valuable than a baby boy in this day and age. Especially as we, officially, no longer value a new Royal princess less than a Royal prince. Like most Britons I will be celebrating the new Royal baby for lots of reasons, but not least for the precedent that has been firmly set for all our daughters. I hope you will too.
To see and sign the petition, go to http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/51222
Our monarchy has progressed into the 21st century in a manner that is both modern and yet stately. The Succession To The Crown Act 2013 has been a piece of elegant and yet robust legislation that we should be proud of. But while it has brought equality to the crown, the law was not able to include other women of title. So while a Royal princess in direct line of succession will now always be equal to her brother, the daughters of Britain’s dukes, marquises, earls, viscounts and barons, of baronets too, have been left behind, trapped in the past, unable to inherit from their fathers, even if there are no other siblings.
Because of this system of primogeniture, where males automatically trump females when it comes to inheritance, my own daughter Rowena, now just eight, currently cannot inherit her father’s earldom of Clancarty, a title dating back to before the Napoleonic wars. Instead, when the time comes, the title will sink back into abeyance, as our family has run out of male heirs.
Sad, but not as devastating as the case of Amanda Murray, whose father’s ancient title, Baron Braybrooke, will pass on his death to a cousin many times removed. The estate where Amanda and her seven siblings grew up will go with it, as will the family treasures and portraits, and the estate business that she is now running for her father in his advanced years.
Other families have seen homes pass to cousins, too. Five Sackville-West daughters watched with sadness when Knole, their home – notoriously one of the loveliest houses in England, half of which is owned by the National Trust – was handed to a male cousin.
Only a generation before, Knole had been home to Vita Sackville-West. When she had to leave it (no brothers either) in 1947, she signed a document relinquishing any claim on the property, and wrote ‘the signing... nearly broke my heart, putting my signature to what I regarded as a betrayal of all the tradition of my ancestors and the house I loved’. The current Lord Sackville is sympathetic and lets his cousins visit their old home.
But not all families are left intact. Witness the ongoing feud among the Lambtons. Here, the youngest child, son Ned, scooped the pool when his fabulously wealthy father, the Earl of Durham, died. Instead of making sure his five sisters, including the broadcaster and writer Lady Lucinda Lambton, wife of Sir Peregrine Worsthorne, were financially secure, he took possession of three stately homes, and cut off the women altogether. The family is now embroiled in a painful legal case.
So what is to be done? Shall we continue to give way to the gentlemen, whether they be our brothers, cousins, or indeed strangers from across the world?
Think back to Downton Abbey. For brotherless Lady Mary Crawley, the solution was simple – she fell in love with distant heir Cousin Matthew, and gave birth to a son, ensuring the title, house and fortune stayed intact, and in direct line from her father. Most of us could not hope to be so lucky.
Instead, we are gathering support for a change in the law to back up the work of the Succession Act. Our law – perhaps we must call it Downton’s Law – will be debated in the House of Lords next autumn. It has been introduced by the Conservative Party peer Lord Lucas, one of the few English peers whose title descends through the female line by right. But it has cross-party support, and a keen following among younger MPs in the Commons, especially the Conservative Mary Macleod, who brought in a Ten Minute Rule Bill on the subject last month.
Among the families affected, a group of campaigners called the Hares has sprung up; we have produced an online petition to gather support. Will we get equality? I believe so. It is impossible to justify any baby girl being considered less valuable than a baby boy in this day and age. Especially as we, officially, no longer value a new Royal princess less than a Royal prince. Like most Britons I will be celebrating the new Royal baby for lots of reasons, but not least for the precedent that has been firmly set for all our daughters. I hope you will too.
To see and sign the petition, go to http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/51222