Prince Charles to visit Barbados after Queen was removed as Head of State

Prince Charles will make a solo visit to Barbados after the country removed Queen Elizabeth II as Head of State.

• The Prince of Wales will visit Barbados later this month on a solo engagement
• The Prime Minister of Barbados, Mia Amor Mottley, extended an invitation to Charles to be the “guest of honour at the Republic Celebration events”
• In other royal news, the Queen's harsh words about Camilla during Prince Charles argument revealed.

Clarence House announced that Prince Charles will make a trip to Barbados after Prime Minister Mia Mottley “extended an invitation to The Prince, as future Head of the Commonwealth, to be Guest of Honour at the Republic Celebration events.”

The short trip will also see him undertake “a short programme of engagements.”

The statement reads, “HRH The Prince of Wales will visit Barbados to mark Barbados’s transition to a Republic within the Commonwealth. The Prime Minister of Barbados, The Honourable Mia Amor Mottley, extended an invitation to The Prince, as future Head of the Commonwealth, to be Guest of Honour at the Republic Celebration events. His Royal Highness will also undertake a short programme of engagements in Barbados.”

When is Barbados to become a republic?

Barbados announced its intention to become a Republic, removing the Queen as head of state, in September 2020. In October this year, Dame Mason was elected as the country’s first President and she will be sworn in at celebrations on November 30.

The Governor General Dame Sandra Mason of Barbados said of the plans to remove the Queen as Head of State, “The time has come to fully leave our colonial past behind.”

Buckingham Palace said the issue was a matter for the people of Barbados.

Though she will be removed as Head of State, the Queen, and one day potentially Prince Charles, will continue to act as the head of the Commonwealth.

What is the Commonwealth?

The Commonwealth is a voluntary, political association of 54 member states, almost all of which are former territories of the British Empire. Barbados will remain a member once it becomes a republic.

King George VI was the first head of the Commonwealth and the Queen took over from him in 1952 but the position is not a hereditary title. In 2018 Prince Charles was voted in as the next head of the Commonwealth by leaders during a meeting at Windsor Castle.

After Barbados becomes a republic, there will be 14 countries left in the Commonwealth realms which still recognize the British sovereign as head of state.

These are Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, The Bahamas, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Solomon Islands and Tuvalu.