From ‘grey goo’ and grammar schools to homeopathy and traditional architecture: the many issues that Charles will be desperate to talk about as King. (But CAN’T!)

• As the Prince of Wales Charles was a controversial backer of homeopathy
• The King was proved right on some issues but must now speak more cautiously 
• READ: King Charles has ‘ten-year plan’ and may then support ‘staged abdication’ 

From ‘grey goo’ to grammar schools, architecture and homeopathy,  King Charles embraced a colourful variety of issues in his long years as Prince of Wales.

In a number of cases, particularly when it came to the environment, he was proved right in his concerns. 

But there was also criticism of his many public interventions, particularly when it emerged he had routinely sent ‘black spider’ letters (a disparaging reference to his handwriting) to government ministers expressing his views on matters that interested him. 

Today, as monarch, he has to be more circumspect. And so far he has followed his own words, expressed in 2018, when he said he would not be ‘stupid’ enough to continue to be quite so outspoken . 

But as a poll for The Mail’s new Royals section demonstrated recently, a majority of the British population (57 per cent) actually believes he should continue to share views in public.

And there is little doubt he would be tempted! Here, then, are the topics that have been close to his heart and the views, some of the controversial, that will be bubbling up to threaten his new vow of discretion (if not quite silence)…  

Homeopathy and other alternative forms of medicine

When he was the Prince of Wales, King Charles repeatedly praisd benefits of homeopathy, despite the fact that the controversial system of alternative medicine has been heavily criticised by mainstream doctors and experts. Above: Charles looks at a display of homeopathic remedies with homeopath Dr Tim Robinson in Poundbury in 2004

The King has expressed support for homeopathy for decades, despite the fact that the controversial system of alternative medicine has been slammed by mainstream doctors and experts.

It treats ailments using highly dilute doses of natural substances.

According to a 2010 House of Commons Science and Technology Committee report, however, remedies perform no better than placebos. 

Charles has been the patron of the Faculty of Homeopathy since 2019 – and was criticised for taking up the post.

The King has spoken out in support of homeopathy and other alternative forms of medicine – such as acupuncture and herbal treatments – on several occasions since as early as 1982. 

In a letter to then health secretary Alan Johnson in September 2007, he said an ‘anti-homeopathy campaign’ was damaging the health service.

In the letter, he said he ‘couldn’t bear to see people suffering… when a complementary approach could make the difference’.

He has also had treatment from herbalists and chiropractors for ailments including severe back pain. 

Charles has also had treatment from herbalists and chiropractors for ailments including severe back pain. Above: Charles mixing a preparation of dried herbs during a visit to the University of Westminster’s Polyclinic in 1999

Charles established the Foundation for Integrated Health in 1993 but the charity closed in 2010 after a criminal investigation into allegations of fraud and money laundering.

Edzard Ernst, the world’s first professor of complementary medicine, was once invited to Highgrove by Charles but the pair’s relationship soured when the expert became sceptical about homeopathy.

He went on to accuse Charles of ‘exploiting a gullible public’ for selling a homeopathic ‘tincture’ through his Duchy Originals brand.

It also emerged that Charles had pushed former government minister Peter Hain to introduce alternative medicine on the NHS in Northern Ireland when he was the cabinet minister in charge of the province.

He told how Charles had been ‘constantly frustrated’ by an inability to persuade ministers that it was a ‘good idea’. 

Mr Hain said he did introduce a trial for complementary medicine on the NHS in Northern Ireland and it had ‘spectacularly good results’, with wellbeing and health being ‘vastly improved’. 

Charles holds a bag of mixed dried herbs which is set to treat chronic indigestion at the University of Westminster’s Polyclinic in 1999

Charles said before he became King that he would stop campaigning on issues such as homeopathy once he was on the throne.

‘I’m not that stupid,’ he told the BBC. ‘I do realise it is a separate exercise being sovereign.

‘I understand entirely how that should operate. I’ve tried to make sure whatever I’ve done has been non-party political, but it’s vital to remember there’s only room for one sovereign at a time, not two.’

Fear of ‘grey goo’ 

READ MORE: King Charles has a ‘ten-year plan’ and may then support a ‘staged abdication’ to function as a ‘King Father’ after William ascends the throne, sources claim 

In 2003, Charles attracted criticism from the then Labour government for expressing fears that nanobots – swarms of self-replicating particles the size of bacteria – could feed off natural matter and turn the planet into ‘grey goo’.

He called on the Royal Society to discuss the ‘enormous environmental and social risks’ of nanotechnology. 

MP Ian Gibson, who was then the chairman of the Commons science and technology committee, also criticised the then Prince of Wales, saying: ‘We shouldn’t be associated with scare stories – science fiction about grey goos, the world being swallowed up. 

‘When a prince – an incipient king – speaks, people will listen.’

Expert Professor Wilson Poon also took aim at Charles, saying his views were ‘misguided and misinformed’ 

Charles’s fears appeared to stem from a 1986 book in which author Eric Drexler raised the prospect of nanomachines replicating themselves billions of times to the point where they would eventually ‘exceed the mass of the sun and all the planets combined.’ 

However, the King has not spoken out on the subject of nanotechnology since his 2003 intervention and it appears unlikely that he will do so as monarch.  

Hatred of grey squirrels

Charles has long been a fan of red squirrels and has repeatedly expressed his wish to ‘eliminate’ invasive greys from the UK.

They were imported to Britain in the 1870s but went on to outcompete the native red. 

Greys are larger and more aggressive and carry a virus that is deadly to their rival reds.

In 2009, Charles called for action to ‘drive out the greys’, adding in a letter to the Country Land and Business Association that it was ‘crucial’ to ‘eliminate’ the ‘alien species’.

However, the RSPCA hit back, saying: ‘We are concerned about the welfare of both red and grey squirrels, and believe that control must not be interpreted solely as lethal control.

Charles has long been a fan of red squirrels and has repeatedly expressed his desires to ‘eliminate’ invasive greys from the UK. Above: Charles with a red squirrel at his Birkhall home in Scotland in 2008

‘Eradicating long-established entire populations of greys would be very difficult and cause suffering.’ 

In 2014, Charles ordered a cull of grey squirrels on Duchy of Cornwall land and his other properties, including around his Birkhall home in Scotland.

He has also suggested making fabric out of grey squirrel fur and declared support for a plan to sterilise the animals by feeding them a contraceptive hidden in Nutella chocolate spread.

According to his son, Prince William, King Charles is ‘obsessed’ with red squirrels 

Charles became patron of the Red Squirrel Survival Trust in 2008. The animals’ population has plunged from 3.2million in the 1870s to around 120,000 now.

The King has previously spoken of how he lets red squirrels into Birkhall, telling Country Life that ‘we get them chasing each other round and round inside.’   

He has also joked that it is his ‘great ambition’ to have a red squirrel ‘siting on the breakfast table and on my shoulder’.

Support for organic and traditional farming

Charles has repeatedly spoken out in favour of traditional and organic farming methods. 

Speaking to mark the 70th anniversary of the Soil Association in 2017, he warned that organic farming might be humanity’s only hope of reversing drastic damage to the environment and suggested the planet might only have 60 harvests left. 

He told his audience: ‘So Ladies and Gentlemen, it is becoming ever clearer that the very future of humanity may depend to a very large extent on a mainstream transition to more sustainable farming practices, based of course on organic principles.

‘Yet despite the extraordinary efforts of the Soil Association, including the work of the individuals and organizations in this room and of many others throughout the world, in terms of impact on the planet and public health, things have actually got worse, not better, with the majority of farmland still in so-called conventional production, and the organic market still small and relatively fragile.

Charles has repeatedly spoken out in favour of traditional and organic farming methods. Above: Charles and his oldest son Prince William tend cows at his Duchy Home Farm in 2004 

‘For instance, the impact of chemical fertilisers and pesticides on the soil biome, mirrored in our own stomachs as a result of excessive use of antibiotics, has been so devastating, that it is now being said that we only have enough fertility left for 60 harvests.’

In 2021, Charles called for small family farmers to join together with others around the world to promote sustainable methods.

Writing in The Guardian, he said: ‘There are small farms the world over which could come together in a global cooperative committed to producing food based on high environmental standards… With the skills of ethical entrepreneurs and a determination from the farmers to make it work, I would like to think it could provide a very real and hopeful future.’

He added that small-scale farmers needed to be ‘a key part of any fair, inclusive, equitable and just transition to a sustainable future.’ 

And in his last speech as the Prince of Wales, given the day before the death of his mother the Queen last September, Charles said he had been thought of as a ‘complete idiot’ for promoting organic farming.

Charles is given a talk on farming by farmer Pat Nagle in County Clare, Ireland, in 2015

‘One of the reasons I went organic 40 years ago was because I felt there was an overuse of antibiotics,’ he said. 

‘And I felt that if you overdo it, you end up with resistance. Anyway, that’s happened. I was told I was a complete idiot for even suggesting going organic.’

Charles farmed organically at his farm near his Highgrove home until 2020 and also uses the methods at his Sandringham estate in Norfolk.

In the same speech, to a global allergy symposium at Dumfries House in Scotland, he also admitted to being concerned about how western lifestyles may have contributed to an apparent global increase in allergies.

He said: ‘It seems to spread further and further as people take up a western lifestyle. 

‘And what’s so sad is that people are still are adopting this lifestyle when we’ve discovered what damage it has already been doing.’ 

The then Prince of Wales and his wife Camilla taste organic lettuce during a visit to a farm in San Francisco in 2005

Charles also suggested that he supported concerns that modern homes could be over-sanitised.

He said: ‘When I was small if I dropped my food on the floor I was encouraged to eat it. 

I was told ‘it was good clean dirt, it won’t harm you at all’. Now, it’s gone berserk, I think, the other way.’ 

Charles is the patron of several farming and animal-related charities, including the Sustainable Food Trust, the Campaign for Wool, the British Deer Society and the Herdwick Sheep Breeders Association.

Against genetically modified crops

When he was the Prince of Wales, the King was a vocal opponent of genetically modified foods. 

In 2008, he said multinational food companies were conducting a ‘gigantic experiment with nature and the whole of humanity which has gone seriously wrong’.

Speaking in an interview with the Telegraph, he added: ‘What we should be talking about is food security, not food production — that is what matters and that is what people will not understand,’ he said.

‘And if they think it’s somehow going to work because they are going to have one form of clever genetic engineering after another, then again count me out, because that will be guaranteed to cause the biggest disaster environmentally of all time.’

Critics of GM crops have said they harm the environment and could have unforseen consequences for those who eat them. 

But supporters argue that the technique can make plants resistant to pests and diseases.

It emerged in 2019 that Charles had written to the then Prime Minister Tony Blair to criticise the development of GM foods.

He accused the biotech industry and scientists of ‘increasingly frantic promotional efforts’ and praised Mr Blair for agreeing to meet opponents of genetic modification.

He also defended critics from the claim that they were what he called ‘hysterical, extreme and anti-progressive’.

The letter emerged after former environment secretary Michael Meacher claimed that he and Charles would ‘consort together’ to try and influence government policy on subjects including GM crops. 

Grammar schools

Charles has also been a vocal proponent of grammar schools and even tried to persuade Tony Blair to expand them.

But former Education Secretary David Blunkett revealed in 2014 how Charles had campaigned on the issue. 

‘I would explain that our policy was not to expand grammar schools, and he didn’t like that,’ he told BBC Radio 4. 

Charles has also been a vocal proponent of grammar schools and even tried to persuade Tony Blair to expand them. Above: Charles visiting Altrincham Grammar School for Girls in 2003

Charles is  pictured in a French class during his visit to Altrincham Grammer School for Girls in Greater Manchester in 2003

‘He was very keen that we should go back to a different era where youngsters had what he would have seen as the opportunity to escape from their background, whereas I wanted to change their background.’ 

Charles’s wider views on education were further revealed when a 2002 letter written to a member of staff emerged at an employment tribunal in 2004. 

He wrote: ‘Why do they all seem to think they are qualified to do things far above their capabilities?

‘It is a consequence of a child-centred education system which tells people they can become pop stars, High Court judges or brilliant TV presenters.’

Dislike of modern architecture

Charles has previously been a vocal critic of modern architecture.

In 1984, he infamously attacked the proposed extension to the National Gallery, saying it was ‘like a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much loved and elegant friend.’

The proposal, by Ahrends Burton Koralek, did not ultimately go ahead. 

Three years later, he hit out at modern architects again by drawing comparison to German bombing raids on Britain in the Second World War. 

He said: ‘You have to give this much to the Luftwaffe. When it knocked down our buildings, it didn’t replace them with anything more offensive than rubble.’ 

Charles has previously been a vocal critic of modern architecture. Above: Charles views the renovation work taking place at Llwynywormwood, which was bought by the Duchy of Cornwall, on February 22, 2008

Charles also opposed a proposed redevelopment of Chelsea Barracks, leading to a legal battle before the plans were dropped. 

The £1billion plans had proposed a modernist vision, complete with 600 luxury apartments. Charles had said the plans were ‘brutalist’.  

And in 2014, he penned a ten-point plan as part of a ‘big rethink on how to design cities for a rapidly expanding global population.

He talked up the benefits of terraced housing and said high-rise tower blocks ‘alienate and insult’.

The then Prince of Wales highlighted the ‘charm and beauty’ of London’s Kensington and Chelsea, a district whose traditional architecture he admires.

Critics pointed out that the average price of property in Kensington was then more than £2million and is now even higher. 

Charles also founded the School of Traditional Arts and went on to lead the construction of the village of Poundbury, which was created on Duchy of Cornwall land in a bid to challenge post-war ideas about planning. 

An artist’s impression of the proposed extension to the National Gallery. In 1984, Charles branded the plan a ‘monstrous carbuncle’ and it never went ahead

Charles also opposed a proposed redevelopment of Chelsea Barracks, leading to a legal battle before the plans were dropped

A quote from the King on the development’s website reads: ‘When I set out on this venture, I was determined that Poundbury would break the mould of conventional housing development in this country, and create an attractive place for people to live, work and play. 

‘Many people said that it could never succeed but I am happy to say that the sceptics were wrong and it is now a thriving urban settlement alongside Dorchester.’ 

Responding to critics of his views, he told Jonathan Dimbleby in an ITV interview in 1994: ‘I just wanted to make the point that I felt anyway that… I didn’t want to see this country which I mind about and love greatly… disappear under a welter of ugliness.’

He added: ‘I want to say one more thing, to emphasise the real basis on which I have tried to express these feelings about architecture, and that is that while I am thoroughly of an avant-garde generally, what I do not think is sensible in the long run and right is when the avant-garde becomes the establishment.

‘And that is what has happened I believe. Not only in architectural terms but in many other areas as well.’

Climate change and the environment

Charles has been speaking out in favour of protecting the environment for more than five decades. 

He made a landmark speech in 1970, when he was just 21, in which he warned about the impact of pollution, gas emissions and overpopulation.

He said presciently: ‘There is the growing menace of oil pollution at sea, which almost destroys beaches and certainly destroys tens of thousands of seabirds,’ he said.

‘There is chemical pollution discharged into rivers from factories and chemical plants, which clogs up the rivers with toxic substances and adds to the filth in the seas. 

Charles has been speaking out in favour of protecting the environment for more than five decades. Above: Charles delivers a speech during the opening ceremony of the UN Climate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow in 2021

‘There is air pollution from smoke and fumes discharged by factories and from gases pumped out by endless cars and aeroplanes.’

But he was ridiculed by some in 1986 when he admitted that ‘I happily talk to plants and trees and listen to them.’ 

He did however continue to speak out on the environment and climate change.  

At a COP summit in 2012, he said: ‘Like a sleepwalker, we seem unable to wake up to the fact that so many of the catastrophic consequences of carrying on with business-as-usual are bearing down on us faster than we think, already dragging many millions more people into poverty and dangerously weakening global food, water and energy security for the future.’

Last year, he spoke out again, saying that the heatwave over the summer months vindicated his view that tackling climate change was ‘utterly essential’.  

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