James Reed: Prince Charles and John Bercow should remember tradition of neutrality exists for a reason

The New England Patriots won American Football’s Superbowl, turning around a 25 point deficit to stage the biggest comeback in the event’s history. In doing so, the Patriots’ quarterback Tom Brady, secured his fifth Superbowl victory and is now widely acclaimed as the greatest of all time.

This success over more than a decade have been masterminded by head coach Bill Belichick whose mantra is “do your job”, a reminder to his players that if they each concentrate on performing their own role well, the rest will take care of itself.

Certain figures in the British establishment would do well to listen to Mr Belichick’s wisdom.

John Bercow’s statement on the merits of Donald Trump addressing Parliament as part of a future state visit will have had plenty of people across the country nodding along in sympathy, but the Commons Speaker was the wrong person to make the case.

His role as a neutral arbiter is to defend the liberty of MPs to speak their minds and the ability of the Commons to hold the Government to account, not to make unilateral, highly-charged political statements.

The Speaker’s intervention followed that of the Prince of Wales, who has let it be known he would be reluctant to meet the visiting president on account of their very different views on climate change.

I suspect many of those who cheered Prince Charles on his stance were also those criticising him over his “black spider memos”, the letters written over years to Ministers lobbying on a wide range of issues.

Cheering those who are supposed to be above politics because they happen to say something with which we agree is a dangerous path, arguably more so in country with an unwritten constitution.

It is the flip-side of the equally worrying attacks launched on the High Court judges last year when they upheld the court action demanding MPs be given a say on the triggering of Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty.

We should demand neutrality of those whose constitutional function requires it, and we should defend their neutrality against those who rail against it.

If Mr Bercow wants to make political statements, he can stand down as Speaker and voice them as an MP.

If the Prince of Wales wants to go into politics, he can give up his Royal privileges and find a paid occupation.

In the meantime, to quote Mr Belichick, both need to just do their jobs.

This issue will arise again later this month when MPs debate the petition, started by Leeds solicitor Graham Guest, on whether President Trump’s proposed state visit should be scrapped “because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen”.

There are many good reasons not to give Mr Trump the full red carpet treatment, but worrying about embarrassing the Queen is not among them.

I cannot imagine, for example, Her Majesty was thrilled about meeting Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah when he was honoured with a state visit in 2007. As head of the Church of England, the Queen was unlikely to be happy with the way Christians are treated in her guest’s country. And the fact that women are not allowed to drive, let alone be head of state, would no doubt also represent a significant difference of opinion.

However, she probably also consoled herself with memories of the day nine years earlier where then Crown Prince Abdullah was invited to take a tour of the Royal estate at Balmoral. It is reported that when the Saudi Prince climbed into the Land Rover for the tour it was the Queen who leapt into the driving seat before taking off a great speed.

Putin, Ceausescu, Hirohito, Mugabe and many other uncompromisng leaders of disrepute have had the state visit treatment and the Queen has done her job. Even Mr Bercow kept his counsel when Chinese president Xi Jingping addressed Parliament in 2015 – his country’s record on human rights leaves much to be desired.

If the proposed state visit of President Trump is to be withdrawn or delayed to an unspecific date, it should be because the elected government of the day deems that to be in this country’s best interests.

But if the president does visit these shores he should meet the Queen, Prince Charles should keep his opinions to himself and Speaker Bercow should defend the right of MPs in the Commons to make their views known if they so wish.

And given the strength of feeling already witnessed here since his inauguration, I have every confidence the British public, MPs, peers and all manner of other prominent figures would do their job and leave Mr Trump in no doubt as to their feelings about his deeply unpleasant and worrying views.

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James Reed is political editor of The Yorkshire Post.