Peter Hamilton: Charles shouldn't be head of state

Opinion

Now is the hour to have most important representational office in our country filled by a New Zealander.

A recent Herald article (Tiki tour for Prince Charles and Camilla) described the visit of "the future King of England" that began yesterday. The writer avoided calling Charles the "future King of New Zealand". Under New Zealand law Charles will be that too.

After a record of exemplary public service, the Queen is now semi-retired and Charles is increasingly taking on her public duties at home and overseas. The time is near when he will become King Charles of New Zealand but our future king remains unknown to us. What we do know about him we glean primarily from the British media.

Yet Charles is about to fill the most important representational office in our country, that of our head of state.

The Government has invited him to New Zealand for the second time in three years so Kiwis will have a chance to meet him in person and see him on the nightly news. Such royal visits are also seen as a chance to showcase New Zealand industry and tourism to a British audience.

The aim will be for him to be seen by as many New Zealanders as possible so we become comfortable with the notion of him as "our" king too. Except Charles and Camilla are here for only seven days. A recent tweet from the Cawthron Institute summed up his level of engagement: "HRH Prince Charles is keen to learn all about our groundbreaking science. So much to share, so little time!"

Our links to the United Kingdom will always be important but nothing can change the fact that our head of state is not a Kiwi, lives far away and does not know us. It falls to our Governor-General to fill the most important representational role both inside New Zealand and increasingly overseas.

Diplomatic relations, cemented by visits overseas by our Governor-General, are important to New Zealand as we develop trade and economic links with key partners globally and advance our interests internationally. Our current head of state cannot carry out these functions for us. When the Queen or Charles travel abroad they can only advance the interests of the UK. Unlike most other countries we have a head of state who can't work for us overseas.

We have in recent years had a succession of excellent governors-general who have worked tirelessly in our interests but when they travel overseas they are only "vice-regal", so their role and function are confusing for foreign governments unfamiliar with the title of Governor-General as a "stand-in" head of state.

Questions are inevitably asked: Should they receive the Governor-General as if he or she were equivalent to New Zealand's head of state, or should they treat them as No2 in New Zealand's constitutional hierarchy? This makes a huge difference to the manner in which they are received and in which New Zealand is perceived overseas.

In a globalised world it is no longer appropriate to have a head of state who is not a New Zealander. An absentee head of state who is also foreign no longer accords with how we see ourselves. We are now mature and independent enough as a country to have our own head of state.

This does not mean we would have to leave the Commonwealth or make big changes to our constitutional arrangements. We simply need to turn the role of Governor-General into our head of state. As a representative of Britain, Prince Charles should be received by a New Zealander in the role of head of state who stands alongside him as his equal and not as a subservient deputy in the form of the Governor-General.

With the reign of King Charles III drawing closer, it is a perfect time to reflect on this issue.

Peter Hamilton is a former deputy secretary of Foreign Affairs and Trade, now retired and living on Waiheke Island.