Charles plans his modern coronation

Christopher Morgan and Nicholas Hellen in the Sunday Times in December 2004

THE royal family has started making preparations for the Prince of Wales to become king by secretly devising sweeping changes to modernise the coronation and other ceremonies marking his accession.

Under the review, courtiers are considering pruning “Ruritanian” elements of the coronation ceremonial and creating a new role for leaders of non-Christian religions in the service.

“A lot has happened since the (Queen’s) coronation in 1953. There will be a large number of differences. I don’t mind the word modernising,” said the Duke of Norfolk, who as earl marshal will organise Charles’s coronation.

Although he emphasised that at 78 the Queen remains in robust good health, the duke said: “I have been secretly planning and secretly thinking and secretly consulting and secretly liaising.” He has already completed a revised plan for her funeral.

The duke will discuss the plans in the new year with Prince Charles’s office, which is conducting a parallel review of the accession ceremonies. These are held immediately after the death of a monarch.

Although the earl marshal said detailed plans for Charles’s coronation would remain flexible, in order to “judge the (public) mood correctly”, he disclosed that Charles will not have to wait as long as his mother did to be crowned after her death. The Queen waited 16 months from the death of her father, George VI, in February 1952, until her coronation in 1953.

“It will all happen much quicker,” the earl marshal said. “I don’t envisage anything like that gap again.”

On the death of the Queen, a new monarch will be proclaimed as soon as possible at an accession council to be held at St James’s Palace to which all members of the privy council will be summoned. Its meeting will be televised for the first time and the new king may also make a broadcast.

Under existing rules, parliament is suspended on the death of the monarch, but it meets again to enable MPs to take an oath to the new sovereign.

The coronation of the Prince of Wales will be a "multi-faith" event.

Prayers and readings from other denominations and religions, including from the Muslim, Sikh and Jewish faiths, are expected to be included in the ceremonies marking Prince Charles's accession to the throne.