Queen remains ‘very much in charge’ even as Charles makes speech

Analysis: Despite watching from home on TV, constitutionally the monarch was still calling the shots

A Queen's speech without a queen; two future kings and a queen consort in waiting; the state opening of parliament was the most public and formal manifestation yet of Operation Transition", which has been quietly going on inside Buckingham Palace for several years.

For the first time in two centuries, an heir to the throne read aloud the words compiled by the government at this most ceremonial of spectacles.