There’s no better advertisement for an Australian republic than wizened old wogboy Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (whom, it should be noted, Edinburghians hold no particular affection for). Every time Big Phil opens his wrinkly lips, little bits of sour Edwardian elitism fly out, like venom from a senile old cobra:

Jamie Durie, the designer of the … Australian Garden at the [Chelsea Flower] show … had been showing the Duke around the showpiece when he put his royal visitor right. “It was my first experience of Prince Philip. He said to me, ‘I do like your tree fern’. I said, ‘Actually, it’s not a tree fern, it’s a member of the Cycad family. It’s a Macrozamia moorei’. With that, he walked off. “I didn’t want a bloody lecture,” Prince Philip was heard to mutter.

Sucks to be wrong, Phil, but I guess it must smart - especially when you’ve had a lifetime of constantly being told you’re right. Not his silliest remark by a long stretch though, having noted - shortly after the Dunblane school shootings - that guns are no more dangerous than cricket bats. And that he’d like to be reincarnated as a virus in order to solve the world’s overpopulation. And any number of similarly racist, bigoted and offensive comments.