Article content continued

“Barring some unexpected tragedy, it’s not going to happen for 50 years … but that would be the situation in law,” said Gary Toffoli, executive director of the Canadian Royal Heritage Trust.

Last year, the U.K. House of Commons introduced an act to undo the age-old practice of giving males first crack at the throne ahead of their elder sisters.

At the same time, U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron called on the Queen’s Realms (the 15 other countries where Queen Elizabeth II is head of state) to make laws of their own.

New Zealanders, for instance, carefully updated their laws to incorporate the reform as part of a uniquely New Zealand succession regime. Australians did the same, even if it meant ironing out some regional saber rattling from a northeastern state that threatened to draft its own, separate, succession law.

But Canada simply rushed through a 400-word Succession to the Throne Act giving a nod to the U.K. changes.

Rather than tackle the legal challenges of an Australia-style succession law, Canada decided that “the best way around that is to say, ‘well, we’ll just assent to British law,’” said Philippe Lagassé, an associate professor of international affairs at the University of Ottawa.

The last time the issue of royal succession came up was in 1936, when Canada needed to give the go-ahead for King George VI to succeed his abdicated brother. At the time, the Canadian government simply asked the U.K. to legislate the affair for them, and then ran the final document (the Succession to the Throne Act 1937) by the House of Commons for final assent.