The monarchy is an institution that needs replacing, no matter what the alternative, a talk in Douglas has heard.

The first Positive Action Group meeting of 2020 discussed the idea of republicanism, replacing the Queen and the Royal family with an elected head of state.

The talk was led by chief executive of the organisation Republic, Graham Smith, who set out why he wants to see the monarchy replaced and how easily it could be done.

A life-long republican, Mr Smith said he joined Republic, initially as a volunteer after returning to the UK following seven years living in Australia.

He said that returning to the UK was a ’reverse culture shock’ as he realised how often the media focuses on the royals and how much the family is revered in the country.

Mr Smith added: ’It is an institution that should be opposed no matter what the alternative is.’

He argued that the defining issue in Britain for the past few years has been Brexit. He said that, whether people supported or opposed it, it had been a democratic process.

With that in mind, Mr Smith said it that there is ’something quite wrong’ with having an undemocratic head of state.

Pointing to the lack of transparency over the royal family, Mr Smith detailed how Freedom of Information requests cannot be used to access data about the royal family, including how much taxpayer money is spent on them.

He added: ’If we knew that they were doing, we may not like it. We can’t remove one boil, we’d have to remove the one institution.’

The ’one boil’ comment came from the way Prince Andrew has been portrayed due to his links with Jeffrey Epstein and the accusation made by the FBI that he has not cooperated with their investigations.

Mr Smith accepted that politicians also do not live up to the expectations of them, but that at least they could be removed or, as shown with the expenses scandal, could be held account for their use of public money.

However, the use of public funds is not a defining issue for Mr Smith. He claimed that ’even if they were free, I’d still be stood here saying here saying we should remove them’.

Mr Smith outlined that following a referendum to remove the monarchy, Republic would still want a parliamentary democracy ’with an independent head of state’.

When challenged on whether the role could be independent, Mr Smith highlighted president Michael D Higgins in Ireland as a ’great example’ of how the role can be performed.

During the question and answer section, Mr Smith noted that a poll in the UK showed that 48% of people didn’t see themselves as royalists.