Last week Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, toured Canada; their first visit to Canada in five years. Unsurprisingly, the reason the Prince hasn't visited Canada in so long is mainly due to the global pandemic.

After Prince William and Catharine, Duchess of Cambridge, had a less than fantastic visit on their Caribbean tour earlier this year filled with protests, the Royal Family had high hopes that things in Canada would go smoother.

Overall, the visit went well, and Charles and Camilla received a warm (or at least lukewarm) welcome at every stop on their Canadian tour. However, polls suggest that Prince Charles is not as popular as the Queen among Canadians.

Furthermore, even though the couple did not encounter protestors, according to an Angus Reid opinion poll conducted in April 2022, 51% of Canadians want to abolish the monarchy, a steep rise compared to previous years. Undoubtedly, the Royal Family is not as beloved in Canada as it once was.

In part, the lack of protestors may have to do with how the Canadian government carefully organizes the Royal tour -only sending Charles and Camila to provinces or territories where they will be welcome so as to avoid embarrassment.

The Royal tour of Canada began in Newfoundland and Labrador, an area of the country which has long been a stronghold for monarchists. Jamie Bradley, the Atlantic director of Citizens for a Canadian Republic, told CBC News, "Queen Elizabeth is beloved. And rightly so."

However, Bradley then clarified, "You can love the queen. You can love the Royal Family. It doesn't mean that they have to 'rule' Canada."

The Angus Reid poll isn't the only poll that shows that the monarchy is falling out of favor with Canadians. Global News conducted an Ipsos poll on the subject and found that 66% of respondents believed that "the Queen and the Royal Family should not have any formal role in Canadian society." The majority of Canadians polled also said they are seen as celebrities and nothing more.

However, what would happen if Canada were to reject the Queen and, in her wake Charles as the Canadian head of state? According to experts, eliminating the monarchy in Canada would be a "complicated process."

In fact, University of Waterloo constitutional expert Emmett Macfarlane told the National Post in 2021 that Canada "arguably has the most difficult to amend constitution in the world."

Photo: By RICHARD FOOT - http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/canadian-charter-of-rights-and-freedoms/, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=39341846

In order to make any change to the Queen or her representatives' role in Canada, the House of Commons and the Senate would need to agree on the subject unanimously. In addition, each province or territory would need to change its legislatures to change the constitution, which would take years to complete.

In an interview with Global News Canada, Carolyn Harris, a historian and author said: "Under our constitution, all ten provinces would have to agree on changes to the office of the Queen, and it's very difficult for all ten provinces to be on the same page at the same time."

In addition, the Indigenous communities in Canada would need to be consulted as they have their own treaties with the crown, making the process much more complicated.

Nonetheless, abolishing the monarchy in Canada would not result in many functional changes in Canada simply because the Queen has no political authority in the country.

Melanie Newton, an associate professor of history at the University of Toronto, told Global News, "...the federal government could become a republic without the Indigenous people necessarily having to give up those symbolic ties to the British monarchy."

According to the National Post, the Canadian Prime Minister is not in favor of abolishing the role of the Royal Family in Canada. In March 2021, Trudeau spoke about the subject, saying: "Obviously, I wish all members of the Royal Family the very best."

Mr. Trudeau then went on to say that Canadians can debate the role of the Royals in Canada all they want, but he isn't interested in discussing the subject, saying, "I'm not having those conversations."