The royals just can't shake off their cruel-toff rural image

DESPITE their best intentions, members of the Royal Family continue to be bad ambassadors for country life. Indulging in rural pastimes, as they do, should provide ample opportunity for photogenic backdrops, while at the same time demonstrating how admirably committed they are to the countryside.

But it doesn’t always work out like that. The famous picture of Diana on Deeside at the time of her engagement was in later years most often used to illustrate her alienation from Charles and her distaste for his obsessions with fishing and shooting.

Visions of the Queen (mercifully) snapping a pheasant’s neck did not endear her to squeamish town folk. And there was outrage at the beginning of this year when schoolchildren witnessed Prince Philip "let rip" at a Sandringham pheasant shoot, causing birds to "cartwheel dead out of the sky". Somehow, the royals manage to miss all the romantic associations that go with rusticity and are stuck with the anachronistic cruel-toff stereotype.

Now, just when country sports are under attack from a class-obsessed Labour administration and need all the good PR they can get, a royal servant is "blasted" during a Balmoral shooting party. Although Philip wasn’t in the party, as previously reported, and although Peter Ord, the Balmoral factor "peppered with lead" by a rogue shot, thankfully sustained only minor injuries, the episode doesn’t reflect well on the Windsors.

"Man in hospital after being hit by Duke’s party" headlines are manna from heaven for those who would love to ban game shoots, just as they have banned foxhunting. They are as helpful as "fish feel pain" headlines will be when the bill to ban angling is eventually tabled.

We must trust and hope that the royals carry on with their perfectly legitimate country pursuits, but perhaps more quietly in the future.

FISH may indeed feel pain. But fishermen don’t, according to the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, which has recommended a ban on commercial fishing in 30 per cent of UK waters. The ban - which, incidentally, is supported by Prince Charles - would destroy what remains of Scotland’s fishing fleet and plunge fishing communities of the North-east further into poverty.

It is enraging for the commission to time its advice, based on apparently flimsy evidence, with the annual Brussels quota carve-up, which traditionally ruins Scottish fishermen’s Christmas. But what is even more galling is the fact that the environmental lobby has once again sought to impose its will on the fishing industry. Fishermen’s leaders have long accepted the need for conservation and have gone along with drastic reductions in the size of fleets and allowable catches.

Scotland’s cod stocks are beginning to recover and haddock - the main catch - is in a healthy state.

Fishermen blame most of their present problems on mismanagement through the CFP but why should anyone listen to them? Just because they are out on the grounds on a regular basis, grounds they have fished for years, does not make them authorities. Oh no. It is people like the Prince of Wales and his fellow eco-warriors, learned people who have never set foot on a trawler, who lead the debate on the fishing industry and who "set so much store" by the Royal Commission’s report. Their compassion for the marine environment (excluding its human component) knows no bounds.

What hope do the fishermen have against such powerful foes?

SINCE it was set up last week I cannot stop thinking about Scotland’s Centre for Confidence and Wellbeing. It seemed a funny thing for the Scottish Executive to invest money in, and so much of the First Minister’s time, until it transpired that Dr Carol Craig, who runs it, is the wife of one of Scottish Labour’s best friends.

But what is it for? Will shy people be able to drop in for show-off workshops? Will the congenitally withdrawn be cured by smile-and-the-world-smiles-with-you sessions?

Critics say Scots hardly need to be taught self-confidence, and that a Centre for Modesty and Moderation might have been more appropriate - or a Centre for Silly Concepts, but I’m sure we have a big one of those already.