New details of King Charles and Queen Camilla’s visit to Sydney and Canberra next month rev…see more

New details of King Charles and Queen Camilla’s visit to Sydney and Canberra next month revealed
By political reporters Matthew Doran and Maani Truu

Buckingham Palace has released new details of King Charles and Queen Camilla’s first visit to Australia since taking the throne.

The visit, scheduled for next month, will be a slimmed-down, five-day affair, taking into account the king’s ongoing health concerns.

It will be the first time in more than a decade that a reigning monarch has touched down on Australian shores, after Queen Elizabeth II’s last tour in 2011.

The highly anticipated visit will see the king and queen in Canberra and Sydney from October 18 to 23. The itinerary will focus on causes of particular interest to them.

Events at Parliament House in Canberra and on Sydney Harbour headline the tour, six years after the couple’s last trip down under.

The prime minister will host a reception for Charles and Camilla on Capital Hill, with Australian political and community leaders before they take part in a solemn wreath-laying ceremony at the Australian War Memorial.

Charles’s longstanding passion for the environment and climate change will be marked with a tour of the National Botanic Gardens on Black Mountain, and a meeting with scientists at the CSIRO researching the impact of bushfires and the resilience of the environment to bounce back from devastation.

Camilla will meet family and domestic violence advocates and representatives from the organisation GIVIT, which helps distribute donations across a range of charities.

In Sydney, the Royal Australian Navy will be on display during a fleet review on Sydney Harbour, where the king and queen will also attend a community barbecue.

Australians of the Year Georgina Long and Richard Scolyer will meet the king to discuss their world-leading research on cancer treatments before Charles sits down with Indigenous representatives to learn about Australia’s First Nations culture and community.

Meanwhile, the queen will visit a Sydney library.

Tour going ahead despite king’s health issues
Planning for the visit has been underway since at least the start of the year, but it was thrown into doubt after the palace revealed Charles had been diagnosed with cancer in February, forcing him to step back from public-facing duties.

He returned to public engagements in April, despite the need for ongoing treatment.

The cancer was discovered while he was being treated for an enlarged prostate.

Since then, the palace has remained vague about his diagnosis, prognosis and treatment, but it has confirmed that the king does not have prostate cancer.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in a statement that he was pleased the king was recovering well and that he had “made visiting Australia once again a priority”.

“The royal visit is an opportunity to showcase the best of Australia — our rich culture, our sense of community, and contributions to science, research and global progress,” he said.

“His majesty first visited Australia in 1966 and has a strong personal affection for our nation.”

Charles has already travelled to Australia 15 times in an official capacity, most recently in 2018 to open the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast and spend time in the Northern Territory.

Charles and Camilla’s tour of Australia coincides with the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, which is being held in the Samoan capital Apia that same week.