That’s why every Australian can request and receive a free portrait of King Charles

WELLINGTON, New Zealand – Just hours before King Charles III. to arrive in Australia last week, MP Patrick Gorman posted on social media that he was offering free printed portraits of the British royal family to any constituents who visited his office in Perth to request one.

Gorman, a deputy minister in the Australian federal government, told the Associated Press that “a number” of eager voters wanted a portrait.

The photos of King Charles are available as part of a little-known government policy that allows any Australian to request and receive a portrait of their monarch.

That’s unusual in a country where leaders are increasingly ambivalent about the British royal family as Australia’s heads of state.

Elsewhere, British institutions can apply for portraits of King Charles, but individuals generally cannot. In New Zealand, free portraits are only available for digital download. Canadians can receive a printed copy from a monarchist organization if they pay postage.

But Australians can visit their federal representative’s office and ask for one.

After her death in 2022, demand for portraits of Queen Elizabeth II surged.

Australian government documents released by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet almost a year later show officials were still waiting for an official portrait of King Charles to be provided by Buckingham Palace.

This portrait was presented to Australia in July this year. Since then, more than 17,000 copies have been distributed to lawmakers, the Treasury Department told the AP.

Figures on how many were requested by the public were not available.

The sometimes-exasperated lawmaker can field dozens of inquiries each time the program is released.

Tim Watts, now deputy secretary of state, wrote on social media in 2018 — as demand for coverage of the program skyrocketed — that fulfilling portrait requests was “conveniently the dumbest part of my job.”

But while those seeking the images are sometimes, as Watts noted, “jam-mouthed,” Gorman said there is also a vested interest.

He said he had delivered 85 of the portraits of King Charles since they became available and colleagues in Parliament had told him they were also “strongly interested”.