Monitor: All the News of the World: The Sunday papers consider the role of the Prince of Wales

EVEN IF the Queen gets old enough to send herself a congratulatory centenary telegram, neither monarchists nor republicans can want her to abdicate in favour of her son.

It is in the essence of hereditary jobs that you cannot take voluntary retirement from them.

Royalists and democrats can agree about his. You can't have a monarchy by opinion poll, focus group, and rolling referendum.

The idea is absurd to both sides. There is only one good reason for the Queen to abdicate: in favour of a republic.

The Observer

BY THE time they reach 50, most men have a glorious future behind them. Not so Prince Charles, who hits his half-century this week.

There are many things he still desires: a happy marriage, a real job and a doting mother. But he'll have to make do with a giant bottle of heir-restorer and, as his mum's not going to the party, a George Clooney video. It's the only way he'll see ER on his birthday

The Sunday Mirror

THE MOST striking thing about the pictures of Prince Charles that have been reproduced to mark his 50th birthday is the way in which, even as a small child, he looked and acted middle-aged. Isn't the greatest tragedy of the Prince's life - and possibly the cause of all his problems - the fact that he never was young?

The sad fact is that he has always been 50.

(Jane Gordon)

The Mail on Sunday

THE ROYAL Family has long described itself as "the firm", a mark of the expectation that its members show solidarity and perform their tasks dutifully. It is important , however, not to take this metaphor too literally. The monarchy is not a family business and the Queen is not its chairman, able to hand over the reins of power to her son and heir at whim. For this reason alone the speculation in tonight's LWT documentary Charles at 50 that the Prince of Wales would be "delighted" if his mother abdicated is as ludicrous as he insisted [it was] on Friday.

The Sunday Telegraph