HOWZAT

“And the Prince is not willing to debate. If the Prince does not debate, there must be a question over why he can participate in political situations.”

He went on: “If we are to avoid a dangerous political clash then we need someone to solve the problem at a level which is not about this site, but at the level of royalty and their say in political matters.

“Are we going to have royalty dictating to us modern art? Are we going to have royalty dictating their taste in music? Are we going to have royalty dictating their belief in medicine, modern or not?

“No, because they’re not experts in any of those fields, but more important still it’s not constitutional to enter into those areas which are political, where they’re protected and where we’re not protected.”

Lord Rogers has designed some of the most influential buildings in the world, including the Lloyd’s building in the City, the Pompidou Centre in Paris and Madrid's Barajas airport. He has won numerous awards.

The Prince, by contrast, has long championed traditional approaches to architecture and created his model development Poundbury in Dorset based on his long-held beliefs.

His intervention in the Chelsea barracks site has already come under fire from Sunand Prasad, the president of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and Nick Raynsford, a former planning minister, who accused him of acting in an "almost feudal" way in discussions with members of royal families overseas, about planning outcomes that "should be determined by the normal democratic process”.

But Georgine Thorburn, the chairman of the Chelsea Barracks Action Group, which opposes Lord Rogers' scheme, said that the architect only had himself to blame for his insensitive and inappropriate designs which she said had failed to comply with the Westminster City Council planning brief.

"What most people don’t realise is that it has been the unstinting opposition by the thousands of Chelsea Barracks Action Group supporters that kept the objection campaign alive and it was them who commissioned Quinlan Terry to find an alternative scheme," said Ms Thorburn.

"It so happened that the Prince Charles agreed with us and reflected the voice of the people that 121 feet high of steel and glass was inappropriate for this area. Lord Rogers’s bitter criticism of the prince is unfounded; to us he is the people’s prince and the only one who seems to stand up for what the people want."

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