UK circulating commemorative coins for 2021

[Pabitra]

Will UK commemorate 90 years of visit by Gandhi?

Britain To Mark Gandhi's 1931 Visit With Commemorative Coin

Sajid Javid unveils plans for a new UK coin commemorating Mahatma Gandhi | Daily

[eurocoin]

Very bad idea.

[Figleaf]

Bad reporting:

Britain will commission a commemorative coin to mark the 90th anniversary of the final visit by Indian independence hero Mahatma Gandhi, its finance minister announced Thursday. (...) "I've asked the team at the Royal Mint to bring forward proposals for a new, commemorative coin of Gandhi," Chancellor Sajid Javid said.

If an Indian finance ministers asks the UK mint to do a coin, that does not mean the UK mint will do the coin.

That said, Gandhi's ideas belong to the world, not to India alone. It would therefore be quite appropriate for the UK to put him on a commem. It would even be a welcome change from the childish fluff they spew these days. That's why it's unlikely to happen. *sigh*

Peter

[Deeman]

I would have thought that a commemorative issue this year for the 150th anniversary of his birth would have been more appropriate.
Don't go too much on the idea of linking a commemorative issue to his last visit to England.

[eurocoin]

Chancellor Javid is also Master of the Mint. If he tells the mint to do something, it will happen.

[Big_M]

Similar topic has already been covered elsewhere but on a "rounder" anniversary:

Mauritius 2001 "MAHATMA GANDHI CENTENARY OF ARRIVAL IN MAURITIUS"

[FosseWay]

I have no particular objection to the nature of the event, and as Peter says it makes a change from some of the banal stuff we've seen recently. But 90 years? What is so special about 90? It was the same the other year when the RM commemorated the 950th anniversary of the Battle of Hastings. A worthy subject to be sure, but be patient and wait till 2066. There must be plenty of significant figures who were born, died or wrote/discovered/made something in 1921, or 1821, or xx21 - why do we have to look to 1931 instead? And if 1921 really is the year in which nothing at all positive worth commemorating happened, it is actually allowed to have a year with no commemorative coins.

As to what Sajid Javid has to say to the mint, I think the likelihood that he is no longer chancellor a long time before the start of 2021 is rather high.

[FosseWay]

Bad reporting:

If an Indian finance ministers asks the UK mint to do a coin, that does not mean the UK mint will do the coin.

That said, Gandhi's ideas belong to the world, not to India alone. It would therefore be quite appropriate for the UK to put him on a commem. It would even be a welcome change from the childish fluff they spew these days. That's why it's unlikely to happen. *sigh*

Peter

Sajid Javid is the *United Kingdom's* finance minister, for the avoidance of doubt.

[Deeman]

Thoughts about potential 2021 commemoratives.

450th anniversary of the opening of The London Royal Exchange.
Bicentenary of the death of the poet John Keats.
150th anniversary of The Royal Albert Hall.
250th anniversary of the death of the poet Thomas Gray.
250th anniversary of the birth of the novelist and poet Sir Walter Scott.
Bicentenary of the birth of George Williams, founder of the YMCA.

[onecenter]

I see three 50-pence commemoratives and three 2-pound commemoratives.

[Pabitra]

As to what Sajid Javid has to say to the mint, I think the likelihood that he is no longer chancellor a long time before the start of 2021 is rather high.

Sajid Javid is no longer chancellor but the coin topic is still alive

See

https://whtc.com/news/articles/2020/aug/01/uk-considering-a-coin-to-commemorate-indias-mahatma-gandhi/1045419/?refer-section=world

[eurocoin]

The Veterans Advisory and Pensions Committee (VAPC), an organisation that offers help to veterans and their families to access vital welfare support has been in talks with The Royal Mint for some time now about a possible commemorative coin to be issued in 2021 for their 100th anniversary. To what extent these discussions are serious, I do not know. The VAPC is an advisory non-departmental public body, sponsored by the Ministry of Defence.

[eurocoin]

In 2021 the Royal Mint will issue commemorative 50 pence coins with the following themes:

- 75 years since the death of television pioneer John Baird
- 50 years since decimalisation
- Team GB (this coin will have the same reverse design as the 2020-dated coin, just a different date).

Two commemorative 2 pound coins willl be issued to commemorate authors HG Wells and Walter Scott.

[Alan71]

Thanks, eurocoin, as ever.  Encouraging that they're marking the 50th anniversary of decimalisation.  Will be interesting to see the design.

The "Diversity Built Britain" coin sounds like a reaction to Black Lives Matter, particularly as we've been encouraged to accept that many of the great figures of the past were slave traders.  Big, bad, little Britain.

I'm assuming all of those coins will be included in the 2021 sets, but these days nothing can be taken for granted. 

[andyg]

The "Diversity Built Britain" coin sounds like a reaction to Black Lives Matter, particularly as we've been encouraged to accept that many of the great figures of the past were slave traders.  Big, bad, little Britain.

A companion piece to the Brexit 50p I presume.