TIME TO START MAKING CHANGES IN THE ROYAL FAMILY

The funding of the royal family, which raises its ugly head once every ten years, will be a thorn in the side of whoever is the next Prime Minister. Under the 10-year settlement, agreed between the palace and Mrs Thatcher, the Civil List will have to be renegotiated by the end of this year.

Like everyone else, the Queen wants more money, and like everyone else, except MPs and bankers, she will struggle to get it. And in any case before there is more money paid out to the royals it is important that we look at how they live in the changing world of recession-torn Britain.

In fairness to the Queen, during the 1990’s her accountants saved money from the Civil List to create a contingency fund, however, as time has gone on she has had to draw on that fund. By next year it will be gone. It’s also reasonable to remember that a lot of the Civil List goes to pay salaries and other employment costs of junior staff.

However, there are, within the current system, some startling wastes of money. While the Queen wants more public money to pay for the upkeep of her crumbling palaces she is allowing minor royals and courtiers to live in rent-free accommodation.

This blog believes that an independent Scotland should be a republic. It also accepts that at the moment we live in the United Kingdom, and that the Queen is head of state, but it thinks that it is high time that we brought royalty into the 21st century.

There are five palaces in London and a further one in Edinburgh. We allow Charles, Anne, Andrew, Edward, Kent, Gloucester, Alexandra, Michael, Beatrice, William and Harry....and their wives/husbands to live more of less free of charge. Additionally we provide free accommodation for a raft of senior courtiers, like the Keeper of the Queen’s Pictures and the Mistress of the Robes.

Enough!

We can’t afford all this. You don’t have to be republican to want value for money. The Swedish, Danish, Dutch, Norwegian, Belgian, Luxembourg and Spanish royal families don’t live like this and don’t cost this kind of money.

Providing accommodation for, and extending security to, junior members of the family, as they try to live “normal” lives and undertake no royal duties, is ridiculous. Paying out money for the upkeep of six crumbling palaces, and providing day and night security for the whole family is now beyond our means. It simply must be slimmed down.

Unlike some republicans I can see that some royals do valuable work. Sometimes simply by being royal they can coax rich snobs to part with their money for a good cause, which without royal intervnetion would not happen. Some are genuinely very hard working, making a big difference to their chosen charities.

So let them work and live in Buckingham Palace, which is big enough for all of them to have apartments for which they could pay rent. And let’s pay them a reasonable salary based on the amount of work they do. Everyone else has productivity targets, why not them?

If they don’t care for that they could get a job outside of royal duties and buy their own house. What’s wrong with that? They are no different from you and me and we manage to do it. We no longer believe that they have blue blood and are a different species.

There are likely to be big changes before the next ten-year settlement. Let’s start making the cuts now.


Pictures: State Apartments at Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace, Beatrice and Eugenie, Holyrood House.