You know times are getting tough when the United Kingdom imposes QE Zero (Queen of England, Zero raise). The headline of Britain’s Telegraph tells it straight up, no chaser: The Queen’s income frozen until 2015:
The Queen is on course for six successive years of cuts for funding for the royal household, new figures show…
The squeeze on the monarch’s income is likely to delay a backlog of repairs to royal palaces. There will be no extra money from the taxpayer to pay for the court of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, who are rapidly emerging as global stars…
“The grant levels envisaged in the early years of the new system [starting April 2013] are, in real terms, below what the Royal Household spent in every one of the last 20 years”…
Since the credit crunch, the Queen has received an effective pay cut every year, dropping from £38.3m in 2008-09. In 1991-02 she received £77.3m. Buckingham Palace is likely to boost its efforts to raise money from commercial sources, or to cut back on public appearances by the royal family.
Is this the uber-class equivalent of being royally screwed?
Next up, given the lockout at the NBA, long term pay cuts for a group of pituitary cases (good at) trying to stuff a ball through a hoop (as Woody Allen had one of his wives say in Annie Hall)?
And/or, corporate profits in the U.S. to revert downwards to their mean from the current near-record level of GDP?
Strange days have found us…
I think they should pay their own way.
http://www.britroyals.com/faqs.htm
How rich is Queen Elizabeth?
Her estimated personal fortune is around £350 million (US $525M). The Duchy of Lancaster estate, a portfolio of land, property and assets, is held in Trust for the Sovereign and worth around £348 million. She also owns properties privately that have never been valued, including Sandringham House, Balmoral Castle reputedly worth £160 million and the Castle of Mey. Her personal art collection is worth at least £10 billion, and she owns personal jewellery and a large stamp collection built up by her grandfather George V. Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, the Crown Jewels and the Royal Art Collection are held in trust for the nation. The Crown Estate, the royal lands dating from 1066, are worth around £7.3 billion and generate £304 million (2008/9) in revenue a year which is handed back to the Government as payment in return for the £38.2 million per year (2009/10 down 7% from £41 million in 2008) cost of running the monarchy. This arrangement dates from George III who gave up the right to the income in return for the Civil List paid to members of the Royal Family. It has been announced that this will be changed in 2013 to a Sovereign Support Grant based on a percentage of the income from the Crown Estate.
Californio: Nice info. Do you have any knowledge of what the UK voting public thinks? For all I know, their support/subsidy may be viewed as a modest investment relative to all the tourism income they bring in.
doctorx, Sorry just what I read on the net. It is notable that the Crown has only paid Income Tax on their earnings since 1993, their wealth has mostly been accumulated TAX Free. As an Irishman on one side – who got the hell out – so my ancestors could own their own land, I really don’t follow the Pommies and their need for special people to rule above them, even if it is a modern charade.
A cynic might suggest that this news made the front page in the UK because it might help the populace swallow their economic problems a little more readily. Obviously my post was tongue-in-cheek; at least I hoped it was obvious!