Not in Front of the Corgis (16 page)

o one doubts that The Queen is a wealthy woman, with a fortune that has been allowed to accumulate through decades of sound advice and monetary shrewdness by her
financial
advisers in banking and the City.

She has also benefited from tax privileges available only to her and not to any of her people. In spite of all these advantages, The Queen is not the richest person in the United Kingdom, or even the richest woman. Estimates of her wealth vary from £100 million to over £1 billion, but those people who, in spite of
arguments
to the contrary, still believe that she owns all her palaces and castles, and every piece of the Crown Jewels, none of which is her personal property, really have no idea.

There is a vast difference between the sovereign’s private wealth and the riches of the Crown, which are inalienable and have to be passed down from
generation
to generation. The only properties The Queen could sell in her own right are Balmoral Castle and Sandringham House. But before one imagines that might put her on the bread line, it should be
remembered
that those two properties have a combined value in excess of £100 million.

The private incomes of The Queen and the Prince of Wales are paid by the Duchy of Lancaster and the Duchy of Cornwall, the two exceptions when George III surrendered the monarch’s land to the Crown Estate in 1760 in return for a Civil List.

Both these estates are fabulously wealthy and as the recipients of the proceeds, The Queen’s and her eldest son’s fortunes increase year by year as they are managed by some of the sharpest financial brains in the world.

No accurate estimate of either Elizabeth II’s or the Prince of Wales’s true worth has ever been revealed – and neither will it ever be. But, assisted by the
transparency
of the financial accounts that are published every year, it is possible to arrive at a reasonably educated valuation.

The estate of the Duchy of Lancaster consists of large areas of land in Lancashire (where The Queen is known as the ‘Duke’ of Lancaster not Duchess),
Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire, Cheshire, Shropshire and Staffordshire, plus the most valuable single freehold of all – the ground on which stands the Savoy Hotel in The Strand in London’s West End.

In 2010 the assets of the Duchy amounted to £350 million, up from a little over £200 million ten years ago. And in the same year (2010) The Queen received some £13.2 million in income from the profits of the Duchy.

The Duchy itself does not pay tax but income from the Privy Purse to Her Majesty is taxed at normal rates after expenses have been deducted.

Even so, if the Sovereign had retained the entire Crown Estates and relinquished the two Duchies: Lancaster and Cornwall, they would both have been far better off as the income for the Crown Estates in 2009/2010 amounted to a staggering £298 million.

Council appointed by her manages the estates of the Duchy of Lancaster on behalf of Her Majesty and the Government of the day also keeps a close eye on its affairs through the office of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. This office is usually held by a minister of the Crown appointed by the Prime Minister and so changes with each Government. The main
responsibility
of the Chancellor is approving the annual accounts.

Apart from the monetary advantages to The Queen as Duke of Lancaster, she also enjoys certain other rights such as appointing High Sheriffs in Lancashire, Greater Manchester and Merseyside. These are separate appointments to those made for the rest of England and Wales, and The Queen uses a bodkin to ‘prick’ the names offered to her by the Chancellor. The tradition
of using a bodkin goes back to the reign of Elizabeth I, who when she was due to pick a High Sheriff, found she didn’t have a pen handy, so used her own bodkin instead. It is from such inconsequential trivialities that ancient customs are derived.

Another of The Queen’s patronages is the right to bestow livings to clergy in forty-two parishes within her Duchy, though strangely, none at all in Lancaster itself. These church livings range from Yorkshire to Avon, Essex to Lincolnshire, Norfolk to Gloucestershire and Leicestershire to Durham.

For over 600 years the Duke of Lancaster also had the right to appoint magistrates, but this long
tradition
came to an end in 2005 under the Courts Act 2003, and now it is the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice.

One tradition that has remained is
Bona Vacantia
or the right of the Duchy of Lancaster to the estate of anyone who dies having not left a will.

However, if anyone can prove that they have a reasonable claim to all or part of an estate, the Solicitor for the Duchy is authorised to pass it on as a ‘gift’ from the Duke of Lancaster.

Anything remaining – and all the other unclaimed legacies – is channelled into two charities: The Duchy of Lancaster Benevolent Fund and The Duchy of Lancaster Jubilee Trust.

When one reads in the annual accounts of Royal Finances that The Queen has returned to the Treasury amounts paid to members of her family, the money will have come from her income from the Duchy of Lancaster.

She also uses part of the income to pay for the upkeep of her private homes: Sandringham and Balmoral, which are hers and are not paid for by the taxpayer.

All other personal expenses, such as her clothes (apart from those worn on official engagements, both at home and on overseas tours, which are the
responsibility
of various Government departments) and her racing expenses, are met from this single source of income.

rince Charles owns next to nothing in his own name. His houses, cars even his suits, shoes and shirts are all provided by the Duchy of Cornwall, the estate created for Edward the Black Prince in 1337, and which since that date has provided an income for every Prince of Wales. For those interested in such facts, there have been
twenty-three
other Princes of Wales who have held the title Duke of Cornwall.

So, when Charles bought Highgrove House in 1980 as a country home, together with 347 acres of farmland, the cheque for around £800,000 was signed by an official of the Duchy of Cornwall, and His Royal Highness’s name does not appear anywhere on the deeds of the property. Similarly, if it were to be sold, with all the extra land he has bought in
addition
– even though it would be on the instructions of
Charles – the Duchy would profit from the deal and not him personally.

If there is no son or grandson to inherit the Duchy, a daughter is not eligible. So when The Queen was Princess Elizabeth and had no brothers, her father, King George VI, received the income from the Duchy, which he then used to provide incomes for his brothers, the Dukes of Gloucester and Kent.

Prince Charles has received the benefit of the profits of the Duchy of Cornwall since he came of age. The state comprises nearly 130,000 acres and is spread mainly over twenty counties in England but surprisingly, only one in his Principality of Wales.

Outside London, the largest single parcel of land owned by the Duchy is 70,000 acres of Dartmoor, on which the notorious Prison stands. So Charles is, in effect, Dartmoor’s landlord.

But the forty-odd acres the Duchy owns in London is easily the most valuable in the entire portfolio. Houses, blocks of flats and offices in Kennington are worth millions, with the Oval cricket ground, home to Surrey County Cricket Club, the single jewel in this particular crown. Charles, as landlord, is given a private Royal box in the ground, adorned with the Prince of Wales’s feathers, but as he has little interest in cricket, he has rarely made use of this unique privilege.

The remainder of the estate includes the following holdings:

All of which makes Prince Charles, through the Duchy of Cornwall, a very rich man indeed. But its capital is inalienable, so he cannot sell any part of it for his personal gain. It must be passed on to the next Prince of Wales.

The Duchy’s property interests range far and wide and includes pubs, office blocks, farms and small businesses. Two hundred and forty tenants rent farms (with the smallest being a ten-acre holding on the Isles of Scilly, with the largest, a 1,600-acre farm on Dartmoor) while there are 1,500 in
residential
accommodation. The portfolio includes 160 miles of foreshore with mineral rights to a further 230,000 acres.

There are one or two strange privileges attached to being Duke of Cornwall, the inhabitants of the Isles of Scilly are required to provide him with 300 puffins every year. No one knows if he has exercised this right as yet. He also has the right to the carcass of any whale that is washed up on his foreshore – and he is legally obliged to dispose of said bodies.

The property and assets of anyone who dies in the Duchy without making a will are passed to the Duchy of Cornwall and it is surprising how much money is
raised in this way. All the proceeds are disposed of through a number of the Prince’s charities.

In order to receive the benefits of the Duchy, the Duke of Cornwall has to undergo an archaic and somewhat embarrassing ritual before being accepted by the people of the county.

In 1973, Prince Charles duly arrived at the ruins of Launceston Castle (one of six the Duchy owns in Cornwall) to take part in a centuries-old ceremony to secure his seigneurial rights.

In keeping with ancient custom, he was presented with: a load of firewood, a grey clock, 100 shillings (a shilling is five pence in today’s currency), a pound of pepper, a hunting bow, a pair of gilt spurs, a pound of herbs, a salmon spear, a pair of falconer’s gauntlets and two greyhounds.

After symbolically accepting the gifts – without having the least idea what they were all to be used for – the Duke of Cornwall directed that they be returned to Launceston Museum where they are on view to the public. The greyhounds, which were on loan, went back to their rightful owner.

A Council with Prince Charles as Chairman administers the Duchy of Cornwall. But he is not just a rubber-stamp figure and he refuses to accept that the prime responsibility of the Duchy is to maximise its profits.

On a number of occasions, the professionals who advise him on the Council have been over-ruled when they have pointed out that it is uneconomical to continue with some of the tiny tenanted farms and smallholdings. He refuses to raise rents or to combine
several smaller properties into larger holdings simply because it makes more business sense. Displaying a deep feeling of social responsibility, he manages a
delicate
balancing act between commercial profitability and concern for his tenants’ welfare, knowing that if he allowed any unpopular moves against his tenants, the media would crucify him.

One thing Prince William can be sure of is that when the time comes for his father to hand over the reins – and profits – of the Duchy of Cornwall to him, they will be in excellent condition.

obody in his or her right mind, even the most dyed-in-the-wool Royalist, would ever dare claim that the Monarchy is run on the cheap.

As the Sovereign is seen as being apart from her people, and should be seen to be so, it follows that Her Majesty, and the institution she represents, should be maintained in a manner that is regal and therefore necessarily expensive.

Few would argue that The Queen is profligate. She does not indulge in frivolous or extravagant
past-times
(those who say her racing interests are merely a rich woman’s pleasures paid for by the taxpayers, find it difficult to accept that she pays every penny out of her own pocket and nothing comes out of the public purse) and her personal tastes reflect those of an upper-class country woman rather than a spoilt
monarch who can have anything she wants merely by lifting a Royal digit.

The British Monarchy is cost-effective. In the United States, the cost of maintaining the President and the White House is far greater than the combined cost of the Monarchy and the Prime Minister in Britain.

Of course, one could argue that the White House is the seat of Government, and the Administration of such an enormous country, with the richest economy in the world, requires a larger budget. It is interesting to note that the Press Office at the White House employs more people than the entire Royal Household, and the security detail for this single property and one married couple and their children, far outnumbers the Royalty and Diplomatic Department of the Metropolitan Police, which guards every diplomatic mission in London as well as the Royal Family.

Nevertheless it has long been a bone of
contention
that The Queen and her family cost the British taxpayers far too much money. And it is true that the entire cost is borne by Britain; the Commonwealth countries, even those of which The Queen is head of state, do not contribute a penny towards the upkeep of the monarchy.

Many republicans believe that the Monarchy
underpins
a class-conscious nation that refuses to move into the twenty-first century and prefers the idea of living in the past. They also say the Monarchy is interested only in its own survival, not the interests of the United Kingdom or its population. It’s an argument that has little support from the majority of British people.

Public interest in the Royal Family continues unabated. The wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton proved that where ‘ordinary’ men and women are concerned there is a huge groundswell of affection and goodwill towards royalty. Otherwise why would hundreds of thousands of people camp out all night in London just to catch a glimpse of the couple on their way to and from Westminster Abbey? And their first overseas tour, to Canada and the United States, proved that there is still a fascination with all things Royal, with a media frenzy matched only by tens of thousands of fans – and that is the only word that can truly describe the onlookers who turned out to greet William and Catherine – everywhere they went. Hollywood’s own ‘royalty’ took second place to the real thing.

William and Catherine have already, in the short space of a few months, established their credentials as block-busting celebrities. So, if public popularity is the yardstick by which the success or otherwise of the Monarchy is measured, the race is already won.

Would this have happened if it had been just a film star or sports celebrity? Hardly. There is something very special about the British Royal Family that sets them apart from everyone else, even other
monarchies
. The late President Ronald Reagan summed it up perfectly when he said, ‘With respect to every other king or queen in the world, when we speak about “The Queen” we all know which one we are talking about.’ He meant, of course, Elizabeth II.

The Queen has been on the throne for sixty years and throughout that time every national poll has
indicated that the Monarchy remains the single most popular institution in Britain.

There have been occasional blips, particularly in 1997 over the death of the late Diana, Princess of Wales, when the Royal Family in general and The Queen in particular, were accused of treating her with too little sympathy and understanding and thereby indirectly being the cause of the tragedy.

The wave of anti-Royal feeling lasted only for a few days, but at the time it caused deep concern among the family. There remains some feeling of antipathy towards the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall in a few parts of the world. But as the years pass, attitudes soften and Charles and Camilla have become accepted as a happily married couple. Eventually even the romantic image of Diana will gradually fade from public memory, as today, most of the younger
generation
cannot understand what all the fuss was about when Charles and Diana divorced.

Since 1952 when Elizabeth II ascended the Throne, Britain’s reputation as an industrial and
manufacturing
nation has steadily declined, yet the influence of the Monarchy, through the person of The Queen, has grown immeasurably.

Where our political power has diminished, Her Majesty’s influence has increased, to the position where it is now one of the few aspects of Britain that still commands international admiration and respect.

Part of that success must be that The Queen, the most experienced head of state in the world, treats everyone the same. She is a great leveller, with no favourites. Prime Ministers and Presidents,
Archbishops and Artisans; all receive exactly the same courteous greeting – and all are kept at arms length! She makes no distinction between her subjects and the heads of state of any other country, no matter how powerful or otherwise they may be.

There is a mistaken belief that because The Queen comes from such a rarefied background, she is only comfortable among others from similar, if not the same, origins: affluent aristocrats from ancient families. This is totally untrue. The Royal Family lives in a social category entirely its own. But as a pragmatist, The Queen realises that no longer is it possible to expect social intercourse and even
intermarriage
between European royalty exclusively as it once was.

Hence the acceptance of The Queen’s
granddaughter
marrying, with her blessing, a lower middle-class lad from Yorkshire, who happens to play rugby for his country, and doesn’t speak with a cut-glass accent.

Britain’s Royal Family is unique in that its senior members ‘The Firm’, who undertake public duties, are not expected to involve themselves in any outside commercial activities (with the possible exception of the Prince of Wales and his Duchy of Cornwall enterprises).

While their European counterparts in Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Belgium and The Netherlands all work (and travel on public transport) it would be unthinkable for the Duke of Edinburgh (in his early days) or the Princess Royal to be associated with outside businesses while still receiving money from public funds.

The junior and ‘semi-detached’ members like Prince Michael of Kent, Sir Tim Laurence, Peter and Zara Phillips are required to earn a living, but as they are not involved in Royal affairs, no one objects. In fact, if they didn’t engage in productive employment, critics would soon lump them together as ‘free-
loading
’ Royals.

The Royal Household is far from perfect, with too many servants fervently holding the belief that royalty is infallible in all things. When in reality they are just as liable as the rest of us to commit sins and errors – it’s just that they will never admit to their mistakes, they simply ignore them.

There is a seamless continuity about the Household that ensures its stability. In the many years I have been a visitor to Buckingham Palace on a frequent though irregular basis, I have seen a number of changes – not all of them improvements.

One thing that has struck me quite forcibly is the lack of individual personalities one meets in the Palace corridors these days. There’s a sameness about the people who work there. There used to be the odd eccentric who was tolerated because The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh liked having them around, so their little peccadilloes were accepted. All that seems to have disappeared. Efficiency has replaced
enthusiasm
, which I suppose makes for a smoother running operation. But in an organisation as large as the Royal Household surely there could still be a place for the occasional oddball?

The Queen and Prince Philip are in the autumn of their lives. Her Majesty is twenty-five years past the
official retiring age for women, while her husband could have claimed his old age pension (if he was
entitled
to one) some thirty years ago. Both have senior rail cards with Prince Philip having his blown up to poster size that now adorns one of the walls in his saloon on the Royal Train.

They have both fulfilled their roles with flawless professionalism for sixty years and they have proved, that in the institution of Monarchy, Britain and the Commonwealth has certainly got value for money.

There is no one working at Buckingham Palace who was there when Elizabeth II came to the throne as a twenty-five-year-old Queen in 1952. Her current Prime Minister, David Cameron, wasn’t even born when she was crowned. She is the constant presence who has ensured the stability of the Monarchy through some turbulent periods: the Falklands Campaign, Britain’s involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan,
domestic
recession, devolution and the divorces of three of her children.

So if Her Majesty seeks comfort from time to time in the company of her Corgis, who can blame her? Even if they are yappy, snappy, hated by most of the Household and apt to nip at the ankles of unwary footmen.