or let's drag ourselves into the 21st century and have a democratic process to elect our parliament and head of state.

The obverse of your banal point about Charles v x holds true too. EG Queen Diana v President Thatcher. Of course, you missed a point that only 2 out of 5 of your list were elected. There are some who might suggest that Mr Lincoln might well have done his country proud.

It may be that you are happy to live your life subserviant to a non-elected head of state, regardless of any principles of democracy, but to describe t any individual who thinks about and strives for more democracy in this country as a twat is an archaic and primitive perspective.

As a stab in the dark the combined civil list costs of the monarchy is around £10m, which I know is a fair amount in these cash straped times. This is split up between all the royals and there are a number of other incomes as well. As has already been stated, heads of state don't come much cheaper, if anything they can be alot more expensive.

However, to me the really whinge about £10m of tax payers going to the royals is missing the point. The Queen gives the income (profit) from the crown estates (her land and houses) to the Govt / taxpayer. This amounts to somewhere in the region of £200m per year. Overall, the taxpayer is some £190m up each year due to the royal family and I wouldn't even attempt to put a figure on the goodwill etc they project on the many engagements they undertake.

I think that the PoW gives damned good value for money and anyone who says he doesn't should just look at the pure monetary values, and carry on normal whinging.

www.thecrownestate.co....tfolio.htm

www.royal.gov.uk/TheRo...lList.aspx

I suspect that there is some obscuration over the figures admitted to in your links! I doubt that the genuine figures are ever published.

It was only very recently that any tax was paid on income generated by their business activities, so don't be fooled into a naive belief that these figures are accurate.

But, it's not the cost that is the issue.

You're right - it's not the cost. If it was, the MPs (our elected, so-called representatives) would not have just paid back 1/20th of that amount (£500,000) back into the public coffers - that's £500,000 they admit they should not have claimed for, tax free.

Subservience? Should I offer my oath of allegience to Gordon Brown instead? Should I offer it to Tony Blair? If not HM, then who should I offer my allegience? Whom should I serve?

Now is when you say 'nobody'. Thus, none of us should have a boss, a guvnor, a head honcho, a leader. We should serve no man or woman, only ideals! How quaint. Who's ideals? Who's moral code? Who's laws? Who should make them? Do we simply do as we will, with no consequence?

If you remove the Monarchy, you leave us with nothing, nothing but the fat, greedy, lying, self serving scumbags who claim the moral, legal and elected right to make our rules, to levy money from our pockets, and then decide how it is spent - and no alternative, no overwatch, no ruler who we can turn to if it all goes wrong - only those career pigs, who fought tooth and nail to climb up the greasy pole of corruption, stabbing each other in the back and face on the way up. The most succesful at this game of deceipt, corruption and greed gets to lead us, run our economy, decide which wars we shall fight, who gets paid, and who dies.

Neither Prince Charles nor Her Majesty are in their roles through an innate ability to lie, steal and back-stab - having been born to the role, they are there purely to serve in it - for the betterment of Britain. They have demonstrated their devotion to us and our lands for many, many, many years. It is not for them to swan off and make millions out of book deals, or speaking tours, regailing us with tales of conversion to religion, whilst seeking to pontificate from the moral high ground.

Her Majesty hasn't retired - Her work goes on. Her son, born to be a Prince and then a King has served our nation for most of his life, child and adult. He hasn't made the most of it, filled his pockets and then p!ssed off to some lucrative job in a bank somewhere - he works on, and he will not retire.

Not from Her Majesty do we hear 'I'm no leavin 'til ah get wut ahm due! A didnae do this joab all this tahm t'naw git mah due' like the ennobled Speaker of the House Michael Martin.

Tell us, o sage Republican - who shall watch those that govern us?

Worry not Biped, come the revolution the Republicans will be up against the wall.

We need our Royal Family. They desreve the money and do a lot for our country overseas. Leave them alone.

And the kind that allows Liz to dissolve Parliament and forcibly remove the government if Gordon stops taking his pills and tries to cling to power via a State of Emergency.

And the kind that allows Liz to refuse the Royal Assent if Labour decide to pass legislation to make MPs immune to prosecution before the next general election.

Call me an old-fashioned democrat but... try the electorate.

I find it extraordinary tha you trot out the same tired and rather puerile argument about today's politicians every time. It is immaterial to the argument about democracy.

By extrapolation, your argument would seem to suggest that you would rather be ruled by a non-elected govt. If you are content with that then that is fine, but it smacks of an individual who does not want to have a say in the running of this country and is happy to have law foisted upon them. I would far rather be governed by an elected parliament with a head of state that is elected by the people, than have a head of state that is thrust into that position by virtue of northing more than birth.

It happens that the queen (as an individual) would be somewhere near the top of the list of people that i would vote for as I believe that she has all the qualities that one needs and expects from a head of state. But I would rather have a say in it than have it forced upon me. That, however, is by the by - it is the principle of democracy that is important here.

The queen does have that power, but only technically. If she tried it these days, it would be taken away, most likely the monarchy would go with it. However, the royal family cost us about 20p a head per uk citizen, they work extremely hard for our country, and are part of our heritage. why would you want to be a republican? In what way would the royal family offend you? Its a plus for our country, and we have precious few of those these days.

Interesting points on both sides here; but when it comes to the question of a Presidency in a British Republic, what type of Presidency are we talking about?

An executive Presidency, such as that in the US, where the President wields real power.

Or a titular/symbolic President, like that of Israel or Germany, who does not wield significant power, but nevertheless acts as Head of State.

Another question one might ask is what sort of person desires to hold such an office?

Is it the desire to wield power for the good of the people?

Is it personal: vainity, the seduction of power, monetary?

What is their motivation?

Although I find the idea of a Presidency entertaining, I think the system we have is better. The Royal Family are above party politics, they have instilled themselves with a sense of proprietal duty and responsibilty to us, their subjects. Something that has been shown time and time again by Her Majesty, and more latterly her son Charles.

Yes by a whimsy of history and tradition (and some highly entertaining political skullduggery over the last ohhh say 1000 years) they are born into the role, it is thrust upon them, bound by it and imprisoned. But they accept it with grace and determination, more so than we have ever seen any President, politician or Prime Minister in the last 200 or so years.

Do we really want another Blair, or a Nixon, or a Bush to be our Head of State, a character seduced by the trappings of power, a character that would wield it come what may in direct competition to the will of the people.

No let us keep what we have, bind our politicians with ropes of duty and chains of convention, let them understand that they act both by the sufferance of the people and in the name of the Crown.

Why wouldnt you wish to be republican most other countries seem to get by without wasting millions on these parasites, two members work hard the rest should be got shot of

Last edited by auxie on Wed Jun 24, 2009 6:37 pm; edited 1 time in total

At least Charles is Monarchy, and he's not actually been accused of milking and defrauding the public, nor the electorate. Am I wrong?

Personally, the multi million ££££ awards in the private sector, to BBC Directors, MP's, Chief Executives, Utilities, Bankers and anyone else with their noses in the public trough, are obscene. They give nothing, do nothing, sat on their lardy @@ses waiting for the pay off.

There are other reasons I might support the Monarchy, but in this day and age, with the loony brigade and the state this country is in, no-one really thinks I'll explain those? Like fcuk...

£3Million for representing the UK on state visits is peanuts, compared to the amount of revenue brought into UK PLC by the visitors who flock to see the trappings of our Monarchy, I believe opening Buckingham Palace each year nets something like £12Million each year. Each visitor is jobs in the Hotel, catering and travel industries. The royal palaces and their private estates create thousands of jobs and provide much needed income to many families in rural areas.

The Queen pays tax on her personal income, as does Charles. The Royal Household is run in a cost efficient manner, and costs me as a taxpayer less than £1 per year to maintain for their state duties. Not something I cold say for the 650 odd parasites that occupy the palaces of Westminster.

A Presidency with the potential of Blair and his Hideous wife occupying the position is just too horrifying to contemplate. Long may they (the Royal Family) reign over us. They do an exceptional job.

I disagree that it is a 'waste' but anyway, we (as in the taxes we pay) pay for 2 members of the Royal Family, i.e. HM the Queen and HRH DoE. We do not pay for them to do nothing, the expenditure is purely for those duties carried out on behalf of the government, as requested by the government.

The PoW afaik gets some of the money usually allocated to HM when he has carried out duties on her behalf (usually foreign trips).

All other members of the royal family are funded either by thier own personal finances (including jobs in some cases) or from the Queen's own purse.

The majority of the money paid to HM by the government covers the manpower required to run the royal estates, somethign that the government would have to do anyway if they wished to keep the tourists rolling in. The only other expenditure is for security, which would be required for a president anyway.

We get a sum of about £200 milliong each year from the royal estates, and pay back to the royals approx £9 million, that looks a pretty good deal in my books.

So infact the Royal family costs us less than a president would (as he would draw a wage) and they do a shed load more for this country than any president I know of has done for thiers.

S_R

It would be good to see a coherent argument that puts the case for a monarchy as opposed to a democracy.

The economic arguments and the comments about today's crop of politicians are not convincing arguments in favour of a monarchy and against a sound democratic system. At the crux of this argument lies the essential question of how we would like to see our political system - keep the status quo or change it in favour of a more democratic one? I grant that no political system is perfect, but surely we should strive for a democratic utopia and better political systems than sticking with an archaic throwback to feudalism?

And, of course, the flip side of that is thankfully neither Fergie, Edward, Andrew or Diana will ever be the head of state. Had they been, I don't suppose that you would be saying long may they reign over us once they have sold their souls to Hello or OK magazine, or filmed their relatives at St Andrews to make some cash, or committed adultery and etc. They, too, are human and fallible - the difference is that you and I have absolutely no say over whether they are in that position or not.

Im not espousing any argument, the Royal Family are there and have been for hundreds of years in this country, there is no need to change the arrangement, I am perfectly happy with the way it functions. Its not broken so why try to fix it.

If you want to see what happens when you try to "change" things look at the state of the House of Lords, and now the House of Commons. Meddling by a government that had no clue what it wanted to achieve has done more to despoil democracy in this country than anything in our history. When people pronounce change for more democracy be careful what you wish for, because the opportunity for politicians to meddle with the running of the democratic processes is simply an opportunity for them to reform it more in their favour, and achieve less choice for the citizen.

Any thoughts that Brown and his cronies will do anything to "improve democracy" or amend the voting system in the favour of the electorate are simply pipe dreams, and will achieve anything but an improvement to our democratic processes.

I hate to break it to you but there is no such thing as a 'democratic utopia', can't exist until every person involved has equal representation and a full knowledge of the facts and everyone elses opinion. Scale precludes this unless we start becoming borg like and have a joint conciousness.

Also what specifically is wrong with a feudalistic approach to life? it works in one form or another in a large number of countries in the world, including here.

The monarchy gives us several benefits over a political head of state.

Independance - they don't need to run the populist way just to get re-elected. they can offer advice and direction without having to make 'friends' in the political circle.
Continuity - the current royal family have a personal link to almost every person in this country, they have lived through the same times and have seen the changes.
International links - If we are dealing with 'democratic' states send the prime minister....if we are dealing with other monarchys then send a royal...a president doesn't have the same affect.

Personally I think a Monarchy is a great thing and we should treasure it and foster it so that it can keep benefiting the country.

S_R

p.s. suppose breaking it to you, that I'm a monarchist, now might be a bit late?

I dont have a problem with that, if you are so keen to live in a Republic, im sure that these guys will accomodate you:

Linky

Your next statement refutes this comment - the system is clearly imperfect and needs a radical overhaul. Any political system should be subject to regular scrutiny from the top to the bottom and should be robust enough to change where appropriate. The current system is comfortable for too many powerful people - it is undemocratic and archaic.


How can a democratic election of head of state offer less choice for the citizen than the current system?


I dread Brown's meddling as much as you. He process for change needs to be handled sensitively and very carefully - the oafish, clumsy meddling that is symptomatic of this current govt would, I agree, probably create more pain than gain. But they are not here for long.....