In not wanting The Pope to visit uk at the taxpayers expense?

[Alouiseg]

Apparently The visit wil cost 12m pounds. That's 12 million pounds to be pinched from other budgets. For a man who has been responsible for covering up crimes against children.

My MP will receive an email today and I will make my abhorrence very clear.

[girlsyearapart]

He is going to drive up my Mum and Dad's road- they had door to door visits from the police months ago so I can well believe that cost.

[PaulineCampbellJones]

Here we go again....

[BeenBeta]

Its the same when any Head of State visits.

[frikonastick]

does anyone know why the tax payer pays for this? genuine question. is it because he is a visitng head of state? and if so, does it/ did it cost millions when say bush came over. or any other head of state.

[frikonastick]

ah. thank you beenbeta

[SirBoobAlot]

This was done a few months ago. But FWIW, YANBU.

[mrsbuggywinkle]

It doesn't make any sense to me. With all of the cuts, why not just bring over whichever head of state needs to come for a chat, skip the public visiting stuff and send them back again?

Surely its the security costs of doing the public appearance stuff that is both expensive and unnecessary...

[mumblechum]

YANBU.

I can't see 1m people turning out to greet him as they did when John Paul II went to Ireland.
If anything, I've heard that people may turn up on the streets to silently protest by turning their backs when his motorcade comes through. I wonder if that will actually happen?

[Eve4Walle]

I don't want him here either, it's a criminal waste of money in my opinion.

Lets face it, for millions of people in the UK, his visit means nothing.

[mumblechum]

And I know that he's technically a head of state, but come on. I've seen bigger Tescos than the vatican.

[LadyBiscuit]

There's 4.5 million Catholics in the UK. Why don't they fund his visit if they want him to come? Who invited him anyway?

[hocuspontas]

I think with all the public spending cuts they should just video-cam him in the Vatican and parade a big screen through the streets with him waving on it.

[mumblechum]

Or not even bother doing that.

[hocuspontas]

[ilovemydogandMrObama]

Think the reason the Pope's visit is disproportionately more expensive than other visiting head of states is that he will be visiting the public, rather than say, another head of state who mainly stays close to London and in diplomatic circles.

don't see what the relevance of the size of the Vatican has to do with anything? Are we suggesting that the geographical size of a state determines the importance?

[PaulineCampbellJones]

LadyBiscuit - church has been collecting for this for months so some of it is being paid for by the people. I don't think the taxpayer should be paying for it by the way but that also goes for our own Royals protection money when they go to the World Cup etc.

[LadyBiscuit]

I think the Church is putting in £5m. So less than half. Given that the majority of the UK population think he's implicated in covering up systematic sexual abuse, I really don't want to stump up the rest.

[EricNorthmansmistress]

YANBU.

Grrr.

[Jasonthunderpants]

I know what you mean about taxes
I dont want my taxes spent on
Librarys(dont read books)
subsidised theatre(dont go)
The upkeep of roads(dont drive)
Free school meals and other subsidised thing for the needy(we have to pay )
illegal imigrants being looked after,they should be deported imediatly
I could go on
what benefits do i get from these things?

[EricNorthmansmistress]

The pope coming here will benefit, the catholic faith.

So let the Catholics pay. I agree that the Dome etc were a huge waste of money but at least the idea was that they would bring in tourist revenue, as will the Olympics. The Pope is just a figurehead of a religion that most British people do not subscribe to and his visit will benefit us not one bit. I wish he was not coming.

[LadyBiscuit]

That's right jason, those are all exactly the same as funding a visit by the head of a religion