I'm fucking sick of Harry and Meghan already

[ssd]

I don't care if they got engaged or hey went to the moon, I'm sick of the constant media nonsense about them already

the gov will be delighted, finally something to take attention away from the fuck up that is brexit

OP I agree with you.

And if you are interested in the actual news, the whole boring irrelevant nonsense is every bleedin where, there is no escape from it

I am no friend to the monarchy but I think we shouldn’t overlook how difficult it would be to get rid of the monarch. The concept of the crown is stitched into our constitutional arrangements which are unwritten and have evolved over centuries.
We can’t manage to agree on what we should do with the House of Lords and this is much more complex.

I object to paying a penny for it, whilst being forced to choke down continued austerity,

Well, yes. That too.. obvs..

The post I was responding to has gone now, so the context of my post isn't really clear anymore.

Wow ive seen nothing op on it apart from on mn post about catherine which has had me laughing

It's everywhere!

.. would she be marrying him if they'd met while he washed her car? .. NOPE

for christs sake londonrach, do you live on the moon?

I am fucking sick of threads bashing them.

Change the record. yawn....

Well, do we know which of the palaces are property of the UK and which are personal property of the family?

I can research, thanks, but I don’t think there are simple answers out there. When the IFS does a cost benefit analysis of ditching the monarchy and replacing it with a president I’ll be interested to see it.

Until then, I’ll go on thinking there is not a good enough reason to ditch them.

It isn’t an easy question - people often assume we’ll appropriate the queen’s personal family wealth but that is a massive assumption that would be legally problematic if we start appropriating the wealth belonging to individuals.

Let me Google that for you. You are right that its not completely clear how much personal wealth the queen has we do know what she doesn't own. Here's a bit on it and a link to the full article.

According to the Sunday Times, she has an investment portfolio consisting largely of shares in blue-chip British companies, which it valued at £110m.
The Queen also owns personal property including Sandringham House in Norfolk, Balmoral Castle in Aberdeenshire and other smaller houses.
Other personal goods include the royal stamp collection, art, jewels, cars, horses and the Queen Mother's legacy, which all add to her personal fortune.

How rich is the Queen?
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-33253411

I'd like to be pleased for people in love and going to be married, and maybe it will work out and they will have a long and happy marriage (stranger things have happened). But they met quite recently and don't seem to have that many obvious similarities (not that this necessarily matters) and I think all the public fuss about it is slightly irritating. Harry is very unlikely to be King, and although I'm sure he will continue with his family's charity work etc doesn't really need to be a public figure in the way he is being presented. I think they should be married quietly and with the minimum of fuss, and that the marriage doesn't need to be on television (but I suppose it will be anyway).

Funny how quickly they got the announcement out after the news broke that granny had been creative with an offshore tax haven isn’t it?

Truly fucking depressing how well it works though.

‘Aww families are hungry, we are freezing benefits, overturning legal judgements because we hate the disabled and our favourite pet leeches are being shown in a bit of an unfavourable light? Nevermind...look at this shiny thing. It’s nice isn’t it?’

None of the palaces are the property of the government. Balmoral and Sandringham are personally owned by the Queen. Others are owned by the Crown Estate. Most of the revenue from the Crown Estate currently goes to the government, but it is not owned by the government, but administered on behalf of the monarch. I suppose it might be possible to get the Royal Family to agree that all the revenues from the Crown Estate should go to the government if the monarchy was abolished, but legally I don't see how you could just declare this under current laws. The amount the government could receive as an extra would be about 35 million, and that certainly would be something, but tourism would probably at least decline, and it would not be enough to make much difference to taxes.

"granny had been creative with an offshore tax haven"

Granny, as head of state, is exempt from paying tax. But she does anyhow. And there was no suggestion whatsoever that her team had done anything even close to illegal with their overseas investments,

Remember she is also head of the Commonwealth, and head of state for dependent territories. So she isn't a foreigner in those places.

Are all heads of state exempt from paying tax, or is that another special perk of the monarchy?

yes, i can't see it's worth the pain, the fact that the Queen is a rich woman is really neither here nor there in terms of abolishing the monarchy unless we're saying we're going to appropriate her personal wealth - and if we are, why would we stop at the Queen's private wealth when there are plenty of other aristocrats holding huge chunks of land because of historical luck?

It'd require too much imo radical land reform and undermine 300 years of legal history to do this.

I don't really want another dimwit in charge doing ceremonial stuff over this lot, there would certainly be costs involved in making such a change to destroy the monarchy.

Can't see the point, and as you say, the big changes we're trying with devolution, brexit, house of lords reform are all in their infancy, what's the rush?

Can't see the point, and as you say, the big changes we're trying with devolution, brexit, house of lords reform are all in their infancy, what's the rush?

I would have though that making fundamental changes to the way our country works with no clear plan for how to do it is all the rage these days.

I don't care what they do, I just don't want to pay for them. We can't afford them.

I don't care what they do, I just don't want to pay for them. We can't afford them.

Quite. Meghan is now just one more minor full time royal financed by us that we do not need.

Harry complains profusely about the intrusion into their lives. Well why dont they go to the USA and work and live as private people? Nah they want their freebies.

in a country where the winner of a baking contest is big news, it shouldn't be a surprise that there is an appetite for a frilly-frock party. Many of course go wild over their own, so will take great interest in a grown woman dressed like a toilet roll cover.

good luck to them but bet they wish they could do 15 mins in the registry office!

So bloody annoying when all people can find to say is, "Well, don't watch/read it then" or worse, "If you have nothing nice to say, don't say anything".

It's fucking everywhere and close to impossible to avoid. And whenever there's a big story, EVERYONE should be entitled to their opinion, whatever it is. The censure from a bunch of bossy women on here is seriously fucking annoying.

Meghan is going to be a bigger disaster for the BRF than Di & Fergie put together, I am certain. A faux "humanitarian" who's already talking about helping the "poor little commonwealth children" and so fucking vain she's almost a parody of herself.

That she's in this for the glory is without question.

"Oh, I didn't really know who he was...I just asked, "Is he nice?" What shit. She had a mug on her desk at Suits with, "Keep Calm, Harry's Still Single" on it. And her IG was covered in pics of Di that she took down just before the relationship leaked...you can see all her followers asking where they went.

Seems to be that Meghan Markle and the truth are not well acquainted.

Well I don’t see why my post which predicted their divorce was deleted.

Possibly someone had a different opinion? Oops.

I didn’t know we were a mouthpiece for the royal family and we self censor accordingly.

I think Meghan is a fake. I think she’s playing Harry, and he’s roadkill, lamped in the headlights of her veneered smile. Marry in haste, repent in leisure.

I give it 6 years.

Who is he? Is he nice... ha ha ha
There’s a picture of her sitting outside buck palace...
who is he? Please. She’s had him in her sights for years.

He’s easy meat because of the loss of his mum, like most people in his position are.

She’s no sister of mine FYI.
My kin are honest people, who aren’t predatory.
She’s already shown herself to be a liar, and her body language sets off the red flags for me.

Good luck Harry! You’ll need it.

Marry in haste, repent in leisure.

They've been together for over a year haven't they? And it will be 18 months when they are married. What's hasty about that?

One year?

One birthday, one Christmas, one everything. That's all they've had.

They have never lived together either.

It is too soon all things considered.

They do live together!