to think the Queen should refuse this gift?

[WitchesSpelleas]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54915124

"A committee of MPs and peers has been set up to choose a gift "fit" for the Queen to mark the 70th anniversary of her accession, in 2022.
Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden said it would be a "token of our respect". For her Diamond Jubilee in 2012, the Queen had a stained-glass window created for her in Westminster Hall."

The Queen has everything she could possibly need, and the money to buy anything she could want.

This gift will be funded by donations from MPs - of course, it's up to them how they want to spend their money - but at a time when so many of her subjects are struggling financially due to the impact of Covid19, I think it would be appropriate for the Queen to ask the MPs to make a donation to a UK charity instead of spending the money on a Platinum Jubilee gift.

Tourists will always pay more to try to see them. No one pays to try to see a president

If that’s the only argument for keeping a monarchy rather than having a fair democratic presidency then God help us. We must be the laughing stock of the world.

Since all the the adult Waleses and Yorks are now married, and Prince George is only 7, it'll probably be another 20 years before the next state Royal Wedding

You're forgetting the Windsor's plentiful history of divorce and possible remarriage ... I'd say second marriages would be unlikely to be made public affairs, but it worked (or rather, was made to) for Charles

Positive thinking 😂😂

I do my best!! And yes, that was a very good point about the "tourist guide" thing. I'm not even a Londoner but have done more than my own fair share, and the ooohs and aaahs get a bit thin after a while

I think the queen is a disgrace the way she paraded her vile son Andrew after that interview. Almost like she condones his behaviour.

we've already established that the Queen's idea of work is what most of us would deem a series of luxury day trips

We haven’t established anything. That’s what you said. I haven’t seen anyone agree with you. It’s not my idea of a luxury day trip.

I haven’t seen anyone agree with you.

You missed the post at 14:03:04 then?

My question remains unanswered - if they are not luxury day trips, how would you describe being chauffeured in a limo to be shown round a town with your own personal tour guide, being fed, waited upon and then chauffeured home again? (While having someone doing all your housework and cooking your meal for you at home?)

You're forgetting the Windsor's plentiful history of divorce and possible remarriage ... I'd say second marriages would be unlikely to be made public affairs, but it worked (or rather, was made to) for Charles

I imagine that was only because he is the heir apparent. I couldn't see it happening, if, say, Eugenie were to divorce and remarry. And in the unlikely event that Charles divorced Camilla and married someone else, I don't think even being the heir apparent would be enough to get him a public wedding.

I’ll answer your question a different way. A luxury day trip for me would be a first class ticket to London with breakfast en route, coffee at the Ritz, an exhibition in a museum or gallery, afternoon tea at Fortnum and Mason, a West End show and dinner before returning home first class. All without having to talk to anyone.

What it wouldn’t be is being carted round some tedious public building, making small talk and shaking endless hands. And having strangers in my face every minute of the day. Princess Anne did that over 500 times last year. Fuck that for a luxury day trip.

What it wouldn’t be is being carted round some tedious public building, making small talk and shaking endless hands. And having strangers in my face every minute of the day. Princess Anne did that over 500 times last year. Fuck that for a luxury day trip.

Anyone who works in a customer-facing role has to do all that - except, they don't get chauffeured there and back, they are more likely to be shouted at than fawned on, and to be asked difficult questions rather than flattered with small-talk. And they're doing it for 8 or more hour shifts, not a couple of hours at most.

Any ordinary citizen who works with the general public would regard the Queen's version of work as a holiday. Let alone having all your housework done, meals cooked, clothes laid out for you - by all accounts the Royals don't even squeeze their own toothpaste.

... and even if the Queen is so spoilt and lazy that she does regard this as 'work' - she gets five months' holiday from it every year.

I think the queen is a disgrace the way she paraded her vile son Andrew after that interview. Almost like she condones his behaviour

From the reactions at the time it's pretty clear that many would agree
Even as a republican I expected better of her than that, and while we can all have a blind spot with our DCs, this effective "two fingers to the public" was unfortunate in the extreme

Anyone who works in a customer-facing role has to do all that

They don’t get accused of their work being a “luxury day trip” though, do they? Or go on working until they drop.

They don’t get accused of their work being a “luxury day trip” though, do they?

No, because it's missing the luxury elements - the chauffeured limo, the cleaning and polishing of their surroundings in their honour, the finest local delicacies being served at lunch, the attendants walking behind to attend to their every need.

Or go on working until they drop.

With retirement age at 67 and rising, pensions decimated by economic decline, you are optimistic if you think the majority of people won't have to work as long as they're physically able to.

@Andante57

of course, it's up to them how they want to spend their money

This.

Where do you think the majority of MP money comes from?

Where do you think the majority of MP money comes from?

Same place as teachers’ and nurses’. Are you going to argue with how they spend their money?

But my life could be luxurious compared to some. Are folk spitting behind me in the supermarket now because I’m no longer buying value tomato tins and bread to last a week or 10 days? Do they curse me for buying the best I can afford now to keep my parents well fed and healthy? Are people unhappy because I ‘wait’ on my parents? Clean their house for them? On top of being out of the house for work 15 hours a day?

I fully expect to be working in some fashion past 67. Possibly even past 80 if I hold out.

And still I would not want to swap with the Queen.

And the Queen is going on for as long as she is physically able too by the looks of it.

@stillsomewhatsheldonesque

But my life could be luxurious compared to some. Are folk spitting behind me in the supermarket now because I’m no longer buying value tomato tins and bread to last a week or 10 days? Do they curse me for buying the best I can afford now to keep my parents well fed and healthy? Are people unhappy because I ‘wait’ on my parents? Clean their house for them? On top of being out of the house for work 15 hours a day?

I fully expect to be working in some fashion past 67. Possibly even past 80 if I hold out.

And still I would not want to swap with the Queen.

And the Queen is going on for as long as she is physically able too by the looks of it.

Everything is relative, and of course there are people in the depths of poverty who would regard the lives of the average working person who manages to make ends meet as luxurious. My point is, it's those people we should be funding - not the average working person and certainly not the Queen.

The Queen has never had to queue at the supermarket, whether to buy value tinned tomatoes or Waitrose's finest quails' eggs. The Queen has never cleaned her own house, let alone her parents' as well.

The point is that the money and luxury of the Queen's life is stratospherically in excess of that of the average working person, and even of people who'd generally be regarded as well off, those with incomes of £100k+ per annum.

As for going on as long as physically possible - I could 'work' forever if I was being chauffeured about here and there, and had no housework to do.

If the Queen feels under the weather there'll be a top physician at her bedside before she can so much as clear her throat.

If I feel under the weather, I have to crack on with it - or phone the surgery at different times for three days running before getting through to someone. My husband needs a test at the hospital - he was given an appointment in September - for April 2021.

The gulf between the life of the Royals and the life of ordinary citizens cannot be underestimated, and it's obscene to heap gifts on people who are already so privileged.

There is a gulf between me now and the past me who was terribly poor. I never hated anyone for being richer than me.

The gift will not be for her or for her lifelong enjoyment because she isn’t going to be here forever. But it will be something to commemorate her service.

I’m sorry you are struggling for appointments. I haven’t for my parents - well, not more than normal. There have always been waiting lists. You can’t blame the Queen for that.

Appointments for anything are harder to get just now due to Covid - not the Queen.

We all crack on with it when we are unwell. Including the Queen I suspect.

Why are you not asking about the astronomical salaries of footballers? Oligarchs? Film stars? Pop stars? We fund them, if indirectly.

You are not a royalist. I am. And never the Twain shall meet. But if you have something to say about how anyone spends their own money - however it be funded - or how the nation spends its money - then write to your MP and see if you can change things.

But to not celebrate her reign is mean spirited.

Why are you not asking about the astronomical salaries of footballers? Oligarchs? Film stars? Pop stars? We fund them, if indirectly

Footballers, pop stars and film stars are rich because their work is popular. There are people who are prepared to pay whatever the monthly charge is to have Sky Sports, Sky Movies, Netflix etc. and that filters through to remunerate the celebrities who appear on them.

I've never paid a penny to watch football (you'd have to pay me to watch it) or bought any football merchandise, so I disagree that I indirectly fund footballers' high salaries. People who do pay to watch football must think the players are worth it - I don't, personally, but I don't pay for them. I don't have any subscription TV, so in terms of music and film stars, I only fund those who I personally think are worth it, in the form of buying the occasional CD or DVD.

As for oligarchs - again, it's my choice what businesses and products I use. I don't have to fund anyone whose output I don't value.

There are plenty of things ‘my’ money is spent on that I don’t agree with or ‘use’ but it is how our mps have chosen to spend it (for the good of the nation) and that is that.

We have differing opinions on royalty and that is also that.

There will always be the rich and there will always be folk on their uppers. Guess what? That will not change either.

But you started this thread on why the Queen should refuse a gift to mark her reign. And have gone on to something else entirely. You said yourself you can’t tell anyone how to spend their money when it comes to a gift. But you seem to think the Queen should. Do you tell everyone to give your gifts to charity?

I say there should be something to mark her reign. You don’t.

I bet there will be though.

There are plenty of things ‘my’ money is spent on that I don’t agree with or ‘use’ but it is how our mps have chosen to spend it (for the good of the nation) and that is that

I would say the same thing, but I do try to use my vote on the MP I think is likely to make best use of my money.

There will always be the rich and there will always be folk on their uppers. Guess what? That will not change either.

It certainly won't if we just sit back and accept it won't change. Go back 120 years - we could have said 'women can't vote and men can - that won't change' - but people didn't, they set out to make a change. Nothing in society would ever change if we just accepted inequality as something we had to live with.

But you started this thread on why the Queen should refuse a gift to mark her reign. And have gone on to something else entirely.

Well, that's the way of threads. E.g. you raised an interesting point about footballers and oligarchs, so I replied to explain why I don't think they fall into the same category as the Royals.

You said yourself you can’t tell anyone how to spend their money when it comes to a gift. But you seem to think the Queen should. Do you tell everyone to give your gifts to charity?

If they were proposing to buy me something I already had lots of, I'd either tell them not to or donate it to charity myself. I explained earlier in the thread, I don't move in circles where much gift-going goes on.

But it isn’t a gift for her.

The sparkly crystal corgi keyring would be a different matter

You should be the next president. All Saint WitchesSpelleas who donates most of her wages to foodbank charity. But not some local one. That would be unfair.
All hail new ruler in her studio flat in the cheapest part of London.

@WitchesSpelleas

The cost of turning a stately home into a 'training facility' - including bringing people out from the cities into the middle of the countryside - would far outstrip any benefits.

It could be paid for from the immense wealth the Royals have, which is benefiting no one but the Royals at present.

Plus, these are historical properties which are part of the nation's heritage and need to be preserved as such for future generations.

You might have a point if these properties were open to the public but the majority are not. They are being preserved for future generations of the Royal Family only.

Why not get James Dyson to pay for it?

For that matter, we could make sure all the gifts he gets, from anyone, are sold to do so. And maybe any property he owns except one or two.

@stillsomewhatsheldonesque

But it isn’t a gift for her.

The sparkly crystal corgi keyring would be a different matter

I keep checking Swarovski site after thos thread. Eventually they will make it😂

But it isn’t a gift for her.

Well, we don't know what it is yet! I agree, my money is not on the corgi keyring but no clue has been given as to what it will actually be. It was described in the article linked in the OP as being 'a gift for the Queen'. If it turns out not to be that, all well and good, but I'm only going on what parliament have told us so far.