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.

He was NOT pope when most of these crimes were unearthed, that was JPII.

The Pope was invited here by our glorious previous leader Gordon Brown. As with all state visits there will be costs - a large part will cover security not just for the Pope but for all the big wigs that will be meeting with him whilst he is here.

The catholic community will be paying for half of costs which will more than cover the part of his visit that will involve him visiting catholic church's etc.

Yes, lets bash Catholics and the Pope again.

agree oiteach, so, sooo predictable.

Tax payers' money is used to fund all sorts of operations and state/international visits all the time.

But he wasn't head of state when the most of the abuse was unearthed! And, despite what you read on MN, he has done more than JP2 to sort it out (and admittedly it's about time, too).

He's not really a proper head of state - for instance the Holy See is not completely recognised as a state by the United Nations (it is a non-voting permanent observer), and indeed the Holy See itself does not see itself as a State
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_status_of_the_Holy_See

In Edinburgh he is going to parade through the streets surrounded by primary school children ! The cheek of the man. You couldn't make it up.
news.scotsman.com/news/Pope-to-take-to-streets.6396572.jp

This website will let you know the best places to join the protests in September.

www.protest-the-pope.org.uk/

yanbu
cannot understand why money is being wasted like this

altinkum - I don't single out catholics, I am willing to take to the strees to protest all child abuse shielding religious leaders.

Yes because Heaven forbid Catholics should get to see their leader in their own country once every 40 years

How much does the Queen cost every single year.....?

This isn't so much about Catholic-bashing as such disgustingly extravagant expenditure at a time when the Government is making savage cuts to such worthy schemes as BSF and the extension of free school meals.

He's the leader of 1 billion people! We pay to have the leaders of countries with less than 10 million people visit. I can't see why people would resent us seeing him here considering he has not been in my lifetime!

It's a one off.

Sorry, that makes no sense:

This isn't so much about Catholic-bashing as outrage at this disgustingly extravagant expenditure at a time when the Government is making savage cuts to such worthy schemes as BSF and the extension of free school meals.

YANBU

The catholic church should be paying for all of it, especially considering all the cutbacks that are being made atm.

the pope isn't any old religious leader - he is the religious leader parading our streets in Sept seeking the approbation of the crowds.

I'll be throwing an egg.

I wouldn't go to St Peter's square, or into a church to this. That wouldn't be appropriate, but if he is going to drive down Whitehall to get a reaction from the crwods he can hardly complain if some of us boo.

I would like to see a breakdown on where the money is going. This visit is 3x the cost of Bush's.

It exclude security

There are no expensive banquets etc.

He is stayiing in free accomadation with Religious.

Lots of Catholics don't want him to come, not just because of his recent screw ups but because of his stance againt liberal Catholisism when he was a Cardinal, The majority of Catholics are in less progressive countries than us so western Catholics have very little influence, not something westerners are used to on a world stage. Our parish raised £50 for the visit. To put that into context a typical second collection for other causes would raise £6-700.

We are paying 7million. The cuts will save hundreds of millions EACH year. We are talking about 12million for something which won't happen again for 30 odd years!

"does anyone know why the tax payer pays for this? "

frikonastik, don't you mean "what the tax payer did to deserve this"?!