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00:00Hello and welcome to another episode of Catching Up with the Royals with me, Emily Andrews
00:05and me, Richard Coles. This is the podcast that takes you beyond the headlines and lifts
00:10the lid on what life is really like behind palace walls.
00:14Although at one time did have to buy him a drink. He didn't buy me a drink.
00:17Hey, hey, hey, hey, more on that please.
00:19This week we'll be pulling back the proverbial curtain on the inner workings of the so-called
00:25firm, arguably one of the most lucrative companies in the world, from which Royals earns the
00:30most? The king. He is the first billionaire monarch. Doesn't hurt if you are exempt from inheritance
00:36tax. To the act of quitting the family business. What does the world owe you if all of a sudden
00:41you've handed back your crown? We'll be uncovering exactly how the House of Windsor is run and
00:46makes its money.
00:52Well, here we all are again, catching up with the Royals. Now, Prince Philip famously referred
01:00to it not as a family, but a firm. Do you think that was apt?
01:05I think so. I think for two reasons, really. One, the monarch is like the CEO, the chief executive,
01:13and effectively runs everything. He or she, any person within the firm, be they working
01:20royal, member of the family or courtier, answers to the monarch. And actually, I think it's apt
01:24that Philip coined it because he was the arch moderniser. He was a real moderniser in the
01:29royal family of the 20th century. And I think that what's interesting about the firm is that
01:38they are, in some respects, I mean, we're in the age of influencer, aren't we? But aren't
01:42they the ultimate influencer? Aren't they the ultimate brand? So it's really important
01:46to make a distinction between royals, which we talk about, obviously catching up with the
01:50royals.
01:51That's all of them.
01:52That's all of them. They're all welcome here.
01:53Princess Michael of Kent.
01:55Yes, Zara Tindall. She is a royal. But the working royals are funded by the Sovereign Grant.
02:00Now, the monarch is funded in three ways. He or she has their own private inherited income.
02:06Not. They don't have to pay income tax. So because of that, I think Charles is the first
02:10billionaire British monarch ever because he didn't have to pay inheritance tax on his
02:15mother's inheritance. So they're funded by personal wealth, the Duchy of Lancaster and
02:20the Sovereign Grant. The heir to the throne, the Prince of Wales, is funded by the Duchy
02:24of Cornwall.
02:24Hang on. Duchy of Cornwall, Duchy of Lancaster. What are those?
02:27Yes, those are two separate duchies. So the monarch is also the Duke of Lancaster. Queen Elizabeth
02:33was the Duke of Lancaster. And they're separate duchies. They are huge land-owning entities.
02:41Now, the Sovereign Grant is a percentage of the Crown Estate. So the Sovereign Grant is
02:46paid to the monarch that funds all the work of the royal family.
02:49So the Crown Estate are those holdings that belong not to the individual, the king, Charles,
02:54but to the crown, to the king and his successors.
02:57Absolutely. And a percentage of the profits goes to pay for all the working royals and
03:04their travel, the job that they do, basically, for Britain, PLC.
03:09I've got two other words for you. Corporation tax?
03:12I don't know whether the Crown Estate pays corporation tax. That's a really good question.
03:18If you start from the notion that actually anything held by the Crown is exempt from taxation,
03:23because it's HMRC, isn't it? It's the Crown that does the taxing.
03:28Exactly.
03:28So the Crown taxing itself does sort of have to be by its own volition, because that's how
03:34it works, right?
03:35Yeah. Everything else that they do, even when they're going, say, they're visiting India
03:39or they're visiting the US, then that's paid for by us via the Sovereign Grant. Now, the
03:45King, the Queen. Come on, Richard. Who else?
03:48The Prince of Princess Wales.
03:49Yes.
03:51The Princess Royal.
03:52Yes.
03:53The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh.
03:55Well done, Sophie and Edward.
03:58There's three more.
04:00Princess Alexandra.
04:02The Duke of Kent.
04:04Yes.
04:05I can't. I've run out of royals.
04:06And the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester.
04:07Of course. Yeah.
04:08And then, of course, for the Prince of Wales, the heir to the throne is funded by the Duchy
04:13of Cornwall.
04:14All those biscuits.
04:14All those biscuits. Yeah.
04:16Actually, fun fact, you're absolutely right to say about Dutch originals, but that was
04:21set up by Charles as Prince of Wales, but now it's wholly owned by Waitrose.
04:27Oh, really?
04:28Yeah.
04:28But the brand and the association endures?
04:31The brand and the association endures. It was set up in partnership, I think, between
04:34Charles and Waitrose, and then any profits from the range were given to the Prince's Trust.
04:42Oh, I see. So it's actually, it's profits going to charity.
04:46Yeah. It's profits still go to charity, even though it's now a loyal waitrose.
04:48We're talking about kind of large sums of money here, but I just want to say on the sovereign
04:51grant, before people think that that's actually kind of tax that could otherwise, you know,
04:57be spent on hospitals, schools and roads, which indeed it could be. But actually, the
05:00sovereign grant comes out of the income of the crown estates, right? So that's holdings
05:04that belong not to Charles, but to the monarchy. And the sovereign grant is a percentage of
05:12the profits from that.
05:13That's absolutely right.
05:14Right. And that was an arrangement that goes back historically. I know they tinkered with
05:18it from time to time.
05:19Yeah. So George Osborne, when he was chancellor back in, I think, like 2011, 2012, it used to
05:25be the civil list. So effectively, the UK government would dollop a whole load of cash to the keeper
05:30of the privy purse, who is like the chief accountant at Monarchy HQ. Funnily, the principles, the
05:36royal family, call Buckingham Palace Monarchy HQ. They do call it Monarchy HQ. So the government
05:41used to, the UK government used to give a whole load of cash to the keeper of the privy purse,
05:46which would fund all their work. And then under the Cameron coalition government between the
05:54Tories and the Lib Dems, George Osborne was chancellor. And he actually did the royals a real favor
05:59because he said that a percentage of the crown estate, which as you've absolutely said, is
06:05held, it's kind of like it's crown lands, but all the money goes to the UK taxpayer. And now
06:12a percentage goes to the royals to fund their work.
06:15So you could say in a sense that there's sort of self-funding, if you were looking to...
06:19Oh, no. No, I don't think you can say that. Quite the opposite.
06:23Well, I'm going to say if you were looking as a way of... And what I'm saying is it's a
06:26highly
06:26political debate, and indeed a politicised debate. And some people would argue that you
06:31do get value for money from the royal family, some would say, or the monarchy, and some would
06:35say you don't. And that's a very polarised view. And I'm just trying to figure out what
06:39the arguments are on either side of that.
06:41I think how they're funded and whether they provide good value for money, in my opinion,
06:46are two slightly different debates.
06:48Sure. And the other complications, of course, is how much of this is because it's not unreasonable
06:52to pay people to do a job? In other words, how much of this is in return for services rendered,
06:57which is if you're head of a state, it involves things like palaces and security and that kind
07:00of thing. Or how much of this is people just getting an easy ride from the Treasury and HMRC,
07:06not paying inheritance tax, for example, if you're the sovereign?
07:08Well, I think are they worth it? Are they value for money? Depends on who you ask. And I think
07:16it often depends on your view of politics. I think it probably depends on your age. We
07:22tend to be more supportive of monarchy, I think, as we get older. Certainly younger people,
07:26all the popularity polls are that, you know, people don't support the monarchy as much when
07:31they don't.
07:32God save the Queen! I was the king now, innit?
07:35Say aye.
07:35Anyway, it's really bloody complicated. And that's one of the, there's a, one of the reasons
07:39why it works for them is they don't make it, it's not transparent.
07:42It's not transparent. And they want it to be complicated and they want so that they,
07:46we don't delve too much into how much money they really do have. I've got a quiz for you
07:51before we go. Richard, how many official roles working for the family have been related
07:58to the lavatory?
08:00Oh my word.
08:02I know, bringing the tone down, aren't I?
08:03I'm going to have to think about that.
08:05Back with you soon.
08:10Welcome back to Catching Up With The Royals. For the break, I asked you how many official
08:15roles working for the royal family have involved lavatories? Wait for it. And the answer is
08:22two.
08:23Number two.
08:24Oh, Richard! You have to bring the tone down, but I love it. I love it. Of course it had
08:30to be a number two. Yes, and that is relevant. Okay, so the, the two roles are, if you hadn't
08:35worked out already, groom of the stool and keeper of the royal bedchamber stools. Now,
08:41Richard, do you know what the groom of the stool had to do?
08:45Well, I was hoping it was someone who had to do with seating arrangements, but I guess
08:48we're on a different stool here.
08:50I think it's a different stool. I'm going to leave it for you to explain. Okay, so the
08:54groom of the stool would literally be there to wipe the monarch's derriere. They would
09:00be there to wipe the monarch's bottom, should he or she chose. And I think also, there was,
09:05in all seriousness, it was an important job because you also, it was to do with the health
09:08of the monarch. Yeah.
09:09You had to inspect the stool and make sure that it all looked appropriate and that they
09:12didn't have an upset tummy and they weren't ill. But whoever held that job was actually
09:18a very, very important courtier because he or she would be incredibly close to the monarch
09:25and was party to all their private thoughts in a very intimate environment.
09:29So in the days of, say, a Tudor monarchy, for example, where the monarch was the sun, the
09:33moon and everything, if you had the ear of Henry VIII, as well as the bottom of Henry VIII,
09:39you had a very, very direct route to power.
09:42Yeah, definitely. And also, I think there's something, isn't there, to be said.
09:45You know, I don't want to speak for you, Richard, but when you're literally naked or partially
09:50clothed, you are quite vulnerable, aren't you? And I think there has to be a sense of real
09:54intimacy between someone who is helping you in that, you know, not that I've ever had
10:00this. You know, it's quite a vulnerable thing.
10:03Yeah. But also, the fact that the health of the monarch was so closely related to the health
10:08of the nation.
10:09Yeah.
10:09So if the monarch's poo is looking a bit off, that might affect the value of the pound.
10:14Yeah, totally.
10:15Interesting.
10:15Because the monarch needed to live. Because he or she, and it's the same now, you see it
10:21with people around the court, you know, of the monarch and the air in waiting, everyone's
10:27kind of thinking, how long have they got? Because if they go, my position goes too. Which is why
10:33the second role, keeper of the royal bedchamber stools was also important, because that role
10:39involved putting out all the chamber pots for high-ranking and official guests. And
10:44if you think, again, going back to kind of medieval Tudor times, when obviously there
10:48was letter writing, huge amount of letter writing, but the real way that diplomacy, well,
10:54still like now, was effected was through face-to-face.
10:58It's access.
10:59Access.
10:59Yeah.
11:00Mind you, a bittersweet feeling, to be told. The good news is you've been appointed to
11:05a very senior position at court. The bad news is, bring your mittens.
11:09Yeah, I know.
11:11But there are other ones, aren't there? It's so interesting that there's another job, the
11:15page of the back stairs.
11:18Billy Backstairs Billy.
11:19Yes, Backstairs Billy.
11:20Now, the page of the back stairs, it sounds like you would rather be page of the main stairs,
11:25but the back stairs was where a lot of the unofficial business was transacted.
11:29So the back stairs, where people could get in and out, up and down, in and out of the
11:34sovereign or the prince's chamber, without being seen, without being on public display.
11:39So that's quite significant. I remember visiting a stately home, and there was a suite that was
11:44reserved for the heir to the title, and that had a separate entrance, which went to a side
11:49door. So the heir to the title could conduct his, invariably in that case, his business
11:55business, without it being confused with the official business of the house. Do you see
11:59what I mean?
11:59Yeah.
12:00It's interesting, isn't it?
12:00Very clever.
12:01Yeah.
12:01And then, of course, there's always the kind of, there's roles like the royal shoe wearer.
12:06I mean, and that's sort of that, I don't know whether that happens with King Charles,
12:09but that certainly happened with the late Queen, Queen Elizabeth. Angela Kelly, otherwise known
12:15as AK-47, because she was, and she still is pretty formidable, although she's retired now.
12:20She was the late Queen's dresser for many, many years, a very impressive Liverpudlian. And
12:25she had the same size shoe as the Queen, the same size foot, sorry, as the Queen, and she
12:31would wear in her shoes.
12:33Well, that makes sense, because if you're the Queen and you're on your feet all day, you
12:36could be literally put out of business if you've got a blister, or if you, you know,
12:41you need that, that's an indispensable service.
12:44Absolutely. If you're the Queen and you're, or the King, and your time is minuted to the
12:50second to the minute, and they do, their schedules are 7.43, 8.22, you know, if your shoes are
12:56rubbing and you're in pain, that's no good for anyone.
12:59I'm fascinated by Angela Kelly to have had that degree of access and also that degree
13:04of intimacy. And clearly, is affection the right word? I'm not sure.
13:08Yes, I think so.
13:10It's such an interesting role, isn't it? And also how interesting that she's described
13:13as a weapon by her nickname at court.
13:17Yes, AK-47. Well, the story goes that while she was still working for the late Queen, she
13:24was allowed to publish two books, the first of which was a book about royal dresses. And
13:32then I think the then Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, was very worried about what she might
13:37publish after the Queen died, because she literally had access to all the secrets.
13:43She used to watch television with the late Queen, she was her confidant.
13:46She would know who the Queen voted for on Strictly.
13:48Yes, she would know. I bet she'd say you.
13:51I'm certain she wouldn't.
13:53But she would know. She would know who, if the Queen put a bet, which horse she'd been
13:57betting on. She would know who, what the Queen's thought about Meghan.
14:02So...
14:03Also intimacy, knickers and bras and all that stuff.
14:05Yes. All of that kind of thing. When the Queen was unwell, Angela would go and personally
14:11care for her. She did her hair. She helped her with her makeup. And so when a monarch dies,
14:18everybody around the monarch, groom in the stall or not, is out on there. Exactly.
14:22Has to be.
14:22Yeah. So Charles made sure he gave her a nice house.
14:26I mean, there's a story that Backstairs Billy, who was so loyal to the Queen Mother and keeper
14:31of all the secrets, knew where all the bodies were buried. Once the Queen Mother died, he
14:34was booted out to a flat in Kennington, I think.
14:36I'm sure that's true.
14:39Allegedly.
14:40Allegedly. Allegedly. Well, he's dead now, isn't he? But I mean, he knew a lot.
14:45That can make you very powerful.
14:47Yes. Knowledge is power.
14:49Yeah.
14:49So I think it's interesting that now, of course, we don't have, you know, famously, when Queen
14:55Camilla became queen and was crowned a couple of years ago, she let it be known that she
14:59wouldn't have ladies-in-waiting. She now has companions and Kay Middy, our friend, Kay
15:05Middy, the Princess of Wales, everybody.
15:07Her Royal Highness.
15:08Don't clutch your pearls too much. Her Royal Highness Catherine, the Princess of Wales.
15:12She doesn't have ladies-in-waiting either.
15:13Yeah. Interesting. The other thing, of course, is if you've got all these people,
15:17like wearing in your shoes or looking at your stools or whatever, that's payroll, isn't
15:22it? Payroll.
15:22How rich do you need to be? I mean, we've talked about, so the sovereign grant covers
15:26some of this, but what about the personal wealth of the senior or the sovereign?
15:30Let me look at my list. Let me look at my list. I'm glad you asked me that. So the
15:34Royal
15:35Rich List, who do you think tops it?
15:36The King.
15:37Of course. He is the first billionaire monarch. Now, that's partly because of that awful
15:43word inflation. It's also partly through very savvy investments throughout the 50s, 60s,
15:4870s and 80s. And also, I think it's partly thanks to Prince Philip, because Philip and
15:54Charles started treating the Royal Estates, their personal income, their personal lands
16:00as businesses, the firm. And so then they started charging market rent. It wasn't just a
16:06feudal, oh, I'll just let you live in this house if you mow my field for me.
16:10They professionalised it.
16:12They professionalised it. They absolutely, they professionalised the business of being
16:16a monarch. And so Charles is estimated at 1.8 billion.
16:20Can I just add to this? It doesn't hurt if you are exempt from inheritance tax.
16:25I was just about to give you that. Richard, we need to talk about inheritance tax. I think
16:28we do need to talk about inheritance tax. Very quickly, I'm going to run through the rest,
16:31but then we need to explain to everybody about the inheritance tax issue. So Prince William,
16:36as the heir to the throne, Duchy of Cornwall, he's estimated at 90 million. Princess Anne,
16:40I didn't know this, her personal fortune is approximately 50 million. That's largely through
16:45inherited estates and wealth and investments. And then Prince Harry and Meghan, again, we
16:50don't know how much really they're worth, because we don't know what any of them are worth.
16:53But Harry and Meghan combined private net worth is commonly estimated around 47 million pounds.
17:00But the monarch doesn't have to pay inheritance tax.
17:04This is a very significant perk, isn't it? Because it's 40% or something, isn't it,
17:09inheritance tax on most people. I know I inherited a little money from my mother,
17:13and a chunk of that went to the tax ban. And if that hadn't gone to the tax ban,
17:19I would be wearing a tiara right now. Well, I wouldn't, but you know what I mean.
17:23I do. I mean, is it fair? I would say, I suppose the problem is, is that if the monarch
17:28was subject
17:28to inheritance tax, then would they go bankrupt?
17:31Well, and it is, there's a sort of, they use a language, which sounds like an exemption,
17:36which is sovereign to sovereign, right? So it's only the succeeding sovereign who enjoys that benefit.
17:42Yeah.
17:43The other thing that's striking about this is that you do get this right, they do pay a certain amount
17:47of tax, but they seem to decide themselves. I would very much like to speak to HMRC and say,
17:52I've decided to pay you this amount of tax this year. Okay, with you. Thank you very much. Bye.
17:57It's not going to work, is it?
17:59Well, it's interesting because when Charles was Prince of Wales, he was quite open in the Duchy
18:05of Cornwall and used to say how much income tax he paid. He didn't tell us what, how they came
18:10about the calculations, but he publicly said how much they paid. William, as Duke of Cornwall
18:16and Prince of Wales, is not telling us how much income tax he's paid.
18:20Isn't that interesting? Because that would be, that's a counterintuitive fact, because
18:22you imagine more transparency rather than less transparency.
18:26I wonder if it's part of this, certainly with William, I wonder if it's part of this not
18:34wanting to appear rich. I can't believe that any royal would be diddling HMRC because that
18:39would just be, I mean, the only person who's above prosecution is the monarch.
18:43It would just give you a formidable tax advantage.
18:45It does give you a formidable tax advantage if dad, if you're being prosecuted in the name
18:51of your dad. But I can't believe that all those civil servants and the keeper of the
18:57private purse would allow them to get the tax bill wrong. But I do wonder, I do feel that
19:03William wants to be kind of like a man of the people and wants to be seen as another ordinary
19:08type of guy does publishing the millions that he has to pay in tax. Because how much is
19:15he worth, again, do we think? Well, we don't know.
19:16We worked about £20 to £25 million a year in income from the Duchy of Cornwall.
19:19Yeah. I mean, that's a huge amount of money. £20 million a year, Richard. I mean, imagine
19:25how many tiaras both of us could buy with that.
19:27There's a caveat to this, isn't it? Which is making, I remember a neighbour of mine got really
19:31exercised when she found out that the cost of the coronation was about £70 million. And
19:36she said, why can't the king pay for that? And it seems to be quite obviously why. That's
19:40a head of state thing. Yeah.
19:42King isn't crowning himself for his own amusement. He's doing it because as head of state, that's
19:47what you do. And so it only seems to be right that that should be paid by the state. But
19:51that's a useful confusion sometimes, isn't it? Because how would you always know how to
19:55distinguish between what is a function of state and what is a private benefit? It's hard
20:00to call that.
20:01But I mean, going back to what we were sort of saying before, are the royals worth it? You
20:06know, that £20 million a year to William, I mean, it's just, he's the same age as me.
20:10I mean, I just kind of, my mind boggles. And don't forget, that's from the £20 million
20:14doesn't include the money he will get as part of the sovereign grants to be a working royal.
20:19But then another thing, and this is a hard thing, but I mean, I think all of us would
20:22want to have a distinguished between our private resources and the resources that came to us
20:28by virtue of what we do. And I don't, in principle, in principle, I don't think it sounds unreasonable
20:36that public stuff should be funded out of public money and private resources should not be lent
20:42on for that.
20:44I always liken the royals to, and there's that famous advert by Heineken, I don't think they
20:48do it anymore, but you know, Heineken, is it Heineken that it reaches parts other beers
20:52cannot. And I always think the royal family is a bit like the royal Heineken, the royal
20:58beer, because they can do, they can achieve things, they can convene people and bring people
21:03together in a way that I don't think anyone else in the world can. Look at the Trump state
21:07visit last year. There was the Princess of Wales dressed in Trump's favourite colour, gold.
21:13The amount of gold on that table at the Windsor Castle banquet was amazing. He was having the
21:19time of his life in the unprecedented second state visit. I mean, he absolutely loved it.
21:24And the result of that, Richard, meant that we had less bad tariffs than the rest of Europe.
21:30And it meant that factories here didn't close.
21:34Soft power.
21:35Soft power.
21:35And it's very hard to do a profit and loss on that, isn't it? Because they're very hard
21:38to track those figures. But I always thought other people would say, how much is the monarchy
21:42worth in terms of bringing in a tourist pound or dollar or yen? Well, significant amount.
21:46And it's very hard to get any precise figures about that.
21:49But I still think even if we didn't have a monarchy, the coffers of the Royal Collection
21:53Trust, which administer the opening of Holyrood House, Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle,
21:57still think the tourists would come. King Charles or no King Charles?
22:00I've got a hypothetical.
22:02Go on.
22:02In the event that it was thought that perhaps we could manage perfectly well without a monarchy,
22:07it was abolished and we formed a republic, which is perfectly doable. Whether it's wise
22:11or not is another question. Imagine the wrangling over who gets what. If the Windsors were retired
22:18to private life, what would they take with them? Would the title in their art collection,
22:27their jewels, their land holdings, would that just go to the state? Or would they think,
22:33hang on, that was ours? Or that we, I don't know, it's an interesting one, isn't it?
22:36Some stuff is theirs personally. So...
22:39How do you untangle all that?
22:40Balmoral, Sandringham, Highgrove are all personal homes. Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace,
22:47Kensington Palace are owned by the state. The Crown Jewels, locked up in the tower.
22:51They're owned by the crown.
22:52They're owned by the crown. I would say, isn't that the state?
22:57I've got another thing to tell you.
22:59Tell me.
22:59Right. So I've looked this up, actually. And the British monarchy in cost is about 100 million a year.
23:05The other monarchies, European monarchies, about half.
23:09I know.
23:10Some much less than that. But I think Denmark and the Netherlands are the next in terms of expense,
23:17and it's half that cost.
23:18Yeah.
23:19And they, I mean, they seem to live pretty high on the hog, but obviously our lot are super expensive,
23:23and that's partly to do with the splendour and the extent of their living.
23:28Wow. There's not enough transparency for us to know.
23:31Well, it's time to go for a break. But after the break, we'll be asking the question,
23:35how do you actually quit the firm if you should choose to do so? Well, we'll come back to that.
23:40But we have a question for you to mull over also, and it's this.
23:43Is it true or false that the monarch requires no passport or driving licence? See you in a moment.
23:56Welcome back to Catching Up With The Royals, and a quick reminder that if you like what you hear
24:01and would like more content from us, then head to our social media channels.
24:05Search for Catching Up With The Royals.
24:07Now, before the break, the question was,
24:09true or false, the monarch requires a driving licence or passport?
24:13The answer is, no, the monarch doesn't. Stopped by the cops, the monarch can say,
24:19no, no, no, be off with you. Stopped at immigration, no, no, no, be off with you.
24:23They're the fount of the monarch, it's the fount of all law. Doesn't need that stuff.
24:27The monarch is the law. Discuss.
24:30Anyway, look, we were talking about quitting the firm, Emily.
24:33If it is a firm, of course you have the right to hand in your notice.
24:38Yeah.
24:38And it has happened, hasn't it? But it's never been a particularly smooth business.
24:43No. So, obviously, the most infamous was the monarch quitting the top job,
24:51Edward VIII, in 1936.
24:54It does seem a bit bonkers now, doesn't it, to think about it,
24:58but I think you have to put yourself back 100 years.
25:00And, you know, the monarch, well, still is.
25:03The monarch is the head of the Church of England.
25:05Do, do, do.
25:06Oh, sorry. Yes, this is your...
25:07Point of order.
25:08Yeah, point of order. This is your domain. Talk to me about...
25:11Supreme Governor.
25:12Supreme Governor.
25:12Not the head of the Church.
25:13Sorry.
25:14Which is Jesus Christ.
25:15Okay, sorry.
25:16Supreme Governor.
25:16Supreme Governor.
25:17Small but important point.
25:18So, Jesus Christ is the head.
25:20Yes.
25:21And the British monarch is...
25:24The Supreme Governor of the Church of England.
25:25The Supreme Governor of the Church of England.
25:26Of course, after the breakaway from Rome by Henry VIII in the 16th century.
25:32It's so complicated.
25:33So complicated.
25:33There's like a ton of podcasts just to scratch the surface of that.
25:36And also, of course, but at that point, he was still...
25:37He might have broken away from the Church, but he was not Church of England.
25:40Anyway, that was Elizabeth I.
25:42But we're not doing history.
25:43We're doing royals.
25:44But very good.
25:45Thanks.
25:45You're welcome.
25:46The Elizabethan Settlement.
25:47The Elizabethan Settlement.
25:48And, of course, and then there was Edward VI.
25:50But...
25:50Really good.
25:51Yeah, I know.
25:52And Mariah and Mary.
25:53And, your neck of the woods, the Louisian martyrs, I think.
25:58Oh, the Lewis.
25:59Yes.
25:59Martyrs of Lewis.
26:00The Martyrs, yeah.
26:01Anyway.
26:02Bonfire.
26:03I love a Lewis bonfire.
26:04Those of you who know, who know?
26:05You know.
26:06But, back to the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, which was the monarch of Edward VIII.
26:12And, therefore, then, he couldn't marry a divorcee.
26:15So, he had to quit.
26:16I mean, the thing, the Church of England's doctrine at that time has changed now and made it impossible for
26:20a divorcee to remarry if the person they had originally been married to was still living.
26:25Not permitted.
26:26And so, the Archbishop of Canterbury said no way.
26:29It was hard to imagine just what a crisis this was, actually.
26:32It was an unthinkable thing that, all of a sudden, everyone had to think about.
26:36And it was a big trauma for all concerned.
26:38So, and I think the deal was either you give up Mrs. Simpson or you abdicate and marry Mrs. Simpson
26:45or you marry Mrs. Simpson morganatically, which means that she would not become queen.
26:52She would not become royal through the marriage.
26:55And he said no.
26:56And, presumably, he could have stayed being king and had her as a mistress, like every other monarch before him.
27:02Yeah, and, of course, the cat was sort of out of the bag now and he upped the ante.
27:06But it's like one of those things, you know, situations, don't speak, don't tell.
27:10Yeah.
27:11People can kind of make their own arrangements.
27:13But as soon as you sort of make that explicit, then you have to tidy it all up and, you
27:17know, you have to make a decision.
27:19It became official.
27:20And I think, I mean, there have been many books written, of course, famously, Wallace and Edward VIII are buried
27:29side by side in the grounds of Frogmore House, just by Frogmore Cottage, where another American married a British prince
27:41and went to live after their married life.
27:43I've always thought it was quite funny that Harry and Meghan went to live in Frogmore Cottage, which is very,
27:47very close to the graves.
27:49Almost as if there were an element of deliberation, whoever chose that for them.
27:54Well, do you know what, though?
27:55I broke the story that they were going to move to Frogmore Cottage.
27:58And, of course, at the time, everybody thought that they were going to move into one of the vacated apartments
28:04in Kensington Palace.
28:06Everyone thought they were going to live next door to Kate and William.
28:08And there was, I think, apartment, Kate and William have apartment 1A and I think apartment 1A was being renovated.
28:12And that was genuinely what was going to happen.
28:16But quite, I mean, we as the journos, we're always a bit late to the party.
28:19But what happened was Carrie and Meghan spent very little time at KP.
28:25They were living in Nottingham Cottage.
28:27And they didn't want to be, they disliked it so much that they rented a place near Soho Farmhouse in
28:33the Cotswolds.
28:34They spent very little time at Kensington Palace.
28:36And then when they said they didn't want to move into apartment 1, somewhere had to be found for them.
28:41There's a whole episode we've got to do on why royals don't like living in official accommodation.
28:45Like the king and the queen don't want to live in Buckingham Palace.
28:48No.
28:48Nobody wants to live in Buckingham Palace.
28:49No one wants to live in BP.
28:51No.
28:51When, I think soon, this year maybe, we're going to get an updated audit of the money that's been spent
28:59from the Sovereign Grant that's been uplifted for the last, for the 10 years of reservicing.
29:04It's going to be interesting to see how much it's cost.
29:09And we should go round it, Richard.
29:11I've never been there.
29:12Have you not?
29:13No.
29:13Oh, by the way, I hear that they are personally quite tight, that they might have all these mega millions,
29:20but they don't like spending their own money.
29:25Well, there's great stories about Queen Mary, who used to go to visit people.
29:30And if she came to visit, people used to have to hide all their bibelots away because if she liked
29:34something, she'd just expect it to be given to her.
29:36It's a royal favour.
29:37And she used to go to her shops when they were closed to the public and go, that's nice, that's
29:41nice.
29:41And somebody would go around after and wrap it up in brown paper and deliver it to Buckingham Palace.
29:45No.
29:46Yeah.
29:46I think that sense of entitlement still does happen.
29:50I heard this great story about Meghan that on the eve of the Queen's funeral, which was a Monday, she
29:59got very worried about gloves.
30:01Now, this is my opinion.
30:03This is what I was told.
30:04She got very worried about gloves.
30:05My opinion is, because the gloves that she actually wore on the day of the Queen's funeral were elbow length.
30:09In fact, comparisons were made to Wallis Simpson, who was a very stylish lady, but also liked an elbow length
30:15glove.
30:15I was told that on the eve of the funeral, she got one of her people to ring one of
30:22the couple of the big French fashion houses that have stores on Regent Street.
30:27And wanted them opened so that one of her minions could go and get some gloves.
30:33I think in the end, the keys couldn't be found or burglar alarm codes or people couldn't be, you know,
30:38stretched.
30:39And so in the end, she didn't get whatever gloves.
30:42I think she wanted shorter gloves.
30:43I think she suddenly got, this is my personal opinion, I think she suddenly got really worried.
30:47But that sense of, oh my goodness, I need gloves, I need gloves, they're the wrong gloves, get me new
30:51gloves.
30:51Somebody go, go.
30:53It's quite, that optics is very problematic, isn't it?
30:57It's a pop star.
30:57The thing is, you get used to the world being nice to you in about a day.
31:02The interesting thing is getting used to the world no longer caring about you.
31:05So when, you know, of course, Meghan may sort of fret about her gloves, I don't know.
31:09But once you've stopped being the reason people are bothered about gloves, i.e. a member of the royal family,
31:16you need to really adjust very quickly, to trim very quickly to a world in which your caprices might not
31:24carry the weight that they did beforehand, right?
31:26So there's one thing about quitting, isn't it?
31:28All of a sudden the world, what does the world owe you if all of a sudden you've handed back
31:31your crown?
31:31And I think that was the mistake that Harry and Meghan made, because they are trying to make their own
31:37money now.
31:39All well and good, well done then.
31:41But because they have literally bitten, publicly bitten the hand that fed them in terms of being so critical of
31:49the royals,
31:50that was the reason why everyone was interested in them.
31:52So whilst at the time them doing Oprah and doing the Netflix, sort of speaking their truth and saying how
31:59victimised they were and how unfair it all was,
32:01was probably quite cathartic.
32:04And obviously we all lapped it up, didn't we?
32:05In the long run, it wasn't very sensible as a strategic move,
32:10because they want people to buy what they are selling, be it Harry's life coaching or Meghan's jam.
32:17And if they've been, but you know, if she wants us to buy what she's selling, we have to believe
32:26in her and we want to buy into her.
32:28And she's literally told us that she hated the one thing that we were interested in her for, being royal.
32:33But do you think the plan is that you shift from being interesting because you remember the British royal family
32:37to being interesting because you're kind of like the Kardashians,
32:40that there's a sort of another version of that, a sort of secular version of that, if you like,
32:44where people were interested in them for their own sake, rather than for them doing anything.
32:49Well, jam's nice.
32:50And I don't want to be horrible to either Meghan or Harry.
32:53And I think, you know, deprogramming from their weird life is obviously going to be complicated and difficult.
32:58I wish them the best, but I'm not sure how.
33:01Do we?
33:02Yeah, I think I do, really.
33:04I think I do, because, you know.
33:06I think we should.
33:07No, I think we should.
33:08I think with, I always think, I always call it the Emily Andrews Venn diagram.
33:12So you've got three circles.
33:14Okay.
33:14You've got one, are you with me?
33:15Are you with me?
33:16One circle is celebrity.
33:18Yeah.
33:19The next circle is, you know, history.
33:23Yeah.
33:23The bottom circle is the news.
33:26And in that middle, the middle of those three circles is the royal family.
33:29Yeah.
33:29So in a case, sort of to your point, if you take away the celebrity and you take away the
33:35news and you take away the history, what are the royal family?
33:38There isn't really much there.
33:40It's the combination of all those three things that make them so interesting, that makes them, you know, want us,
33:45us want to talk about them.
33:46It makes them be able to earn a living.
33:48It makes them earn a living.
33:49The kind of living they want to earn.
33:50But then when they are the working royals, sometimes they feel quite trapped.
33:56And sometimes they want to quit.
33:57And also, the other thing I'd say in favour of Harry is I understand why as a father you would
34:03be concerned for the safety of your children.
34:05And if you walk away from the royal family and all of a sudden you no longer get that protection,
34:09nonetheless, interest may endure.
34:10And I can quite understand why you would have anxieties that your children might be targeted and that you would
34:16feel that perhaps a degree of security would be available to you for that.
34:20And it's those little things you walk away from and perhaps don't fully anticipate what that's going to look like
34:26and what that's going to cost you and how different your life is going to be.
34:29Because if you've got security and if you've got the stuff that comes with that, you know, kind of private
34:35jets or whatever, that's not a cheap life, is it?
34:39It's a very expensive life.
34:40I don't know how much you need to earn to live that sort of a life, but it's pretty hard
34:44to do that, I think.
34:45I think the security bill…
34:45Take more than jam.
34:46No, for sure.
34:48And I think that's…
34:48Or spread.
34:49That's why.
34:49Or spread.
34:50Spread.
34:51Spread.
34:52Or the sparkling…
34:56No, Emily, stop the accents now.
34:59Or the sparkling brute.
35:00She keeps calling it brute.
35:00I'm like, it's bubbles.
35:02What are you doing, love?
35:02Anyway, their security bill is about two million a year.
35:05So you can completely understand why Harry has mounted this huge campaign.
35:12It is a campaign.
35:13It is a military man campaign to get his metropolitan police security reinstated.
35:20But if, as is indicated currently, he does get that reinstated, that's going to be a huge cost to the
35:28British taxpayer.
35:29That, by the way, the security doesn't come out of the Sovereign Grant.
35:32That's out of us.
35:32It comes out of the Metropolitan Police budget.
35:35Yeah.
35:35Because the Metropolitan Police, which for those…
35:38Metropolitan Police is London's police force.
35:40And they have a special security operation, which protect VIPs, not just the royals, but, you know, the prime minister
35:48and senior…
35:49Got a hypothetical for you.
35:51Go for it.
35:52In the event of some international outrage, not an unimaginable situation, the head of state might be compromised by the
36:01kidnap of his grandchildren.
36:03Yeah?
36:05It's bad, isn't it?
36:06That could be really, really bad.
36:07God, that gives me…
36:08That makes me…
36:10Actually, that's given me a physical reaction.
36:12But before we go, one question for you.
36:16Which of the following unusual facilities can be found inside Buckingham Palace?
36:22An ATM, a post office, or a police station?
36:26We'll be back after this.
36:32Welcome back to Catching Up With The Royals.
36:35Before the break, I asked which of the following unusual facilities can be found inside Buckingham Palace?
36:40An ATM, a post office, or a police station?
36:43What do you reckon, Richard?
36:45Police station.
36:46Well, you're right, but…
36:49All of them.
36:50All of them.
36:50And I've seen all of them inside Buckingham Palace.
36:53And who do you think provides the ATM inside BP?
36:57I want to say Coots and Kelly.
36:59You are absolutely correct.
37:00Yes!
37:00It's a Coots ATM.
37:03It's a freestanding.
37:04I actually used it just so that I could, you know, say that I had used the cash machine in
37:10Buckingham Palace.
37:11It's part of the NatWest group, actually, yeah.
37:12Is it?
37:13Yeah.
37:13I bet your account's with Coots, isn't it?
37:15It's not.
37:16No.
37:16But it will be.
37:17It's with another member of the NatWest group.
37:19NatWest.
37:19There you are.
37:20I'm very excited because I've got the red box here.
37:23It's your turn.
37:24This is viewers' questions.
37:26Yes, the most important bit of the show.
37:28Right.
37:28Let's have a little look.
37:29Okay.
37:32I've made a mess of it.
37:33Hang on.
37:34There we go.
37:34Careful of your mic.
37:35Oh!
37:36Oh, relevant.
37:37This is from Maisie.
37:39Okay.
37:39And she asks,
37:40Has Harry's public image taken a turn for the worse since he no longer has access to the Palace AIDS?
37:46Oh, good question, Maisie.
37:49I mean, if you look at the opinion polls, his popularity has really nosedived.
37:54And as has Meghan's.
37:56I mean, he used to be one of the most popular members of the royal family.
38:00And I remember writing that Prince Harry was the one member of the royal family you'd love to go down
38:04the pub with.
38:05But the only one you can imagine going to have a pint.
38:07Although one time did have to buy him a drink.
38:10He didn't buy me a drink.
38:11Hey, hey, hey, hey.
38:12More on that, please.
38:13Oh, we were in Chile and on a royal tour and on royal tours, it's kind of, it's sort of
38:24like convention that if you go and follow them around and report on what they're doing, then there's a private
38:34drinks reception.
38:36And we got to the bar and Harry is a delight.
38:40He's so fun.
38:42He's exactly, well, he was anyway.
38:44I think he lost a bit of his joie de vivre before he left the UK.
38:47I really hope he's got it back now.
38:49But he was so fun.
38:50He's like Tigger, bounding around.
38:52And he was like, hey, Emma, he comes into the bar.
38:55I said, oh, hi, Harry.
38:56I said, oh.
38:57And he's like, oh, have you got a drink?
38:58I said, oh, have you not got a drink?
38:59He said, oh, I'll get you a drink.
39:01I'll buy you a drink.
39:02And he went, oh, thanks so much.
39:04I'll have half a pint or whatever.
39:06I can't remember what it was, whatever the local lager is.
39:08Did you think that it was an unusual thing that someone offered to buy him a pint?
39:12I don't know.
39:15I think that they probably don't think that much about who is paying for things.
39:23I've certainly been on royal tours where William and Kate were in Bhutan and William and Kate wanted to buy
39:29some jewellery, I think, at the foot of the Tiger's Messingham Monastery.
39:32And they didn't have any cash.
39:34And equally, Charles, when he loves to go to a local market on tour, he doesn't have any cash.
39:40Now, you can kind of understand that because they're in almost like a bubble when they're on tour.
39:45So who has time to go and change your tenner?
39:48You don't go to a cash point, even though there is one in Buckingham Palace.
39:50Even though there is a cash point in Buckingham Palace.
39:52But that's probably giving out pounds.
39:54It's not giving out euros or I can't remember the currency in Bhutan now.
39:58So I think that's kind of understandable.
40:00But I think maybe the sense that I always got, even with Harry and William, who are very down to
40:05worth, was that they were always kind of used to people paying for them.
40:11I suppose if things come your way, you don't really think about it that much, do you?
40:15And also, I suppose you have to remember that, and this is part of the reason, I think, for Harry
40:21and Meghan leaving the royal family, that they were effectively being paid for by dad.
40:28So, you know, we've been talking this episode about funding.
40:33We talked about the monarch's funding.
40:34We talked about the Prince of Wales' funding as the heir to the throne.
40:37When Harry and William were growing up, it was their dad who was paying for everything for them.
40:42Fine when they were at Eton.
40:44Fine when they were in their military and at Sandhurst.
40:48But then when they were men in their late 20s and early 30s, they couldn't earn their own money because
40:54they were working royals.
40:56And they had to rely on handouts for dad.
40:59And particularly when they both started their own families, William with Kate and Harry with Meghan.
41:04Then, you know, when you start your own family, you want your independence.
41:09You might have children.
41:10You've got to have a bigger, you know, all that kind of thing.
41:12To continually have to kind of ask your dad.
41:15It's quite embarrassing, isn't it?
41:16I don't know.
41:17It's just such an unimaginably weird life to me.
41:19Yeah, it is.
41:20And also one that's, I can quite understand why you would not want to shine light upon it when so
41:24many people are struggling to pay bills, right?
41:27Well, and also in a cost of living crisis, I think it doesn't behove the family in a particularly good
41:32light to be seen as unimaginably wealthy.
41:36Yeah.
41:36And for Harry, so I think we have to, so to Maisie's question, which was, has the loss of the
41:41courtiers kind of served Harry a disservice?
41:45I mean, I think it just depends on, on who your staff are.
41:50I mean, infamously, Meghan and Harry can't keep hold of their staff that quickly.
41:56They do seem to go through staff quite quickly.
42:01And...
42:01It's the Duchess of Difficult.
42:03The Duchess Difficult, yes.
42:05And I think if the really, really good members of staff, and this was probably the same with celebrities, right?
42:11You would know this better than me, but because of course you are an A-list celeb, Rich.
42:15But it depends on the calibre of the people around you.
42:18But crucially, they have to be able to stand up to and say no to their employer, whilst also doing
42:26that in a way that they still have the confidence and trust of their employer, who is ultimately paying their
42:31wage.
42:32It's quite a difficult balancing act, isn't it?
42:34It's a very difficult one.
42:35And I imagine to have somebody, it's essential to have somebody in your corner who has the power and the
42:42trust to tell you the difficult stuff you need to hear.
42:44And if you don't have that, you're really lacking something.
42:48For me, that's why Harry and Meghan's strategy, or on the face of it, lack of strategy, becomes so explicable.
42:59Because I think that they've gone from being, in my Andrews Venn diagram, in the middle, being royal, with all
43:06the associations that that comes with it, to moving out to America, to becoming just, in inverted commas, celebs.
43:13Now, that's great, but I think they've had a lot of yes people around them.
43:20And also, if, as, I mean, Meghan's always denied all the bullying claims, it's got to be said.
43:25But if it is correct, then it's quite difficult to tell her what she doesn't want to hear.
43:32You know what else has run out?
43:34Time.
43:34Are we talking too long again?
43:36I think so.
43:37Well, we could talk about this for hours and hours and hours, but we haven't got any time left, and
43:40we have to say goodbye.
43:42We do.
43:43Well, don't forget, everybody, that you can send your questions.
43:45We love the questions, so please send more of your questions to royals at spirit-studios.com.
43:53We love the questions.
43:54Keep coming.
43:56That's all for now.
43:57We'll be with you every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts, over on our YouTube channel,
44:01But you can stream us now on 5, so until we meet again, it's goodbye from me.
44:07And goodbye from me.
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