Tag Archives: royal family

Kate Middleton Has To Curtsy To ‘Blood’ Royals.

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Kate Middleton may now be the Duchess of Cambridge, but she has been told that she must bow to ‘blood’ royals when her Prince is not around.

Middle-class Middleton has come a long way but the Queen has updated the Order of Precedence to account for the Duke of Cambridge’s wife.

Kate must curtsy to the “blood princesses”, the Princess Royal, Princess Alexandra, and the daughters of the Duke of York, Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie when Prince William is not around as she does not have any blue blood in her veins.

When her husband is with her she only has to curtsy to the Prince of Wales, the Duchess of Cornwall, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh.

If Kate thinks she has it bad then give the Countess of Wessex is probably even less happy, she has to curtsy to Kate even when William is not there.

The last time the order was updated after Prince Charles married Camilla the Countess of Wessex then had to curtsy to Camilla. According to a courtier: “She didn’t like it one bit,”

The Queen has changed the Order of Precedence “on blood principles”

What do you think? Would you curtsy to The Queen or another member of the Royal household?

Britons are prouder of their history, NHS and army than of the Royals.

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While 2012 celebrates the Diamond Jubilee and London hosting the Olympics, it is history that makes people most proud to be British.

A survey commissioned by Channel 4 from Ipsos MORI found that more people (45%) are proud to be British due to the country’s history than they are because of the Royal Family (28%). And more people cite the NHS (37%) and the armed forces (36%) as a source of pride than they do the Royals. British sports teams come in at a lowly 10%. Bringing up the bottom of the table is British business, with only 4%.

Overall, which two or three of the following, would you say makes you most proud to be British?

1. Our history (45%)

2. The NHS (37%)

3. British Army / armed forces (36%)

4. The Royal Family (28%)

5. Our culture and arts (24%)

6. Our system of democracy (22%)

7. Having a free press / media (15%)

8. British sports teams (10%)

9. Our position in the world (5%)

10. British business (4%)

Timed to coincide with, Make Bradford British, a documentary series exploring what it means to be British, the survey also found that a ‘good sense of humour’ (45%) topped the poll when people were asked what are the best characteristics of British people, followed by friendly (34%) and tolerant to all sections of society (30%).

But while being funny may be the best British characteristic, of those surveyed, half (50%) said the worst was drinking too much. Ignorance of other cultures (33%) and complaining too much (23%) were also cited. And a fifth of respondents thought the worst characteristic was being lazy (20%).

Tea topped the poll not only as people’s favourite drink (38%) but also what they thought was the country’s national drink (65%) proving that we are a nation of tea lovers.

While fish and chips is seen as the national dish by four in ten Britons (41%) just one in ten (9%) say it is their favourite food. Roast beef and Yorkshire pudding tops the poll as the nation’s favourite dish (33%).

And while 15% enjoy a curry as their meal of choice, only 8% think it’s the national dish.

Make Bradford British continues on Thursday 8 March at 9pm on Channel 4

Glenn Mulcaire May Have Hacked For Other Papers.

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Glenn Mulcaire’s notebooks have been making waves today as the phone hacking inquiry rumbles on. Twenty-eight News International employees are named in a notebook. The notebook also has a references to The Sun and Daily Mirror, which suggest that phone hacking may have happened at other papers.

Robert Jay QC, counsel to the inquiry, said that senior executives had either condoned hacking or did not do the proper checks. In either case there was ‘room for a Nelsonian blind eye’ towards the ‘thriving cottage industry’.

Some of the notes that corresponded to News of the World employees reveals that they made 1,453 separate requests for information from Mulcaire.

The private detective also wrote ‘The Sun’ and a name relating to the Daily Mirror in his notebooks.

Mulcaire was imprisoned with the News of the World’s former royal editor Clive Goodman in January 2007 after they admitted intercepting voicemail messages left on phones belonging to members of the royal family.

The inquiry heard that the investigator’s notes relating to the royal aides are marked ‘Clive’, ‘private’ and with the name of ‘A’, who cannot be named for fear of prejudicing the ongoing police investigation into phone hacking.

Robert Jay QC said: ‘One possible inference to be drawn is that ”A” was working with or for Goodman, and he or she may have instructed Mulcaire to carry out an interception.

‘It might be argued that ”A” could have been acting independently of Goodman, but that would not make much sense since Goodman was the royal editor.’

Mr Jay added: ‘Either News International senior management knew what was going on at the time and therefore, at the very least, condoned this illegal activity.

‘Or they didn’t and News International’s systems failed to the extent that there was failure in supervision, failure of oversight with possible failures of training and corporate ethos and checking of expenses claims.

‘And there’s room for a Nelsonian blind eye. In either version, we have clear evidence of a generic, systematic or cultural problem.

He added: ‘I suggest that it would not be unfair to comment that it was at the very least a thriving cottage industry.’

Mulcaire also hacked the phones of publicist Max Clifford, football agent Sky Andrew, chairman of the Professional Footballers Association Gordon Taylor, MP Simon Hughes and supermodel Elle Macpherson.

In total about 28 legible corner names are legible in the 11,000 pages of notes that police seized from Mulcaire, which relate to a total of 2,266 taskings and the names of 5,795 potential victims, the inquiry heard.

Lord Justice Leveson this morning opened the inquiry into media standards that was set up after the News of the World phone hacking scandal.

He is examining the ‘culture, practices and ethics of the press’.

The Court of Appeal judge was watched by Bob Dowler, the father of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler. Her phone was hacked by the News of the World.

James Murdoch Was 'Never Shown “For Neville” Email' Hacking Inquiry.

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James Murdoch is in front of the Commons Committee again today. He is holding himself well and was ‘offended’ when MP Tom Watson compared News International to the mafia, Watson claimed that Mr Murdoch was the only mafia head who did not know he was running a mafia. To which Murdoch said the comment was ‘rude and inappropriate, [to the chairman] Chairman, please’.

James Murdoch claimed knowledge of the ‘For Neville’ email, but claims it was not shown to him.

He then went on to blame Colin Myler and Tom Crone for ‘misleading MPs’ at the Culture, Media and Sport Committee in testimony they gave about whether he was made aware of the extent of phone hacking at the paper.

Mr Murdoch said of the meeting with Mr Myler and Mr Crone that it had been to discuss increasing an offer to settle a legal claim by the chief executive of the Professional Footballers’ Association, Gordon Taylor.

“The meeting, which I remember quite well, was a short meeting, and I was given at that meeting sufficient information to authorise the increase of the settlement offers that had been made,” he said. “But I was given no more than that.”

“That second part, that importance, was not described to me in detail or at all,” Mr Murdoch said. “It was not described as the For Neville email, and I want to be very clear. No documents were shown to me at that meeting or were given to me at that meeting.”

Mr Murdoch said he could not recall discussing the Gordon Taylor case with Mr Myler before June 10 2008. “The first and only substantive meeting or conversation that I recall about the matter was the June 10 meeting with Mr Crone and Mr Myler, although I cannot rule out whether or not he called me or stopped me in the hallway, or something like that, for a brief conversation,”

Are The Royal Family Worth It?

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So are the Royal Family worth taxpayer’s money? As the recession starts to bite and unemployment rises it’s worth asking if we really need an unelected had of state that cost every person in Britain 69p. Frost wants to open up a debate on the Royal Family. Love them or hate them? Frost came across the video below that made us stop and wonder; should we rejoice that we have a Queen?

With Prince William and Catherine Middleton making royalty cool again and becoming more and more popular it seems that the royal family are having a resurgence. Posh has become cool again. Maybe we need more fantasy in our lives and the royal family gives us that.

Did the video change your mind? Are you a royalist or republican? Let us know.

Prince William Praises Queen For Help Planning Wedding

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A new book about the Royal Family has revealed that when Prince William was first handed his wedding list, he did not know anyone on it.

The book, called Our Queen also reveals that the Queen advised him to bin the official guest-list for his wedding to Kate Middleton and start again.

He said: “I came into the first meeting for the wedding, post-engagement, and I was given this official list of 777 names – dignitaries, governors, all sorts of people – and not one person I knew. They said: “These are the people we should invite”.

“I looked at it in absolute horror and said, ‘I think we should start again’. I rang [The Queen] up the next day and said, ‘Do we need to be doing this?’ And she said, ‘No. Start with your friends first and then go from there’. And she told me to bin the list.”

“She made the point that there are certain times when you have to strike the right balance. And it’s advice like that, which is really key, when you know that she’s seen and done it before.”

He also revealed that it was the Queen that insisted her wore his Irish Guards uniform for the wedding.

Have you paid for the Royal Wedding?

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It’s the Royal Wedding soon – 29 April 2011. Have you bought your tea towel? Have you paid £3 for a bottle of Kiss me Kate from your local Weatherspoons pub?

If you haven’t yet then you need to be quick, the economy needs you! If conservative estimates are correct, £1bn could be injected into the economy as a consequence of this wedding, but it needs you, the consumer, to get out over the bank holiday weekend and spend like your children’s centre or maternity unit depended on it.

Of course that doesn’t matter much because the wedding will cost £5bn to the economy anyway, making the whole occasion a loss to the tune of £4bn – hey but it’s worth it, right? It’ll be the most expensive day that the nation has taken off for a long time but who hasn’t taken a sneaky day off before at the expense of a day’s wages (and a taxation loss of a few hundred frontline police staff)?

I suppose it would be a bit rich to ask either of the families to pay up. The Middleton’s, despite much fuss being made of Kate’s maternal family lineage, which includes coal miners from Byker (as in Byker Grove, I cannae believe that man), are worth £30m. True, that wouldn’t be able to re-pay the loss to the UK economy for an extra bank holiday, but it could’ve at least contributed to the cheesey pineapple sticks and cocktail sausages.

And the other family, the Royal Family, the most Royal of all UK families. They have a bit of cash lying around to see that Kate and Bill’s special day is, er, special, don’t they? Prince Charles, through entrepreneurial ventures, is worth something close to £36m himself. And if that’s the case, why does it matter that in 2009 the Royal Family cost the taxpayer 7p more than in 2010. It’s not a saving, it’s an insult.

The Civil List, which effectively is the Government subsidy for the family (around £38m a year), pays for Royal staff and transport. The Crown Estate says that 70% of that sum goes on staffing costs. But how much do they cost, if you consider that it cost the taxpayer £14,756 for the Prince of Wales to take the Royal Train from London to Cumbria to launch a Red Squirrel Survival Trust. Or consider that it cost £85,700 in charter flights to get him and the Duchess of Cornwall to Italy and Germany in 2009.

Those are some significant staff costs.

But – a big but – they are worth every penny for the money they bring to the economy. The Crown Estate estimates £304m. It doesn’t say exactly how, and I’d love to see some breakdown figures. I’ll give it a guess though: tourism and trade. Though France doesn’t have a Monarchy, and they’re doing okay aren’t they?

Not just okay. France is the second largest economy in Europe, fifth largest in the world and has been growing consistently since 2009. Wow. France attracted 78.95 million foreign tourists in 2010, making it the most popular tourist destination in the world. Their tower – the Eiffel tower – is the most visited paid monument in the world.

So France can do international trade well, and receive tourists without making losses literally all over the place. I’m not liking the sound of this, but perhaps there is no point having a Monarchy. But how do we tell them that?