Should we abolish the Royal family?

[Gandalf]

I happen to think some of the architecture is quite wonderful too, but if they are her homes then surely she is responsible for the upkeep. As it is, these homes are open to the public and at a cost. Surely this money would suffice for the upkeep of the properties. I don't understand why she should have any claim over taxpayers money. It was estimated that the Royal family cost the tax payer over 40 milllion pounds last year. Now look at the following article to see where this money went....

BBC NEWS | UK | Cost of Royal Family rises �1.5m

I see no way to justify it. I much prefer the idea of Graham Smith who suggested a cap on the Queens income at 200, 000 pounds a year. That's a mighty fine yearly salary for anyone! Surely, no one could have any complaints about that being better than what we currently have?

As for me possibly being a communist. Well, I wouldn't quite go that far. I am pretty left wing though in quite a bit of my thinking. Personally, I think the systems that we have in place today are becoming ever more evil and twisted too. The room for opportunity has seldom been this bad. The rich at the top are sucking it all dry and the banks are being handed over billions of pounds of hard working tax payers money just to keep the bubble afloat. The entire system is criminal. But at least we have the right to say what we want and be ignored by everyone!

I don't think keeping most of the wealth in society in the hands of a limited number of families who are free to manipulate the system through cronyism is a very good idea. It's best to funnel that wealth away from them and to stimulate the areas of society which suffer most. The 'have not's' deserve the opportunity to try and make something of themselves too. But I am digressing here away from talking specifically about the Royal family and going into a bit of a diatribe at what is taking place right now before our very eyes. But, no I'm not a communist. I'm more a humanist with strong socialist leanings.

In response to your final point, the Queen has a standard of living far beyond the reach of most ordinary people. If anybody was able to command millions of pounds for performing her duties, I'm sure they would jump at the chance too! But as it is, unless you are in the bloodline then you haven't a chance. It doesn't matter to me that she hasn't been galivanting and living it up in expensive clubs and collecting airplanes as a hobby. She does though have private cooks who cook her the finest food she desires all paid for by the humble old taxpayer. Why can't she cook her own tin of soup like I am most other people have to?

I'm not really into the salaries of top football players either, but they are paid by the people who are willing to pay money to watch games. Nobody is forcing people to buy tickets or watch football. There is a demand and the market stipulates that top players earn a lot more than the lowly minnions in the lesser leagues. I don't like that, but the taxpayers are not funding it so it doesn't matter so much. I can choose not to watch a game, but I am unable to stipulate who the head of state should be. The market does not respond to the Royal family in quite the same way.

The country is pretty much a republic anyway. Gordon Brown is the leader and what he wants generally gets passed as long as the house agrees. The Queen is head of state in name only.

Out of interest Miles how far does your desire to see the 'have nots' empowered extend?

You seem to have no problem with the Royal family and other rich families having their inherited wealth taken from them but what about yours?

Are you not, purely by virtue of birth a beneficiary of being born into glorious first world country, which in comparison with most of the most is fabulously wealthy beyond compare?

As you, I and all the rest of us inherited this land purely by birthright is it really fair that we get to enjoy it rather than those in struggling third world countries?

I presume you support not only uncontrolled immigration but also a compulsary repatriation process whereby British citizens are selected to trade places with those from Africa, Indian and the Arab countries so as to redisperse the wealth in as fair a way as possible?

Do you feel this way? Does our great wealth as a first world country also rightly belong to our cousins in the second and third worlds?

Or do you think Britain's wealth, in which we partake soley as a result of heredity birthright is for the people of Britain only?

Let's not forget that when we talk about inherited wealth I am talking about extremely wealthy families. I am not talking about taking away everything they have either. Taken at an individual level and in terms of my own possible future, I don't really have a lot of wealth to give away. I have lived away from home too long to ever think about claiming a pension there and the pension here covers nothing. My entire working life is simply to try and support me when I am too old to work. It won't be a life of luxury, but I hope it will be in comfort. I also hope I don't live too long just in case there isn't enough! It would be awful to get to 82 and the pot runs dry...I might be from a wealthy country, but I really won't ever see any of that wealth myself. When it comes to inherited wealth, I don't imagine there will be all that much left over when I die. Hopefully, I will have paid for the education of my kids and given them a decent sense of right and wrong and that will have been my job done. And of course, I would help out when I can but thats pretty much it.

As to how far my support of the 'have nots' goes, well we have been talking about Britain and I have no qualms with this being about the wealth of the rich being filtered down to support the poor. I'm not talking about just handing over cash to lazy bums, but investing it in education, creating jobs and other things like improving rough estates. Governments of all developed nations should contribute to supporting the least well off internationally too. I would have loved it if we had spent a fraction of the money we spent in Iraq on building water supplies for those in parts of Africa that most need it. We could have actually helped people rather than invading illegally, killing thousands.

I don't believe in unrestricted imigration though. I think it is unhealthy and with opportunities being as meagre as they are, it is unfair on those already looking for jobs. You could say, "well that isn't so considerate of the poor who are wanting to come to the UK to escape poverty". And I would understand that, but you are extending the question somewhat by asking me that and getting beyond the position of the monarchy and inherited wealth. But as I said before, I do believe it is the responsibility of our governments and our taxes to try and improve the lot of others overseas as well. It doesn't help things to have the rich getting richer and then having mass immigration allowing standards of living to fall for the vast majority of the population....and for the rich to continue to be unnaffected. That's not particularly fair.