The queen's decor

The office staff could move into the apartments in St James Palace and Kensington Palace, the domestic staff , the kitchen staff, the footmen etc could be given a very long holiday , she has staff at Windsorno need to take them with her.

Tourists go to Buckingham Palace because it's there .... no-one comes to the UK just to stand outside BP. It's very close to many interesting tourist sites e.g. Downing St, Houses of Parliament, Trafalgar Square, etc.

France is the world's most visited tourist country and they don't have a monarchy; the second is the United States.

Would the French not consider maintaining the Elysée Palace?

Republican/Royalist , your view will skew the response to the question won't it.

The French Govt spend a lot of money repairing monuments and churches etc. A local town near to us received no Govt money for about 50 years as the population was regarded as collaborators - the local chateau was used as the Gestapo HQ - but what would you do if held by the SS and your children threatened - very difficult question. This area had been Vichy France but the resistance were very active and there are all sorts of memorials to people taken away and never seen again or a town/village under siege and then bombarded. Very interesting reading all these things and makes you think what it was like to be occupied by a foreign power.

The Louvre was a royal residence at one time, before the French court moved to Versailles. So was The Hermitage in Russia.
It took a revolution to change them to museums.

The first thing my Italian friend wanted to do was to be photographed outside the palace. It would never have occurred to me to stand there

Is there any reason why she could not be photographed there if the queen wasn't ;iving there?
After all, most of the time she's in one of her/our other seven houses/castles.

Sorry, living there I meant.

If she didn't live there it would still be a tourist attraction and we'd make more money because people would be able to tour it.

Btw I know this is off subject but did you know the queen doesn't even run her own bath. That's one of the duties of a housemaid who earns £6.92 an hour (276.92 per week gross).

What? More than the minimum wage?
Or is that the London minimum wage?
Did you know there are more staff bedrooms in Buck House than there are rooms in total in The White House?

It's slightly higher than the National Minimum Wage which is £6.50 per hour (rising to £6.70 in October). However the Greater London Authority say that a minimum living wage in London would be £9.15 per hour so she's hardly being generous.

I looked online and found this job as a chambermaid in a five star hotel in London. The wage is £7.35 an hour.
www.indeed.co.uk/cmp/ECB-Services/jobs/Room-Attendant-1950378f42c11ccc

If the chambermaid is the main wage earner then she will have to claim top up benefits in order to have enough money to live. David Cameron wants employers to pay more to relieve the burden on the benefits system. Perhaps Liz should set an example and lead from the front for a change.

Can someone please explain to me why Liz can't run her own bath btw?

vq, Have you checked to see whether or not the housemaid has a live in position?

I think it's very likely that accommodation/meals etc., are included in some wages.

The Queen is 89 and I doubt she could cope with having a bath without help but even if she could, she's in a position to have others to do that for her.

I think it is quite right and proper that the Queen has her bath prepared for her. What's the point in being a flippin' queen otherwise?!

I wonder if she's like the rest of us and thinks, Sod the bath...One prefers a shower these days

She might be like me and have both. #onlysensiblesolution

Actually, at 89 she could be a bit wobbly on the old pins. Probably safer sitting down. Bless.

I could do my own ironing but I pay someone else to do it. I'd employ a chauffeur if I could afford it!

I find the decadent lifestyle of the windsors offensive , we pay for a maid to run her bath whilst the elderly who need this help get a carer for fifteen minutes. The cut backs which will affect the disabled will mean hardship, the quern must read the papers , she asks for a large increase in her pay yet she could dip into her own purse. There is a desperate need for housing yet we paid one million for work to a 57 room apartment for her grandson . The million would not have solved the housing crisis but the lack of sensitivity by this money grabbing family angers me.

I wouldn't say the lifestyle of the Windsors is 'decadent'! Certainly not that of the Queen...

Perhaps not at 89 Ana, but she certainly has lived quite a decadent life , she hasn't always been a sweet old lady, and I did say the windsors not just the queen

Do you know something we don't, Anniebach

I've just been watching this sweet old lady visiting Bergen Belsen. Dignified doesn't come close. She is amazing for her age and we are very lucky to have her.

She's staying in an hotel. I don't suppose they'll be expecting her to run her own bath

I thought "decadent" meant gorging yourself with rich food, probably things like baby quails stuffed with pate de foie gras, drinking 24 hours a day, having kinky sex with anything that moves (or doesn't), taking hard drugs and being generally nasty to people. You are free to object to the cost of the monarchy, but I don't think it is correct to say that she has ever been decadent.

Anniebach I'm sure a lot of people share your views on welfare cuts but they have nothing to do with the Queen's domestic arrangements. You should write to your MP or join a campaign. Having a go at the royal family is completely irrelevant! BTW are you Welsh? Is it fair that people resident in Wales all get free prescriptions? Or that elderly people in Scotland don't pay for care? People in England pay for both. I suppose you think that's ER's fault as well?

Love the general lack of deference here - go Gransnet. I'm a republican but wearing my pragmatic go-with-the-status-quo hat I agree with the posting that says: Move out to Windsor, rent Buck House out to Parliament while Westminster is refurbished, and use rent to pay for refurbishment of Buck House. I am sure Windsor Town Council will cope. Not sure the Royals will enjoy wrapping up all their family photos and personal artefacts, though. And what about the Trooping of the Colour?

As for the Royals being decadent - well, so many secrets creep out of the woodwork at intervals about the rich and famous at sex parties and drinking gin and dubonnet at all times - so who knows?

What a load of twaddle!