Saturday 22 October 2016

Oh dear. How sad. What a pity. Also, it's nonsense.

Here

Quite apart from the fact that the EU uses subsidies to buy its support and fund its mates, why is HM bleating about this when Brexit has delivered her family business its property back? You'd think she'd be bloody grateful. As for all the other pleaders, do they not realise that they are on benefits?

Humph. And then there are these pearls:

It is understood there were concerns about whether demand for stores on Regent’s Street and other parts of London owned by the Crown would drop after a vote for Brexit.

All revenue made by the Crown Estates goes to the Treasury, with 15 per cent of the taking shared to the Royal Family through a yearly 'Sovereign' Wealth Fund.

However a Crown Estate source said last night: “Businesses are still queuing round the block to take retail space on Regent’s Street and St James’s.”

Update

Something else has occured to me.

The taxpayer is coerced into paying subsidies to one part of 'The Crown Estates', whilst another bit collects a share of rents from land in prime retail locations.

Why not just stop paying the subsidies and collecting the share of the rents?

9 comments:

Mark Wadsworth said...

"Sandringham Estate, the Queen’s country retreat in Norfolk, will lose close to £700,000 a year when EU farming subsidies end while the farms near Windsor Castle will be around £300,000 down.

Prince Charles’s estates are also facing a funding cut from Brexit of £100,000 a year while the Crown Estate – which manages Royal land – will also be hit."

World's tiniest violin. Makes me glad I voted Leave.

Bayard said...

"Sandringham Estate, the Queen’s country retreat in Norfolk, will lose close to £700,000 a year when EU farming subsidies end while the farms near Windsor Castle will be around £300,000 down."

Yes, but that assumes that the government doesn't just go on paying the subsidies - note the weasel words "but have refused to make commitments beyond that." Well of course they haven't, that's election year. It's like that Mel Brooks film (can't remember which) where someone says that he he has contacted a famous actor "and he hasn't said no" when the truth is he hasn't replied at all.

This is typical Bremoaner "let's pretend that the outcome from leaving can't be anything other be the worst possible" crap.

"why is HM bleating about this"

To be fair to Her Maj, she isn't. The Torygraph is bleating on her behalf, probably without consulting her.

"Why not just stop paying the subsidies and collecting the share of the rents?"

Because that's not how bureaucracy works - see also recent discussions on the government paying tax to itself - we have to have this sort of money-go-round because it all makes work for the bureaucrat to do.

MikeW said...

Mw, BF, Bayard,

Yes, apart from the central Sovereignty issue, the list of 'good things' that should unite everybody around leave just keeps getting longer and longer.

Though, 'fake farmers' were always at the back of my mind. (My wife's father being a proper, efficient one, who worked till 68, keeping his unit going)

DBC Reed said...

With Bayard on this one: there's been plenty of weasel words on the Anglian media that the agricultural subsidies will continue post Brexit.

Lola said...

B. HM's 'people' seemed to be bleating about it. Perhaps it should be HMG? :-)

Mark Wadsworth said...

Re your last comment, local councils, Crown Estates and HM Revenue & Customs are all just different bits of 'the government'.

So we get a wonderful money-go-round.

Tenant on Regent St pays part of his rent to the council (the business rates) and part to CE. He also pays tax to HMRC, part of which goes to EU. Part of the EU's bit is pinged straight back to Department of Agriculture to pass on to large landowners as CAP subsidies, including CE, which gets the rents from Regent St and the CAP subsidies and pays 15% to glorified welfare scroungers and 85% to the government.

The other large landowners have to pay income or corporation tax on their CAP subsidies, which goes to HMRC. The council in turn has to pay some of the business rates to the government which then pools it and pays it out as grants to local councils again (although the Tories might be phasing this out, not sure right now).

Love it.

Lola said...

MW. That's you and Kafka happy then.

Bayard said...

Lola, I expect the Torygraph asked them if they wanted to bleat and so they did. Ask the right question, get the "right" answer.

Bayard said...

Mike W, I think that the subsidies should be phased out. They just benefit landowners who do no actual farming and the farmers' customers, i.e. the supermarkets.

However, agriculture, like finance (land and money, as always) are the two areas where the EU doesn't ban state aid to industry, so if we stopped subsidies and the EU kept them on, as they will, all our supermarkets will buy EU subsidised products instead of home-grown unsubsidised ones. The rules could be tightened to get rid of "fake farmers" but i) the "fake farmers" have too much clout for that to happen and ii) there would still be no way to prevent the subsidies going straight into higher rents.