MUCH has been made of a major investigation which revealed how senior royals are making a killing out of rental income on their feudal estates – but it begged the question: Why weren’t they getting money out of Scotland?
The King and Prince William (below) made around £50 million through their private estates – the duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall, respectively – last year, according to an explosive investigation.
They are making millions from the public sector, according to the Channel 4 and Sunday Times investigation, including £37.5m from the lease of Dartmoor Prison and £11.4m deal with Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Trust.
But conspicuously absent from the revelations were any Scottish properties. We took a look into why.
The royal family’s Scottish estate
As the names perhaps suggest, neither the Duchy of Lancaster nor the Duchy of Cornwall have holdings in Scotland.
This does not mean the King does not have private property in Scotland. He personally owns the Balmoral estate – rather than it being held by a public agency like Crown Estate Scotland.
He appears to make some money from the Aberdeenshire estate. The Balmoral Castle website advertises stays in the surrounding cottages costing in the region of £2000 per night. Its website sells Scottish-made apple and date chutney (£6.50 per jar), branded Christmas tree decorations (£24 a pop) and plenty of cashmere products including, baby booties (£29 a pair).
There is a question mark over another Scottish holding: The Palace of Holyroodhouse.
The historic royal residence, which sits across the road from the Scottish Parliament, last year brought in £7.7m for the Royal Collection Trust which owns the palace and its gallery.
It is understood the King, a patron of the charity, receives part of his Sovereign Grant from the charity, via a facilities fee.
Because the Channel 4 and Sunday Times investigation focused on the two duchies, we don’t know precisely how much, if any, the royals get from these properties.
Crown Estate
The other section of the royal estate forms what is own as the Crown Estate. This is different in Scotland.
While the Crown Estate in the rest of the UK funds the monarchy, it does not in Scotland.
Since it was devolved to the Scottish Government in 2016, the money it brings in (after the cost of maintenance and improvements) gets funnelled directly into the Scottish Parliament’s coffers.
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “Scottish Crown Estate assets are held 'in right of the Crown,' while the monarch is the legal owner, they are not the monarch’s private property.
“Crown Estate Scotland’s net revenue profit from managing the Scottish Crown Estate is not used to fund the monarch or the Sovereign Grant. All net revenue profit generated by Crown Estate Scotland is passed to the Scottish Government for public spending.”
Crown Estate Scotland’s holdings are substantial, including “virtually” all of the seabed out to 12 nautical miles, slightly less than half of the foreshore (the bit of land next to the sea between the limits reached at high and low tide) and four rural estates comprising around 37,000 hectares of land.
It also owns the rights to wild salmon and sea trout fishing and the rights to naturally occurring gold and silver.
Other historic palaces – like Linlithgow Palace, Stirling Castle and Edinburgh Castle – were transferred to the control of Scottish ministers in 1999.
