Examination of Witnesses (Questions 180-199)
THE ACCOUNTS
OF THE
DUCHIES OF
CORNWALL AND
LANCASTER
7 FEBRUARY 2005
Q180 Mr Bacon: Given he is the Chancellor
of the Duchy of Lancaster, what does he do for this £127,000?
Mr Clarke: He is not paid £127,000.
Q181 Mr Bacon: He is not paid £127,000?
Mr Clarke: Not by the Duchy.
Q182 Mr Bacon: Not by the Duchy of
Lancaster?
Mr Clarke: No.
Q183 Mr Bacon: But he is paid £127,000,
is he not, Mr Glicksman?
Mr Glicksman: I cannot verify
the figure but he is a member of the Cabinet.
Q184 Mr Bacon: He is a member of
the Cabinet but he is paid in his capacity as Chancellor of the
Duchy of Lancaster.
Mr Glicksman: He has the title
of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, he is also a member of
the Cabinet.
Mr Clarke: If I can just explain,
the appointment of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is
an appointment by the Queen and it is outwith his duties as a
minister.
Q185 Mr Bacon: So does he have another
ministerial title as well which I do not know about? Perhaps he
does.
Mr Clarke: It is not within my
remit, I am afraid.
Q186 Mr Bacon: Mr Glicksman?
Mr Glicksman: I am afraid I cannot
help you.
Q187 Mr Bacon: Can I ask a slightly
different question and that is about the nature of the phrase
"public money" because we have been bandying this phrase
around. The net surplus of the revenues from this landed estate
are handed over to the Prince of Wales as his private income,
and the same in relation to the Duchy of Lancaster, but they are
monies from an agricultural landed estate in the same way as the
Duke of Westminster has a landed estate or the Duke of Bedford
or whoever else, so in what sense are they public money? Do you
regard them as public money in that sense?
Mr Clarke: I think that is a very
good question. I do not want to go back because I know time is
limited, but when the Duchy of Lancaster was first created, Henry
Bolingbroke created the first pre-nuptial agreement to the extent
he actually inherited the Duchy before he was King and when he
took over the monarchy he brought the Duchy to it, but he wanted
to make absolutely sure it was dealt with as a separate inheritance
outwith the estates he took over as monarch. So the Charter of
1399 was created and that Charter very specifically states that
it is a separate inheritance under separate administration from
the Crown Estates.
Q188 Mr Bacon: So, for example, Sandringham,
we know, is privately owned by Her Majesty the Queen, whereas
Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace are properties of the state.
Are you saying this would be regarded in the same way as Sandringham,
as private property?
Mr Clarke: Yes.
Q189 Mr Bacon: Although the capital
cannot be accessed in the same way as if it was private property?
Mr Clarke: No, the capital cannot
be accessed, but it is like a statutory perpetual trust.
Mr Bacon: Thank you.
Q190 Mr Allan: Following up that
line of questioning, it seems to me that Parliament over time
has gradually encroached more and more on the Royal possessions.
We are squatting in a Royal Palace at the moment. Is it right
too that Parliament could, through primary legislation, attempt
to do something different with the capital? Parliament set the
rules for the capital in the two Duchies and Parliament therefore
could change the rules? Is that the correct interpretation?
Mr Clarke: I think you have to
go back a bit. A Charter was a very early form of Act, and the
only way that control could be placed on ensuring that capital
was not whittled away by perhaps a life tenant who had other ideas
as to how it was to be spent, was by Parliament passing an Act,
because that was the only way to place rules over a Charter which
was then created by a King.
Q191 Mr Allan: Can we examine how
tightly you are defined, both of you, because you have different
rules from different Acts. Starting with you, Mr Clarke, do you
have to go to the Treasury for permission to carry out large capital
transactions in the same way that Mr Ross has told us the Duchy
of Cornwall does?
Mr Clarke: No, we have a different
form of governance, to the extent that the Queen appoints the
Chancellor, as I mentioned earlier, outwith his role as minister,
and the Chancellor has delegated authority to Council. In the
old days, our Council was advisory and the power was really settled
in the Chancellor and indeed the Clerk of the Council which was
myself in the old days. Now it is very different, because the
Chancellor delegates authority to Council. Council is far more
akin to a board of a company and they take responsibility and
have fiduciary responsibility for the fact and for the decisions
and the strategy that we follow.
Q192 Mr Allan: So the Treasury wants
a lot more detail from the Duchy of Cornwall; it trusts them less
in a sense than it trusts you? Your Council has a lot more freedom
from Treasury than the Duchy of Cornwall? Is that correct, Mr
Glicksman?
Mr Glicksman: It is not so much
a question of whether the Treasury trusts them more or less, it
is a question of what the legislation says.
Q193 Mr Allan: The legislation trusts
them more; entrusts them with more freedom?
Mr Glicksman: Yes.
Q194 Mr Allan: Can I ask, Mr Glicksman,
in respect of Mr Ross, you presumably have bits of paper floating
around the Treasury asking for permission for lots of individual
transactions?
Mr Glicksman: The Duchy of Cornwall
under the Management Acts is required to get Treasury approval
for all significant capital transactions.
Q195 Mr Allan: Has anybody asked
for these under the Freedom of Information legislation yet?
Mr Glicksman: Not that I am aware
of.
Q196 Mr Allan: But presumably they
could and you would have to judge them in the normal way?
Mr Glicksman: Yes, anybody could
ask for them and we would have to judge them under the criteria
in the legislation.
Q197 Mr Allan: Not that I am suggesting
they should. Both Mr Clarke and Mr Ross, have you taken advice
on whether or not you are public bodies for the purposes of the
Freedom of Information Act and what the result of that advice
was?
Mr Clarke: We are not public bodies,
we are exempt.
Mr Ross: We are the same.
Q198 Mr Allan: Can I ask about your
Council, Mr Clarke. You said it is more like the board of a public
company. Can you briefly describe what happens when a vacancy
occurs, one of your Council members goes? What happens then? So
Mr Steinberg can apply.
Mr Clarke: I will look forward
to receiving his CV!
Q199 Mr Allan: He is writing his
CV now.
Mr Clarke: We have, as I mentioned
earlier, appointed two new Council members—Sir Christopher
Howes retires this year—and we were looking for two particular
disciplines, one in property and the other in the financial market.
The posts were advertised on the Cabinet Office website and we
employed an appointments specialist to seek these new appointees.
They produced a shortlist for our consideration, we held a number
of interviews over a two-day period, the interview panel compromising
myself, the Chairman of the Council, and the Keeper of the Privy
Purse together with Lord Shuttleworth, and we had Mr Taylor from
Treasury acting as an independent member of that interview panel.
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