Costs and Finances of the Belgian Royal Family

[Marengo]

According to a senator of N-VA party, the Belgian monarchy costs 28 million a year, which is much higher than the dotation the members receive annualy.
Read an article in Dutch about it here.

The dotations add up to 12 million euros annualy but the 'hidden' costs that are placed at other depatments are 16 million euros. The senator also wants to stop the dotation for Prince Laurent and Princess Astrid.

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Always curious how people keep going after the costs of a monarchy while it is proven that republics are more expensive and 'make' less money than a monarchy. It is all right if people are republican and such, but IMO the argument of 'costs' is falsifying the debate.

[cdm]

It's the zillionth time the costs of the royal family are discussed, it's getting pretty boring :)
Although I don't agree with everything this politician is saying, he has some good ideas.

I think it would be a good idea to raise the dotation to cover all the costs. And not keep costs hidden in other departments, because that's only good for speculation.

I agree with the idea that only the king and the crown prince should get a dotation. But I think it would only be fair to start with that with the grandchildren of the present king. It's not fair to Astrid and Laurent to give them a dotation and then take it away again and tell them to go find a job.

[LadyLeana]

Originally Posted by cdm

I agree with the idea that only the king and the crown prince should get a dotation. But I think it would only be fair to start with that with the grandchildren of the present king. It's not fair to Astrid and Laurent to give them a dotation and then take it away again and tell them to go find a job.

That is true, but if the Belgian people give them a dotation, they should "work" for it by appearing as official representatives of the RF. Prince Laurent does very little in that way, so it is not very fair to give him any amount of money. If he has anything on his agenda, he hardly ever turns up in time (if he turns up at all). Princess Astrid, on the other hand, still has a rather full agenda, she's always turning up at happenings to represent the RF, and she is also very active in the charity field, so that's not really a problem.

[Marengo]

According to ' Het Laatste Nieuws' the Belgian RF is getting a raise of 5% this year. The budgetted costs are 13.043.000 Euros. Queen Fabiola is getting a raise of 73.000 euros, her dotation is now E 1.5 million a year.

The article in Dutch here.

[Marengo]

'Het Laatste Nieuws' reports that the royal family had 119 private flights in military airplanes from 2004 to 2007.

Article in Dutch here. The article specified which member had the most private visits in militairy airplanes; if the article is right it seems that the King is 'responsable' for 100 of them.

The costs:

2004: 626.277 euro
2005: 680.626 euro
2006: 470.240 euro
2007: 492.902 euro

Now since the government is responsible for the safety of the king you would suppose that the king is travelling with these airplanes on their advice, so I don't get much of the controversy.

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As ever at the HLN website the anonimous comments are vitriolic at best.

[Marengo]

The minister defended the RF against attacks from extreme right party Flemish Interest (VB) in parlament. The King needs to be protected, according to the minister. The state has no intention of changing that policy. It also has been a courtesy to the former Queen Consort to allow her 3 private airplane flights a year, again the minister does not feel like changing that either.

The debate: video - Vlaams Belang: 'Koning Albert voortdurend op vakantie'

Since 2005 the princes do not use the military planes for private travels.

And the VB also critisized the king for being on holiday too often, which they based on the high amount of his private flights, mainly to Italy, Spain and France.

[Marengo]

According to Belgian TV Programme 'Royalty' prince Laurent earns a net amount of 8666,- euros for each workday. Last years his dotation was 312.000 euros for 36 public events. An official event on average lasts 2 hours.

For Filips and Mathilde that came on an average of 6328 euros. They earn 924.000,- euros and have 148 public events.

Article in Dutch here.

[johann]

Originally Posted by Marengo

According to Belgian TV Programme 'Royalty' prince Laurent earns a net amount of 8666,- euros for each workday. Last years his dotation was 312.000 euros for 36 public events. An official event on average lasts 2 hours.

For Filips and Mathilde that came on an average of 6328 euros. They earn 924.000,- euros and have 148 public events.

Article in Dutch here.

Oh and let´s say Katy Pauwels, the lady who presents Royalty, gets a pay check of 100.000€ per year by VTM (just an estimate of course). Divided by her let´s say 45 appearances on TV, she earns more than 2.200€ per day and Royalty is a magazine of 20 minutes, so her 45 workdays are pretty short. And if we now start calculating the income of top soccer players based only on their number of official soccer matches … cough, cough.
With all due respect for VTM, this calculation is nothing else than a waste of time. I´m all for implementing more transparency and it´s indeed rather questionable if Astrid, nr. 6 in line of throne, and Laurent, nr. 12 in line of throne, should be founded by the taxpayer. BTW introducing dotations for Astrid and Laurent was justified by the legislative with the fact that the Belgian citizens would not appreciate it if members of the royal family would engage in commercial or political activities. Their dotations are more a compensation for those limits coming with their position rather than a payment for activities. Times changed obviously and now their dotations are a topic of discussion. Nothing wrong with that, but this silly little calculation is adding nothing to the discussion and is just a populist attempt to stir up things again. HLN of course jumps into this discussion, shortens the Royalty stuff to an even more polemic piece of journalism, et voila, here we go again.

Royalty was fair enough to mention though that Philippe and Mathilde carry out far more engagements than those 146 listed in the official agenda and thus earn much less then the mentioned 6.300€ per day - even the ever so critical Jan Van Den Berghe had a very positive remark on Philippe. Of course they did not mention that especially Philippe and Mathilde´s income isn´t theirs alone but also has to cover their huge expenses (like office staff etc.).

[stephanievl]

I really am a big fan of the royal family but for me the dotations should only go to King Alber/Queen Paola, Queen FAbiola and Prince Philippe/princess Mathilde the rest of the royal family should go to work.

We only see prince Laurent a few times in a year and then hearing that he earns 8666€ for each workday of 2 hours is really to much! Even inportant leading business men/women earn less than the prince and these people have to work day in day out with a lot of stress. Nowadays prince Laurent has a very bad realtionship with the press so we harldy see him doing anything.

[LadyLeana]

And while the nation celebrates the King and the Dynasty, there is a new controversy about the Royal dotations as well. The dotation for the Royal Family will be raised with another 6 % next year, which results in a total of 14 milion Euro. Many politicians are outraged that in times of economic hardship the financials of the royals are raised like that. As a reference: the wages of the average Belgian are raised with a mere 3 to 4%. See here for clip and article in Dutch.

Most politicians agree that the dotations are problematic, and that it would be a nice gesture if the RF would refund the extra money. But the Prime Minister has explained that the Government only executes the law as it was voted in Parliament.

[LadyLeana]

Update on the dotation front: the dotation for the members of the BRF will not be raised with 6 % , following the consumption price index as it always had, but it will be raised like the wages of the working people, with some 3%, following, from now on, the "health index". This has been agreed by the Government, the Palace and the Senate. (See here for article in Dutch). Apparently, the King himself didn't like his raise. Some sources say that the King wants a change in the dotation system himself, because he knows the negative publicity is menacing the image of the royal family.

However, the president of the Senate commission which is supposed to work out some kind of solution for the dotation "problem", Armand De Decker, pointed out that Queen Fabiola, King Albert, Princes Philippe & Laurent and Princess Astrid will always receive a dotation. The system will only be changed for the children of the next King. (See here)