{"id":355,"date":"2012-02-16T00:34:22","date_gmt":"2012-02-15T23:34:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.colindgordon.net\/?p=355"},"modified":"2012-08-25T14:45:29","modified_gmt":"2012-08-25T13:45:29","slug":"lordsladies-gentlemen-the-uk-honours-system-in-disarray","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/2012\/02\/lordsladies-gentlemen-the-uk-honours-system-in-disarray\/","title":{"rendered":"Lords,Ladies & Gentlemen: The UK Honours System in Disarray:"},"content":{"rendered":"

Would you like to obtain a British aristocratic title \u2013 to have the\u00a0designation\u00a0 \u201cBaron(ess)”, \u201cCount(ess)\u201d or \u201cDuke \/ Duchess”\u00a0in front of your name? If so, then the website \u201cRegaltitles.com\u201d can (so they declare) arrange it all for you \u2013 at a discounted price of $197 (usual cost: $397). As a \u201cbonus\u201d they will also provide you with a \u201cpersonalized Coat-Of-Arms\u201d ($99) especially designed for your new family identity. Once you\u2019ve submitted the fee and joined the nobility, the results will be \u201castounding\u201d: You\u2019ll be allocated the \u201cbest table & receive the finest attention\u201d in the top restaurants, airlines will place you in first class even if you haven\u2019t asked (or paid) for it and when you check into a hotel you\u2019ll receive complimentary wine, fruit and a room upgrade \u201csimply because the management are eager to improve their class of clientele\u201d. There are several other websites \u2013 among them, \u201celitetitles.co.uk \u201c\/ \u201cenglishmanor.co.uk\u201d \/ \u201chighlandtitles.com (for Scotland)\u201d \u2013 which also purport to offer \u201cinstant\u00a0 access to the privileged world\u201d. Such assertions are, however, according to the British Embassy in Washington, misleading: It points out on its website that \u201cThe sale of British titles is prohibited by the Honours (Prevention of Abuses) Act 1925\u201d, warns its American readers that buying a \u201cbogus lordship of the manor\u201d would not give them the right to put \u201cLord\u201d on their passport or have a coat-of arms and emphasizes that the recipients of\u00a0 British honours are chosen by the Queen on the advice of the Prime Minister and the leaders of the main opposition parties.<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u00a0 are an estimated 700 \u201chereditary peers\u201d in the UK . This includes 31 Dukes \u2013 among them the Duke of Edinburgh (the Queen\u2019s husband), the Duke of Cambridge (Prince Willam) and the Duke of Westminster ( 4th<\/sup> on the list of \u201cRichest People In the UK\u201d 2011). Prince Charles is both the Duke of Cornwall and the Duke of Rothesey (Scotland). Since the Parliamentary reforms of 1999, the majority (about 630) of the members of the House of Lords have been \u201cLife Peers\u201d (they can\u2019t pass their title onto their heirs) and only 92 are \u201chereditary\u201d. They are not paid a salary but can claim a \u00a3300 allowance per day for attending proceedings in the House or one of its committees. The House of Lords Appointments Commission \u201cwill consider any British, Irish or Commonwealth citizen over the age of 21 for membership of the House\u201d. They must be resident in the UK for tax purposes. It is possible to nominate oneself or arrange for someone else \/ an organization to do it for you. <\/strong><\/p>\n

There has, though, been increasing concern as to how some people become Lords and the way they behave once they get there. In 2006, the police \u00a0investigated allegations that wealthy supporters of both the Labour and Conservative parties had been offered life peerages in return for a financial contribution. No-one was eventually prosecuted \u2013 but in November 2011, a parliamentary committee insisted that a party political donation should not influence the decision to grant an honour. Meanwhile, several Lords who have been convicted of offences have nonetheless controversially retained their titles and membership of the House of Lords. Examples are: Lord (Jeffrey) Archer, the best \u2013selling author (two years in jail for perjury and perverting the course of justice); Lord Taylor (12 months\u2019 jail for expenses fraud); Lord Black ,the Canadian-born former \u201cDaily Telegraph\u201d owner (jailed in the US for fraud). Baroness Uddin was given an 18-month suspension from the House for cheating on her expenses but may still be able to return later this year, even if she hasn\u2019t repaid the \u00a3125,000 she owes. As the \u201cSunday Times\u201d has pointed out, some peers \u00a0(such as Lord Chitnis \u201cwho lives in France and did not attend for 20 years\u201d) hardly ever appear in the House of Lords.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The current media debate about the honours system has focused mainly on the case of the former \u201cSir\u201d Fred Goodwin (now a mere \u201cMr\u201d). He was given a knighthood by the Tony Blair Government in 2004 but went on to preside over the near-collapse in 2008 of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), which then had to be rescued by the British tax-payer. Despite this failure, he left with a pension of \u00a3703,000 pa. After huge public outcry, he reluctantly agreed to reduce this to \u00a3342,500 pa. \u00a0On 2nd<\/sup> February \u00a02012, the Queen (as recommended by the \u201cHonours Forfeiture Committee\u201d) stripped him of his knighthood. This also means that his wife reverted to being just \u00a0\u201cMrs\u201d Goodwin. Women who are married to a \u201cSir\u201d or a Lord automatically\u00a0 assume\u00a0 the title of \u201cLady\u201d – but lose it again if their domestic circumstances change. \u00a0\u00a0Nancy Shevell, the American heiress who wed Sir Paul McCartney on 9th<\/sup> October 2011 thus instantly became \u201cLady McCartney\u201d \u2013 a description that\u00a0from 2002\u00a0until 2008\u00a0had applied to Heather. It doesn\u2019t work in reverse: A man whose wife is (or becomes) a Baroness or Countess \u00a0remains \u00a0plain \u201cMr\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

BBC News has noted that there is considerable precedent for annulling an honour: It happened to the Queen\u2019s art adviser Anthony Blunt (knighthood removed in 1979 after he was revealed as a Soviet spy) .\u00a0 Robert Mugabe (President of Zimbabwe), former Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu and Italy\u2019s Benito Mussolini were all awarded honorary knighthoods \u2013 and then had them taken away again. Between 1951-1999, 277 people \u2013 such as the painters Francis Bacon & Lucien Freud, author Roald Dahl and (apparently) the singer David Bowie \u2013 turned down the offer of honours. The Beatles\u2019 John Lennon sent back his MBE (Member Of The British Empire) as \u201ca protest against violence and war\u201d. Many other rock stars –\u00a0 Paul McCartney, Mick Jagger, Elton John, Tom Jones (all once depicted as \u201crebels against\u00a0 the establishment\u201d)\u00a0 readily accepted their knighthoods.\u00a0 As both Bob Geldof and Bono are Irish, they can\u2019t call themselves \u201cSir\u201d but can add the letters \u201cKBE\u201d (Knight Commander Of The Order Of the British Empire) after their names. The \u201cListosaur\u201d website\u00a0 has\u00a0 queried whether \u2013 in view of his alleged tax-avoidance activities \u2013 Bono still deserves the award. Honorary KBE\u2019s have also been given to former US Presidents George Bush Snr. & Ronald Reagan, ex-Secretary of State Colin Powell and film director Steven Spielberg .<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most other countries also, of course, operate their own honours system. Colombia\u2019s \u201cOrden de San Carlos\u201d has seven different categories, the highest of which is \u201cknight\u201d. In 2004, Starbucks was awarded the Colombian \u201cOrder Of the Grand Cross Medal\u201d for its role in \u201csupporting the local economy.\u201d In 2008, that country’s\u00a0House of Representative\u2019s President , German Varon Cotrino, queried whether the previous year\u2019s total of 300 had diminished the value of the awards. In July 2006, President Ahmadinejad of Iran granted President \u00a0Hugo Chavez the \u201cHigh Medal of the Islamic Republic of Iran\u201d and received Venezuela\u2019s \u201cLibertador Medal\u201d in return two months later. President Jose Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua assigned the \u201cOrden Augusto Cesar Sandino\u201d to President Eva Morales of Bolivia and Hugo Chavez in January 2007. Former French President Jacques Chirac conferred the \u201cGrand Cross of the Legion d\u2019Honneur\u201d on Russia\u2019s Vladimir Putin in 2006.\u00a0 US actors Meryl Streep, Bruce Willis, Johnny Depp, Clint Eastwood , Britain\u2019s Jude Law and\u00a0 J.K. Rowling\u00a0 ( the Harry Potter author) have all been made Knights of France\u2019s Legion d\u2019Honneur.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Would you like to obtain a British aristocratic title \u2013 to have the\u00a0designation\u00a0 \u201cBaron(ess)”, \u201cCount(ess)\u201d or \u201cDuke \/ Duchess”\u00a0in front of your name? If so, then the website \u201cRegaltitles.com\u201d can (so they declare) arrange it all for you \u2013 at a discounted price of $197 (usual cost: $397). As a \u201cbonus\u201d they will also provide […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-society"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=355"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":423,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355\/revisions\/423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}