Royal Cottage Is 'Unfit For Animals' and Costs Taxpayer £484 A Month

It may have royal connections, but Stephen Warr’s rented home is certainly no palace. He describes the damp, dilapidated cottage owned by the Crown Estate as “unfit for animals”. With chunks of plaster hanging from the ceiling, rotting floorboards and mould growing on the walls, it looks more like the inner-city property of a slum landlord. Yet the taxpayer is forking out £484 a month in housing benefit for the former farm worker to live there. The cottage is owned by the vast £8.6 billion Crown Estate, which will earn the Queen around £39 million this year. The estate received £38,539 in housing benefit from West Somerset Council alone last year.  Read more on the Daily Mirror website.

Queen and Prince Charles Cash In On Benefits

Hard-up families struggling to cope with crippling rises in living costs are already angry that private ­landlords rake in thousands of pounds from housing benefits. But many will be even more furious to learn Prince Charles and the Queen are also making money from hard-up tenants who rely on the payments just to keep a roof over their heads. The pair receive tens of thousands of pounds a year in housing benefits that are paid by local authorities to landlords.  Charles’ Duchy of Cornwall Estate raked in at least £163,000 from a string of councils providing cash to households and the Crown Estate received at least £38,539 in housing benefit payments from just one town hall last year. Read more on the Daily Mirror website.