In 2001, I wrote an article for Taxation magazine dealing with an issue where companies could fall foul of the bona vacantia rules (Revealed: King Charles secretly profiting from the assets of dead citizens, 23 November). I sent a copy of the article to the Treasury solicitor and Farrer & Co, the solicitors for the duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall, asking if they had any comments on the article and giving them an opportunity to confirm that I had properly reflected their policy towards bona vacantia. Farrer & Co declined to comment and referred me to the Treasury solicitor.
Following a response from the Treasury solicitor, I published a follow-up article. Since those articles were published, the legislation and guidance have changed more than once but I found the Treasury solicitor’s comments interesting on one point. I referred to bona vacantia as giving the crown and the two duchies windfall profits. The Treasury solicitor did not think that it was correct to refer to windfall profits since bona vacantia was one of the ancient hereditary revenues of the crown.
Does that mean that the next time we have a dispute with an EU country, we will see the ancient and hereditary feudal host being called out to repeat the victories of Crecy, Poitiers and Agincourt?
Jim Greenwood
Horsforth, West Yorkshire
• Re your investigation on royal estates collecting bona vacantia, the financial assets of people who died without a will or known next of kin, individuals in the duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall can avoid having the royals snatch their assets by simply making a will and ensuring they have a copy somewhere accessible (a compulsory central registry of wills would be good).
Simple wills can even be drawn up free through the National Free Wills Network (you do have to be referred by a charity – 225 are listed on the network’s website). There is also “free wills month” in March 2024. If you have no next of kin, you can at least make sure your assets go to a cause close to your heart, not to the monarchy.
Maggie Johnston
St Albans
• Having starred as third merchant in Purley grammar school’s production of The Government Inspector (1968), and subsequently during my teaching career, it’s been easy to see that Nikolai Gogol’s satire has remained relevant to modern life. But in light of the revelations about bona vacantia, I’ve been shocked to realise that it is, in fact, Gogol’s Dead Souls (con artist buys details of dead serfs to raise mortgage) that is the most apposite text for our times.
Paul Michell
Bristol
• Maybe the proceeds from this horrible feudal custom could be given as reparations to the countries that were colonised by us, although they are a drop in the bucket to what we owe them. Why does the royal family need to own whole swathes of Britain anyway? Not that being owned by some rapacious developer would be any better.
Rosemary Fletcher-Jones
New Milton, Hampshire
• Having trousered dead people’s money for centuries, the royal family has decided to put its ill-gotten gains into “ethical” investments after the Guardian’s investigation. Who gains from this? We need now a “crownfall” tax of at least a billion pounds to claw back our loot from the royal robbers.
Kit Jackson
London
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