Pope To Be Protected From Arrest On UK Visit

reply to post by Pockets

If anyone else was responsible for the covering up of what the current pope has helped to facilitate,they would not be allowed to the UK,or arrested on entry by interpol or the like.

But hey,this is the UK we live in-and its going to cost us,the UK taxpayers a mere 12 MILLION pounds,to augment the Vatican who will chip in a paultry few million.

Costs for the pope's inaugural visit to Britain are soaring, with taxpayers contributing as much as £12m towards the four-day event, an increase of £4m on previous estimates.
Lord Patten of Barnes, David Cameron's special representative for the papal visit, said at a Foreign Office briefing today that the government had revised its initial contribution because of a failure to grasp the "complexity and sophistication" of the trip.
He told journalists that non-policing costs were first put at £15m, with taxpayers shouldering £8m of the bill and the Catholic church paying the balance.
"These estimates were made in good faith. But I think we underestimated the complexity and sophistication of a visit that has normal aspects of a state visit and pastoral events. We will have to make a larger commitment even though we have driven down some of the costs."

www.guardian.co.uk...

Well fan bleeding tastic,I ain't even catholic,nor are countless others,but we ALL get to pay for the pope to visit.

In his Davross bullet proof pope golf cart of doom no less,I expect..



Wonderful.Just smashing.How this will help the current state of our country!!
Ain't it just peachy?




Edit,10 mins after post:

Good grief,its only now sinking in.This 4 day visit is going to cost the UK tax paying collective 12 million pounds.

This is complete insantity-does the pope drink antimatter milkshakes or something?
Does the guy drive round in brand new Bugatti veyron's,insisting upon a replacement every 50 miles?
How else can someone spend over 12 million of OUR pounds in 4 days?
And how many schools,hospitals and houses could that money build instead?

How the heck can this be justified-aren't the church supposed to help people,rather than pinch 12 million in a recession?

Complete madness...Although I am unsurprised by such a turn of events in these times.


[edit on 22/7/2010 by Silcone Synapse]

Whilst to us wee individual the amount of money is staggering in the wider context it isn't so bad. Countries can't just stop state visits because of a recession; and they won't stop them.

Based on Income Tax receipts:

In 2009/10, the Treasury is expecting to take in £140.5 billion in gross income tax receipts. Social security benefits are projected to be £164.7 billion.

Source Daily Telegraph

If the UK tax payer has to pay £12 million that equates to around 20p per person for an event that happens every 30 years. Considering we spend 164.7 billion a year on social security, paying a lot of that to some people on Job Seekers Allowance [The people who enjoy sponging not legitimate jobless]. I would much rather spend 20p every 30 years and see millions of Catholics satisfied, not only this but a visit from the head of Catholicism cannot do any harm with the new tension in Northern Ireland at the moment. At least the pope is doing his job visiting his flock et cetera. I think I can part with having one less chocolate bar over the next three decades.


[edit on 22/7/10 by Jon Quinn]

When Snoop Dogg came to the UK, One newspaper declared on it's front page:

"Kick This Evil Bastard Out!"

I hope for the Pope they drop the F-Bomb and more with disgust.

I went to dig for some more information on the visit, and came across this interesting story from The Guardian

www.guardian.co.uk...

Catholic group's initiative will see the slogan 'Pope Benedict Ordain Women Now' appear on 10 buses throughout September

I hope all sorts of people kick up a stink about the popes visit. It may be impossible to arrest him, but it's definitely possible to embarrass him in many ways,

A very interesting quote from that article shows you the kind of things the Catholic Church takes very seriously

Last Thursday the Vatican issued sweeping changes to its laws on sexual abuse, extending the period in which charges can be filed against priests in church courts and broadening the use of fast-track procedures to defrock them. But while the document dealt mostly with paedophilia, it also stated that the "attempted ordination of a woman" to the priesthood was one of the most serious crimes in church law.

reply to post by harpsounds


Something as simple as a mass mooning may do the trick-but it may go the other way,he may get the wrong idea and stay for months.

That would be awful.

Its a cop out for entirely practical reasons. We've had enough sectarian violence in our British history without the UK police arresting the pope.

Growing up where I did the old "what team do you support" was a common playground question. It really meant are you protestant or catholic. The wrong answer to the wrong people meant trouble.

A quick look at UK history will explain why this was never getting out of the starting gate.

Feel free to arrest him somewhere else with less history though....