Droit de seigneur

2 magnificent French Cabinets were made for the Palace of Versailles around 1675 grace the the Drawing Room of Drumlanrig Castle, presented by King Louis XIV to King Charles II who gave them to his natural son, The Duke of Monmouth. An almost identical cabinet to the larger (see pic) of these is now on display at the Paul Getty Museum in the United States of America, while the smaller boasts a companion in the Wallace Collection in London.

Value ? Priceless. Like the Da Vinci painting stolen from the Castle in a daring daylight raid in 2003, claimed to be worth £80 Mn, their owner is Walter Francis John Scott, 9th Duke of Buccleuch, 11th Duke of Queensberry (b. 1923) Eton and Christ Church,Oxford.

He owns five major landed Estates, his estimated personal fortune of £55m is supplemented by a further c.£400m held by the Buccleuch Group, his holding company.

One company in the group of the enterprising Duke, (the largest landowner in the country) is Buccleuch BioEnergy , who will provide over 60MW of plant in the next 5/6 years or so, to provide metered biomass heating to commercial and domestic customers using locally sourced forestry and sawmill co - product (offcuts). Concentrating on the Scottish borders, South Central Scotland and the Aberdeen, Aviemore and Perthshire, the business claims it will expand and not be limited by geography.

What is this sophisticated technology that the Duke is so anxious to press on the Highlander and Lowlander alike? Well it’s the Köb Pyrot range of innovative wood pellet burning boilers manufactured by Köb & Schäfer GmbH, Flotzbachstrasse 33, A-6922 Wolfurt, of Austria. Their perfect combustion lowers the emissions of CO and NOx to below that of modern oil heating systems. Unlike oil and gas, wood is CO2-neutral and renewable, burner efficiency of more than 90% is achievable.

On January 3rd this year, Buccleuch BioEnergy was awarded a tax free grant to develop the business of £571,933 from the Big Lottery renewable Energy Fund to "to develop the business ."

What the fuck are we doing lining the pockets of this aristocratic billionaire from Lottery Funds for a commercial enterprise which is merely flogging imported equipment! What are we doing but sustaining the forelock tugging dependents of this chinless childless wonder - descended from one of Charles' II's whores.