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Buckingham House is a public institution in Westminster, London dedicated to the history of the monarchy of the United Kingdom which existed until 1820. Its permanent collection of over one million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in Britain on the subject, having been collected from former royal households and other institutions in the years following the British Revolution.

The museum at Buckingham House was established on 30 January 1824, exactly 175 years since the execution of King Charles I and was housed in what had been a private retreat for Queen Charlotte until her death in 1818. Large renovations of the House had continued after the accession of King George IV to the throne in January 1820, and after his execution in April 1820 at the end of the Revolution, the Provisional Government under Arthur Thistlewood determined that the work should continue and the site converted from royal palace to a second national museum, alongside the British Museum established in 1753. Architect John Nash was commissioned to work on the building, including the addition of the famous Marble Arch entrance, to demonstrate the new British Republic's commitment to the preservation and display of the nation's history.

The museum sourced its collection from the former royal households, including Carlton House, St James's Palace, Kensington Palace and Windsor Castle, which remain on display despite repeated legal challenges from members of the House of Hanover to recover items such as papers and jewellery belonging to their ancestors. The British Crown Jewels were displayed at Buckingham House between 1824 and 1961 when they were returned to the Tower of London to be displayed in the renovated Jewel House.

Like other publicly funded national museums in Britain, Buckingham House does not charge an admission fee. Visitors have access to Buckingham House itself, the Buckingham House Gallery, dedicated to displaying portraits of monarchs and royalty, the Buckingham House Gardens and the Royal Mews at Buckingham House, where the carriages used during the monarchy such as the Gold State Coach and carriages still in use today, such as the Lord Mayor of London's State Coach, can be viewed. The Buckingham House estate was made a Grade I Listed Building in March 1970 ahead of the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Republic in April 1970.

In 2020, the year of the 200th anniversary of the Republic, the museum recorded over 10.2 million visitors, breaking the previous record of 9.6 million set in 2010 when multiple special exhibitions were held to mark the 350th anniversary of the restoration to the throne of Charles II in 1660 after the Interregnum.

Buckingham House can be accessed via public transport through the London Underground stations at Green Park, Hyde Park Corner and Grosvenor Gardens. Constitution Hill remains a public access road to private vehicles, private hire vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists. Buses are not permitted to run routes down Constitution Hill or The Mall.

 

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Universal Basics (UB) is the programme of four universal basic services that forms the core of the welfare state in Britain. It was introduced in 2000 to replace and upgrade the various number of benefits for working-age adults, their dependents and retired adults and sought to return to the welfare state in Britain to the basic ideas set out by Thomas Spence, Arthur Thistlewood and William Davidson in the 19th Century. All residents in Britain are eligible for all the services provided through the programme.

Universal Basics is comprised of four basic services, created by the Universal Basics Act 1996 and defined as:

1) Universal Basics: Guaranteed Income​

2) Universal Basics: Housing Service​

3) Universal Basics: Information Service​

4) Universal Basics: Transport for Britain​

The National Health and Care Service (NHCS), which uses UB-style branding, state-provided education, free school lunches and legal services are not considered part of the Universal Basics programme.

History
The radical overhaul of Britain's welfare state was first proposed in 1990 at the annual conference of the National Spencean Alliance by Leader, and former Chief Commissioner, Eric Varley as part of the party's "bold offer" to the electorate after unexpectedly losing the 1988 election. The party won a significant majority in the 1991 election which saw the formal consultations and preparations for implementation legislation begin. When Varley resigned in 1993 due to a health scare, the Social Security Commissioner, who had overseen the first two years of work on the policy, Ann Taylor was elected to succeed him and declared the welfare reforms a "Millennium challenge" for Britain and promised to have the reforms in place by 2000. A white paper on the proposals was published in January 1994 and draft legislation published in February 1995. The Speceans made the draft legislation and the policy the key focus of their campaign in the 1995 election in which they were re-elected with another significant majority. Universals Basics, and the wider reforms of social security, were legislated for in the Universal Basics Act 1996 and the Welfare Reform Act 1997. A third successive Spencean victory in the 1999 election ensured that the reforms took effect, as planned, on 1st January 2000.

Services
All four services are operated under the umbrella of Universal Basics, but are largely administered in separate government departments while using a single database to ensure consistency in the data used by each department. 'Guaranteed Income' and the 'Housing Service' are managed by the Department for Employment and Social Security, the 'Information Service' is managed by the Department for Culture and National Heritage and 'Transport for Britain' is an executive agency within the Department for Infrastructure and Enterprise. Accounting for both capital and current expenditure, spending on Universal Basics in 2020 was £914.8 billion - equivalent to 34% of GDP.

Guaranteed Income​

Guaranteed Income, otherwise known as basic income or universal basic income, is the the cornerstone of the Universal Basics programme. It was designed to replace almost all of the individual benefit payments that existed prior to 2000, while eradicating poverty and returning the welfare state, on the whole, to its origins when surplus revenue achieved by government was redistributed in equal sized payments to all residents. This system existed between 1820 and 1883 when it was replaced by William Gladstone and the Whigs by an early version of the welfare state that existed between 1883 and 2000.

Guaranteed Income is, by far, the single largest expenditure in the government's budget, with £850.1 billion being spent on the programme in 2020 - the equivalent of 31.65% of GDP, and 93% of the total capital and current expenditure of Universal Basics. Every adult (those aged 18 and over) resident receives a £1,000 payment on the first working day of each month of the year, totalling to £12,000 across one calendar year, direct to the bank account they have registered with for the purposes of Universal Basics. The payment is tax-free and makes up the vast majority of the £15,000 'personal allowance', which is the income one can accrue before they begin to pay income tax. Every resident aged 0 to 17 receives a £3,000 payment into a dedicated personal Guaranteed Income Fund. Parents of children aged 0 to 15 are able to access up to 50% of the payments each month to help pay towards costs relating to their child. At ages 16 and 17 responsibility for the fund is transferred directly to the child, who access up to 75% of the payments monthly. These rules were designed to ensure that each child would have a minimum amount of £24,000 in their funds upon their 18th birthday, allowing them to fund the tuition for an undergraduate university degree (which is capped at £4,000 a year) if they wish to attend university while still retaining a significant amount to expend as they wish.

Housing Service​

Through the Housing Service, the government spends £19.1 billion each year in capital expenditure to build 225,000 prefab homes which are built in factories across Britain. All the homes are social housing for at least the first 5 years. Tenants who remain in a property for 5 years or more can then opt-in to the Share to Buy scheme which allows them to purchase a share in the property of up to 50% initially, and 'staircase' up to 100% ownership over a period of 25 years. In the first year of the scheme, in 2000, all the homeless and rough sleepers in Britain were given a newbuild through the Housing Service with the first year rent and utility free applied to all homes in the first year of the scheme. This allowed homelessness and rough sleeping in Britain to be completely eradicated, which remains the case as of 2020. The rent exemption applied only for the first year of the scheme. The utility exemption, applied to gas, water and electricity, remains in place for the first year of the tenancy through a £3,250 Utility Allowance paid directly to suppliers by the government, at a total cost to the government of £731.3 million a year.

Information Service​

The Information Service is the second largest service provided through Universal Basics in terms of total expenditure, costing £34 billion in 2020. For all households, the Television Licence Fee, which allows live television to be watched in a household and which is set independently by the BBC each year as their funding source, is financed directly through the service. Every household also has a basic broadband package financed through the service, providing at least 50Mb broadband at a cost of £25 per month per household. Households may opt for a faster speed or package extension, such as including a landline telephone, with a private company. In this case, the government will continue to finance the first £25 of the monthly bill, with the remainder financed by the household themselves. Finally, the Information Service provides a basic mobile phone package to all adults at the value of £18 a month, which provides 75GB of data and unlimited calls and texts. As with broadband, adults can opt for package extensions with private providers and the government will finance the first £18 of their monthly bill with the remainder financed by the individual. Mobile phones for those under the age of 18 are not financed through the scheme, however the government launched a consultation in 2019 on extending the policy to 16 and 17-year-olds.

Transport for Britain​

Through Transport for Britain, which is responsible for most of the transport network in Britain, all residents are given free bus travel regardless of age at a cost of £10.1 billion in 2020. As with all other Transport for Britain services on rail, rapid transit, trams, tolls and bicycle and scooter hire, travellers must tap in and out for their journeys on buses with their TfB Travelcards or contactless payment device. Despite no charge being made, tapping in and out is still required in order to allow records to be kept of how many journeys are made on the bus network and where additional services may be needed in future to deal with overcrowding. Non-residents, such as tourists and those on temporary visas, are charged £1 for each journey they make on the bus network, with travel remaining free for non-resident children aged 10 and below.