Wanted: Royal chewing gum cleaner
Forget Downton Abbey and Upstairs Downstairs. This week, we have had a glimpse behind the scenes of a reallife royal household, with the news that the Queen has been advertising for someone to remove chewing gum from the floors and furniture at Holyrood House. The Queen’s chosen cleaner must be available to scrape off pink goo for four hours a day, five days a week (including Sundays), on a part-time salary based on a rate of $28,645 per year. The successful applicant will also be required to perform less adhesive-related tasks, namely the making of royal beds and the laundering of royal linen. But if the combination of Febreze and Juicy Fruit is not to your liking, there are lots of other royal opportunities up for grabs. Sous chef (45 hours per week, $45,005): Based at Buckingham Palace. There’s no more important job than feeding the royal family and their guests. Poisoning a visiting president because you forgot to look at the best-before date on the venison is going to land you in the same kind of hot water in which you normally boil eggs. It’s the equivalent level of responsibility as the person who used to have to roll over the monarch’s bed pre-sleep, just to make sure there weren’t any swords sticking out. Recruitment adviser (37.5 hours per week, $54,000$63,000, plus “rewards package”): Based at Buckingham Palace but responsibilities across the realm. Impress your friends by telling them you’re employed in the Privy Purse and Treasurer’s Office. You’ll need a degree plus the ability to recruit everyone from helicopter pilots to building conservators. As well as looking after the 1,200 staff on the permanent payroll, you have to take on 400 summer-only workers. Retail assistant (average of 38.37 hours per week, $27,476): Based at Windsor Castle. Your job is to “ensure that all our visitors from around the world leave with both amazing memories and a souvenir of their visit.” Superintendent, Windsor Castle (37.5 hours, salary “competitive”): Reading between the lines, you have to be the iron fist within the jewelled glove. You may not be able to throw troublesome employees into the dungeons, but you definitely aren’t going to take lip from anybody. Not even the corgis. There aren’t many job ads these days that require the applicant to have “gravitas.”