Knighton Rates

A Royal decree granted the villagers of Knighton in Staffordshire tax free living for life - all for a £1,000 loan to the Crown.

Thanks to a loan by local haberdasher William Adams to Charles II in the seventeenth century the villagers of Knighton in Staffordshire have been free of rates payments ever since. Peter Green meets villagers who are not surprisingly in favour of this historical quirk.

The royal decree of 1660 that exempted the villagers of Knighton from paying any rates has been gradually eroded over the years to the point where only agricultural workers qualify for the benefit.