Heating but spending for real finances

Official spending by the Royal House rose 5% last year to £107.5m, while taxpayer funding stood at £86.3m, the annual accounts have revealed.

This meant drawing on reserves for what royal officials called an “exceptional period of transition” after Elizabeth II’s death.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have also been confirmed to have left Frogmore Cottage, in Windsor, Berkshire.

The accounts also show that the actual heating is kept at 19°C, to reduce energy use.

To help save the planet and bills, the accounts report a “concerted effort” by staff at the royal residences to set winter heating to 19°C, while vacant rooms were kept at 16°C.

The running costs of the monarchy, such as official visits and residences, are funded by the “Sovereign Grant”, which is currently estimated at 25% of the Crown Estate’s profits.

The annual accounts for 2022-23 show that this funding was £86.3m, the same as the previous year.

But the spending was nearly £21m higher than the Sovereign Grant, with palace officials putting the extra costs down to:

The £369m 10-year project to repair Buckingham Palace was earmarked for £34.5m this year.

“Virtually no one” lived in the palace, royal officials said, although staff could stay there temporarily for events.

But King and Queen Camilla planned to live there once the construction work was finished, in a few years.

Officials did not give further details of the plans for Frogmore Cottage.

The Duke of York remains at the Royal Lodge in Windsor but would not comment on their rental arrangements.

On average, around 500 Royal Household staff were paid by the Sovereign Grant during the year, and there were questions about efforts to increase diversity, with the proportion belonging to ethnic minorities, 9.7%, unchanged from last year.

Royal staff received training under a “diversity and inclusion strategy”, and concerns were raised after the founder of a black British charity, Ngozi Fulani, faced repeated questions about where she was “really” from, at a reception at the Palace. of Buckingham.

Public funding also covers the cost of official royal tours and visits, which included:

But most visits were much more low-key, with:

Paying visitors to royal residences helped offset some of the costs, with £9.8m in revenue earned, still less than half pre-Covid levels.

The Queen’s death last September saw the Palace receive an unprecedented level of correspondence, including condolence messages, with 183,000 items arriving by post.

In separate accounts, the Duchy of Cornwall reported profits of around £24 million, in a transition year that saw the new Prince of Wales replace his father as beneficiary.

The keeper of the private purse, Sir Michael Stevens, said the annual finances covered an unprecedented “year of pain, change and celebration”.

In addition to events including the Platinum Jubilee, the Queen’s death and the King’s accession to the throne, he said, the Royal House “has not been immune to the impacts of the joint challenges of the pandemic and inflationary pressures, which have result in a flat sovereign grant”. “.

But the anti-monarchy group Republic said the royals were increasing their spending while “public services are being cut”.

Revenue from the dukedoms of Cornwall and Lancaster should go to the state, he says, while additional costs such as policing are not included in the annual accounts.

“The royals have long hidden their true cost, which we have estimated to be at least £345m,” Republic chief executive Graham Smith said. “That’s enough to pay for 13,000 new nurses or teachers.”

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