Queen asks UK Government for pay rise

By Rebecca English

September 27, 2008 12:01am
Article from: The Courier-Mail


    * Queens to ask for more money
    * Faces higher food and fuel prices
    * Aides say she's not broke

THE Queen plans to ask the UK Government for more money to run her household after being hit by rising costs, officials say.

Like homeowners across Britain, the monarch has faced escalating prices for fuel, food and home repairs.

These have seen the cost of maintaining her position as head of state almost double.

But her taxpayer-funded Civil List payment of £7.9 million ($17.5m) has not increased in 20 years - and is not due to be renegotiated until 2010.

The shortfall has left what has been described as a "black hole" in Buckingham Palace's accounts of several million pounds each year and led to claims that the Queen will be unable to balance her books if she is not awarded extra funding within the next three years.

Senior officials have firmly denied the Queen is facing a "cash crisis" but confirmed this week that they would have to ask for an increase in Civil List funding.

A royal spokeswoman said there was nothing that could "remotely be described as a black hole in the books" and rejected the claim the Queen would face ruin without government intervention.

"We are never complacent, but we have managed our finances well and are ahead of the game at this point," she said.

"When the time comes we will, of course, be hoping for an increase - after all, there are few people in the country who haven't had a pay rise for 20 years."

Officials said the Queen's accountants had squirrelled away £35 million for a rainy day.

Although this is down to £26 million, aides say there is enough in the pot to "draw down from" until they are able to renegotiate their government hand-out.

"Like so many we have been hit by rising costs, but fortunately our reserves adequately cover the extra expenditure we are now facing," a Buckingham Palace spokesman said.

"We will have enough money to keep going until we can open negotiations about a new Civil List payment."

The Queen receives the majority of her funding through the Civil List as well as "grants in aid" for the upkeep of palaces and travel. She also benefits from a portfolio of investments managed by the Duchy of Lancaster.

About 70 per cent of her Civil List revenue is spent on staff salaries. The rest goes on entertaining.
The current figure of £7.9 million a year was agreed in 1990 and Tony Blair's government refused to sanction an increase 10 years later.

The Treasury would not be drawn yesterday on whether the payment would be increased.

Whitehall sources privately argue, however, that there is simply not enough money to go round.

It is also understood that the Queen's Keeper of the Privy Purse, Sir Alan Reid, has asked the Government for VAT exemption on payment for services such as building works in line with government departments.

Two senior MPs who sit on the Public Accounts Committee said they had no sympathy for the Queen's plight and called for the Royal Household's accounts to be publicly audited in the same way as government departments.