THE monarchy now costs every man, woman and child in the country the equivalent of one minute’s worth of a ticket to watch England play Portugal on Saturday.

According to the annual report on the royal finances, published yesterday, the monarchy costs us 62p per head per year, an increase of a penny on last year. Buckingham Palace has admitted that it is seeking an extra £1 million, plus inflation, on its annual £15 million government grant to maintain the Royal Palaces.

Nicholas Macpherson, the Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, who audits the royal accounts, has, unusually, given them only qualified approval. He is unhappy with the way that the Palace has presented the hole in its staff pension fund, saying that it is £1.3 million bigger than claimed.

Mr Macpherson has not suggested wrongdoing, only a technicality of financial reporting. Palace officials said that by the time next year’s accounts were presented the anomaly would be corrected.

Maintaining the head of state cost taxpayers £37.4 million last year, a 4 per cent increase on the previous year — yet a fraction of the cost of monarchy in the early 1990s, when it exceeded £90 million before a stringent programme of Palace financial reforms.

Unlike Clarence House, which this week disclosed how much the Prince of Wales paid in tax, the Palace resolutely refused to say how much the Queen paid. “We have no intention of disclosing that now or in the future. She is entitled to her privacy,” a senior official said.

This year’s increase in Civil List spending was blamed on three main sources: an expensive series of overseas visits by the Queen and the Prince of Wales; the need to employ extra staff to deal with inquiries under the Freedom of Information Act; and new staff vetting procedures after a Daily Mirror reporter got a job as a footman.

Alan Reid, Keeper of the Privy Purse and the Queen’s accountant, said yesterday that the Palace was already pressing the Government for an increase in its £15 million grant-in-aid to maintain the occupied Royal Palaces. It is looking for an extra £1 million a year, plus an inflation-linked increase in the existing grant.

“We are being squeezed by our water, gas and electricity bills, which last year were £2.1 million, up £500,000 on five years ago, leaving less for essential maintenance work at a time when the building industry is subject to higher-than- average inflation,” Mr Reid said. “Unless we get an increase in funding, some buildings will begin to deteriorate.”

One building in need of serious repair is the Royal Mausoleum, the tomb of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert in Windsor Great Park, rarely visited, open three days a year, but suffering from 150 years of rising damp. It needs a £2 million refurbishment.

Building maintenance, like royal travel, is separate from the Civil List, which pays the working expenses of the Queen’s office, chiefly her official entertaining and the salaries of her 310 permanent staff. The Civil List has been set at £7.3 million a year since 2000, and thanks to careful husbanding now has a £32.2 million reserve in the bank, which is slowly being used to cover other royal expenses.

Mr Reid said yesterday that there was little scope for any further substantial reduction in the cost of the monarchy, most fat having been cut out of the operation in the past decade. “Our key aim is not to achieve a low-cost monarchy. We want a high quality, efficient monarchy,” Mr Reid said. “We are spending taxpayers’ money, so are trying to be as transparent as possible.”

Indeed, freedom of information has been another cost. The Palace is exempt from the Act but, as one royal official said yesterday: “We have dealings with many government departments which often disclose things about us that perhaps they shouldn’t.” Three extra staff now deal with queries.

Vetting procedures instituted after the Mirror demonstrated gaping holes in palace security have added another £150,000 to annual Civil List costs. The new system has already caught two reporters trying to follow the Mirror’s example.

But, as with the Prince of Wales’s annual accounts published on Monday, nowhere in the Palace balance-sheet is there any mention of what it costs the police to protect the Royal Family. The figure, in these times of terrorism, is assumed to be vast.

During the year, royal travel costs rose by £500,000. The royal train was blameless, being used five times fewer than in the previous year. Air travel on civilian charter flights accounted for almost all the increase.

As the accounts were being made public in the Palace yesterday a small group of protesters from the pressure group Republic, including the agony aunt Claire Rayner, and the gay rights activist Peter Tatchell, demonstrated outside. Mr Tatchell said: “The Queen’s personal wealth is shrouded in secrecy. Until we get full transparency there will be doubts as to whether her contribution to the Exchequer is fair.”

Inside, the Keeper had no intention of letting the cat out of the Privy Purse.

THE TOP ROYAL PAY PACKETS

It will scarcely be a surprise that the Royal Household’s highest paid courtier is the accountant:

Air Vice-Marshal David Walker earned £115,000 after being seconded from the Ministry of Defence as the Palace’s new Master of the Household, a post equivalent to being general manager of a five-star hotel

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