MPs set to agree £100million grant to King Charles as critics blast ‘royal rip off’
The government’s Sovereign Grant Bill will see the sum given to the royal family slashed by £40million a year, but critics argue it is almost double the amount it should be
The Sovereign Grant is set to total just under £100million next year
Andy Burnham is under pressure to go further in slashing the amount of taxpayer cash given to the royal family – with MPs set to approve a £100million annual grant.
On Tuesday the Treasury will put forward legislation cutting the Sovereign Grant by nearly £40million. But King Charles will still be given £99.9million to carry out his duties and maintain royal palaces – a sum critics say is excessive.
The amount given to the royals has rocketed in the past 15 years despite the number of working royals falling. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was stripped of his titles amid the toxic fallout over his friendship with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
And Prince Harry and Meghan quit the Firm in 2020 and moved to the US, only to make a shock return to Britain last week raising fears the taxpayer may end up forking out for the couple’s security.
Former Lib Dem minister Norman Baker, a firm critic of the monarchy, told The Mirror that the PM must “stop this royal rip-off now”.
The grant is an annual payment to fund the monarch’s official duties, such as overseas trips. In April King Charles was praised for his handling of Donald Trump during a state visit to the US.
The payment – based on profits from the Crown Estate – also covers the cost of palace maintenance and employing staff. But critics say the proposed 2027/28 grant is more than double what it should be.
The sum is more than three times the initial £31million allocated by Chancellor George Osborne when the Sovereign Grant was introduced in 2012/13. It had soared by more than £100million to £137.9million this year, largely due to a decade-long refurbishment at Buckingham Palace costing £369million.
New legislation needs to be passed in order to reduce the grant. In a briefing note sent to Labour MPs, anti-monarchy campaign group Labour for a Republic said: “The grant for 2027-28 should not, in real terms, be more that the Grant’s starting point in 2012-13: that would mean a Grant around £45m.
“The Royal Family is smaller that it was in 2011 and the King and Prince of Wales claim to favour a slimmed-down monarchy. Making the anticipated increase to £99.9m, when the Government cannot afford many of the changes it wants to make to tackle poverty and deprivation, would be wrong and would appear to be wrong.”
The group called for a complete overhaul of the way the royals are funded, breaking the link between Crown Estate profits and the sum handed over. It also urged the government to take the King’s income – which it estimates at around £20million a year – from the Duchy of Lancaster into account.
Labour for a Republic secretary Ken Richie said: “Whatever one’s views on the monarchy, questions must be asked about why it needs so much more money now than it did in 2012.”
In the year to March 31, the royal annual financial report showed £5.1million was spent on travel, £33.7million on payroll and £3.5million on housekeeping and hospitality. Property maintenance totalled £67.5million.
Nearly £127,000 was spent on travel for the King and Queen to make an official visit to Rome last April. And documents show £733,000 was spent on 177 helicopter flights over 12 months. And 60 charter flights cost £837,000 in that time.
The government said it has no intention of ripping up the Sovereign Grant system. Earlier this year Labour grandee Baroness Margaret Hodge – who was appointed anti-corruption tsar in 2024 – said: “It’s (the Sovereign Grant) run out of time.”
She also called for more transparency around the royals’ private wealth. The King has an estimated net worth of £680million, according to the Sunday Times Rich List, while accounts for the Sovereign Grant this year showed for the first time that Prince William is richer than his father, with a net worth of £1.2billion via the Duchy of Cornwall.
A Sunday Mirror investigation in 2024 found the Duchy of Cornwall made an average of £3.3million a year from selling properties from 2010 to 2020.
But in the four years after this, this soared to £11million a year – but it is exempt from capital gains tax. Critics have argued the two Duchies should be public assets, but successive Governments have accepted them as private wealth.
Buckingham Palace said the King has voluntarily paid more than £30million in tax since ascending to the throne. In a statement in June, James Chalmers, Keeper of The Privy Purse, said: “It is important to emphasise that the Sovereign Grant does not provide personal income to members of the Royal Family. It funds the work of the institution – not private lives or private wealth.”
And he continued: “This is not a blank cheque. Expenditure is governed by the same standards and disciplines as any publicly funded body, with strict value-for-money requirements, detailed planning, multi-year strategies, independent audit, and Treasury oversight.”
The Sovereign Grant is a sum set each year by the Royal Trustees – comprising the Prime Minister, the Chancellor, and the Keeper of the Privy Purse.
Under a deal reached during the coalition Government, the grant is calculated based on the profit of the Crown Estate. In the past decade, over £5billion of profits from the Crown Estate have been paid to the Exchequer.
A Treasury spokesman told The Mirror: “The Grant – which funds official business and doesn’t provide an income to any members of the Royal Family – will fall by over 25% next year as the temporary funding for the reservicing of Buckingham Palace ends.
“The settlement is evidence‑based and reflects an increase in core activities like state visits and overseas trips. This supports government objectives and the UK’s position on the world stage.”
