Annual statements suggest a royal bailout may be needed for Britain’s queen
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LONDON - The latest financial statements from Britain’s royal family suggest the next British institution needing a taxpayer bailout could well be the monarch herself.
Annual accounts analyzed by Britain’s press yesterday show that Queen Elizabeth II took $9.9 million over the past year from her own state-funded reserve account to balance the books at Buckingham Palace and myriad other royal residences.
The total bill for the queen and her family’s globe-trotting rose 3.8 percent to $68.6 million during a 12-month period ended in March.
Specialists on royal finances said the monarchy would require millions more in taxpayer support. Otherwise the queen’s reserve funds soon could run out. The specialists warned Buckingham Palace and other royal residences badly needed repairs, some of which had already been postponed for decades.
The report on royal finances said if the queen continued to dip into her reserves, the current amount of $34.7 million would run dry by 2012, her 60th year as monarch.
