Buckingham Palace won’t publish probe into claims of Meghan bullying staff / Royal family receives over £100 million as costs soar despite cost of living crisis - full breakdown

 

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Buckingham Palace won’t publish probe into claims of Meghan bullying staff

By Karla Adam

June 30, 2022 at 7:20 a.m. EDT

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/06/30/meghan-royal-family-bullying-report-conclusion/

 

LONDON — Buckingham Palace confirmed that “lessons have been learned” following an investigation into complaints that Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, had bullied palace staff members, but it has not published the findings nor explained what those lessons are.

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Last year, the palace launched an investigation into bullying claims after an article in the Times of London claimed that two of her employees had been driven from their jobs and a third had been undermined.

 

Lawyers for Meghan denied the reports, calling it a “calculated smear campaign” and said that the Times of London was being “used by Buckingham Palace to peddle a wholly false narrative” about the duchess. The reports appeared in the paper shortly before Meghan and Prince Harry’s bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey.

 

The palace, which never backed the claims but said they were serious enough to be investigated, said in a statement on Thursday that the probe had concluded and that “recommendations on our policies and procedures have been taken forward.” The palace said that it would not be publishing the results of the review, which looked at how the palace handled the complaints — not the specifics of the allegations themselves.

 

Buckingham Palace to investigate whether Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, bullied her staff

 

During a Wednesday briefing on annual royal finances, a palace official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told reporters that the details would remain confidential to protect the privacy of those who gave testimony about their experiences.

 

“Because of the confidentiality of the discussions we have not communicated the detailed recommendations,” the official said. “The recommendations have been incorporated within policies and procedures wherever appropriate, and policies and procedures have changed.”

 

The official added: “I think the objectives have been satisfied because lessons have been learned.”

 

Royal watchers had expected the review might be mentioned in the Sovereign Grant Report, the annual financial accounts of the monarchy’s spending and income that was published on Thursday.

 

According to the palace official, the investigation into the bullying allegations was funded privately, not by taxpayers, meaning that it did not have to be included in the public accounts.

 

The annual report showed that British monarch’s official expenditure for 2021-2022 had been about $124 million, an increase of 17 percent on the previous financial year.

 

This amount exceeded the $105 million in the Sovereign Grant — the pot of public money provided by the British government to cover the costs of the queen’s household and upkeep of royal residences. The palace said that the royal finances cost $1.57 per person in the United Kingdom and that the bulk of its spending went toward major renovation works at Buckingham Palace. The extra costs, the palace said, would be met by reserves set aside in previous years.

 

The accounts showed that the most expensive trip over the past year was the trip to the Caribbean in March by Prince William and his wife Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge — seen as something of a public relations disaster — that cost $274,000.

 

William and Kate, touring the Caribbean to celebrate queen’s jubilee, draw anti-colonial protests, demands for reparations

 

Some said that the costs seemed excessive, especially in the current economic climate with a cost-of-living crisis that is starting to bite. Inflation in the U.K. is over 9 percent — the highest rate in 40 years. “£100m for the royals? Reign it in,” roared the Daily Mirror on its front page.

 

Michael Stevens, the queen’s treasurer who is also called the Keeper of the Privy Purse, said in a statement that royal finances would also probably be tightened in coming years.

 

“With the Sovereign Grant likely to be flat in the next couple of years, inflationary pressures on operating costs and our ability to grow supplementary income likely to be constrained in the short term, we will continue to deliver against our plans and manage these impacts through our own efforts and efficiencies,” he said.

 

By Karla Adam

Karla Adam is a London correspondent for The Washington Post. Before joining The Post in 2006, she worked as a freelancer in London, writing for several U.S. publications including the New York Times, Newsweek and People magazine. She is a former president of the Association of American Correspondents in London.  Twitter

Royal family receives over £100 million as costs soar despite cost of living crisis - full breakdown

 

Costs claimed by senior royals such as the Queen, Prince Charles and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have continued to rise

 

By Russell Myers Enda Mullen

08:26, 30 JUN 2022UPDATED08:53, 30 JUN 2022

https://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/uk-world-news/royal-family-receives-over-100-24359721

 

A new report has revealed that the royal family cost taxpayers £102.4 million last year. While the country continues to cope with the cost of living crisis the money received by the the royals rose by 17 per cent (£15 million).

 

It means the cash they received exceeded £100 million for the first time. Royal finances expert Norman Baker described it as “not right”, the Mirror reports.

 

The bill was driven up in part by the multi-million-pound renovation of Buckingham Palace. Spending on the project rose to £63.9 million, up £14.4million on the previous year.

 

Renovation work intensified to prepare the palace for the Platinum Jubilee celebrations. The Queen was in another of her official residences yesterday, receiving Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon at Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.

 

The Sovereign Grant Report shows that last year the royal family’s travel costs soared from £1.3 million to £4.5 million, as in-person royal visits resumed following the pandemic.

 

Royal finances expert Norman Baker said: “The Government should have a complete rethink of how taxpayers’ money is allocated to the royal family. We have no say in how the royals choose to use private jets or helicopters, which are all paid for out of the public purse, and while ordinary people are struggling it isn’t right.”

 

The 10-year Buckingham Palace renovation project appears to be on target to cost £369 million. Delivering the Sovereign Grant Report, Keeper of the Privy Purse, Sir Michael Stevens, said: “There was a significant increase in work against a hard deadline to enable Buckingham Palace to be at the centre of the Platinum Jubilee celebrations. We were pleased to deliver against our plans.”

 

Spending on the royals rose by almost £15 million in 2021/22, up more than 17 per cent on the previous year, the report revealed. Sir Michael said: “The year was not without operational and financial challenges. Covid meant we had another year in which access to the royal palaces was restricted for the Royal Collection Trust, which again affected our ability to help self-finance our work on behalf of the nation.”

 

While ordinary Brits coped with the cost of living crisis costs incurred by senior royals continued to rise. Prince William and Kate’s trip to the Caribbean cost £226,000 in flights and accommodation.

 

Despite campaigning on environmental issues, Prince Charles still flies between his royal residences at an average cost of £15,000 a time. The Queen’s royal train cost £100,000 for just three outings last year, but is now exclusively powered by “hydro-treated vegetable oil”, royal sources revealed.

 

As a non-working royal, like Prince Harry and his wife Megan, Prince Andrew no longer qualifies for public funding and gets nothing from the Sovereign Grant. He is now thought to be exclusively funded privately by the Queen.

 

Caribbean tour

William and Kate’s controversial visit to Belize, Jamaica and the Bahamas cost roughly £226,000. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge came in for heavy criticism during the tour in March, with critics labelling it a “throwback to Britain’s colonial past”.

 

The royal pair raised eyebrows for travelling in an open top Land Rover driven by a Jamaican soldier during a military parade, with some people suggesting it “looked like a scene from The Crown”.

 

In an unprecedented statement, William said after the Caribbean visit: “Tours are an opportunity to reflect. You learn so much. This tour has brought into even sharper focus questions about the past and the future. In Belize, Jamaica and the Bahamas, that future is for the people to decide upon.”

 

Royal train

The Queen will not give up using the royal train despite just three outings for her and Prince Charles costing £100,000 The monarch will hold on to her favourite mode of transport, which she can travel and sleep on when on engagements - despite it being used so little each year.

 

Her Majesty used the royal train last July on a return journey from Windsor to Manchester to celebrate 60 years of Coronation Street and the 600th Anniversary of Manchester Cathedral, costing a staggering £42,452. Prince Charles used the train twice, with a journey over several days between Stonehaven, Newcastle and Durham and back to Windsor coming in at £42,450.

 

A royal aide said: “The Queen has no plans to stop using the royal train which provides excellent value for money.”

 

Green fuel

Environmentalist Charles committed to using “green fuel” for plane journeys where he can, despite it costing the public purse far more than normal fuel. A source said: “The prince is aware of the extra cost but the destructive cost to the environment during a climate emergency is far greater."

 

Harry and Meghan are now paying for themselves - the Prince of Wales no longer funds them after they ditched their royal roles seeking “financial independence”. After they shed their life as working royals in 2020 they signed £100m worth of deals with streaming giants Netflix and Spotify.

 

During the couple’s interview with Oprah Winfrey in March last year, Harry said “my family literally cut me off financially” in “the first quarter of 2020”. A source close to Prince Charles said the Duke and Duchess “should be congratulated on achieving their goal” in raking in millions from the private sector - despite using their new found roles to routinely slam the royal family on global television interviews.

 

Charles’s bill for his sons and their families no longer lists the Sussexes in the accounts.

 

Charity cash

 

Changes to the way the royal charities accept donations have been implemented after Prince Charles accepted £2.6million in cash from a former prime minister of Qatar. The Prince of Wales will never again handle large sums in notes to be passed to his charities, a royal source has stated.

 

Charles faced criticism over being presented with one million euros stuffed in a briefcase while two other cash gifts of more than £1.6million were given in Fortnum & Mason carrier bags between 2011 and 2015. A report claimed the heir to the throne personally accepted the donations for his charity The Prince of Wales’s Charitable Fund from Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim, above .

 

A royal source said Charles acts on advice and such incidents have not happened in the past five years and will not happen again.