Queen may be millions better off

New funding arrangements for the Queen's household could see her better off to the tune of millions of pounds.

George Osborne announced this week in the spending review how the household's budget would fall by 14 per cent in the coming years before a new Sovereign Support Grant started. The grant will be linked to the 6.6 billion Crown Estate, but it emerged yesterday the Treasury was considering allocating around 15 per cent of the profits from the large property and land portfolio to the royal budget.

A Treasury spokesman said: "There will be safeguards in place to ensure that this is not adversely high."