Car pool

The case for a bicycling monarchy has hit a pothole. The release of the Queen's financial information yesterday reveals that, of the £35.3m of taxpayer's money which she received last year, a mere £38,000 was spent on cars. Not much to be saved by switching from the royal Bentley to a Moulton, then.

The case for a bicycling monarchy has hit a pothole. The release of the Queen's financial information yesterday reveals that, of the £35.3m of taxpayer's money which she received last year, a mere £38,000 was spent on cars. Not much to be saved by switching from the royal Bentley to a Moulton, then.

But the £35.3m will come as a bit of a surprise to those who thought a constitutional monarchy was a reasonable deal for a mere £7.9m a year on the Civil List. We did not know, it turns out, the quarter of it. Who audited these accounts, Arthur Andersen? Let the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Commission go through the figures. The Duke of Edinburgh's London taxi is presumably his own private vehicle. But if he could be persuaded to take up his obvious vocation and drive it for a living, it might help the numbers a little.