Royalty in tatters: Queen Elizabeth down to last £1 mn

Queen Elizabeth II's household finances are at a ''historic low'' with just £1 million left in the kitty, even as British MPs criticise courtiers of the Queen's royal household of mismanaging Palace funds.

The House of Commons public accounts committee said in a report that the royal palaces, including Buckingham, Windsor, and the Royal retreats in Scotland - were ''crumbling'' and in urgent need of repair. It said the Queen's advisers were failing to control her finances and her courtiers have been advised to take money-saving tips from the Treasury.

The committee said the Queen's advisers had overspent to such an extent that her reserve fund had fallen from £35 million in 2001 to just £1 million. The Royal household had made efficiency savings of just 5 per cent over the past five years compared with government departments, which are cutting their budgets by up to a third. The MPs said the Treasury must ''get a grip'' and help to protect the royal palaces from ''further damage and deterioration''.

Margaret Hodge, the Labour chairman of the committee, said, ''We believe that the Treasury has a duty to be actively involved in reviewing the household's financial planning and management - and it has failed to do so.''

Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle are reported to be in urgent need of repair. Staffers had been reduced to catching rainwater in buckets to protect art and antiquities, while the Queen's old boilers were contributing to bills of £774,000 pounds a year, the report said.

''The household must get a much firmer grip on how it plans to address its maintenance backlog. It has not even costed the repair works needed to bring the estate back to an acceptable condition. Again, the Treasury has an oversight role here,'' Hodge said.

In April 2012 the Sovereign Grant replaced the old way of funding the Royal family through the Civil List and various government grants. The Sovereign Grant represents 15 per cent of the net surplus income of the Crown Estate, land holdings that generate money for the Treasury.

A Buckingham Palace spokesman said the sovereign grant had made the Queen's funding ''more transparent and scrutinised'' and was resulting in a ''more efficient use of public funds''.

The royal household's latest accounts showed it had exceeded its 2012-13 budget of £31 million by £2.3 million. To plug the gap, it had to dip into a reserve fund – which itself has fallen from £35 million in 2001 to just £1 millon this year.

Buckingham Palace, which is over 300 years old, has not had its electrical wiring renewed since 1949, needs asbestos removing and has 60-year old boilers, the PAC report said.

The report included a transcript of exchanges between MPs and a royal household official over the upkeep of Buck Palace, which is the monarch's London home.

The Queen and the royal family command widespread respect and affection in Britain, but their spending has not escaped scrutiny as the country has tightened its belt since the global financial crisis of 2008.

The committee urged both the royal household and the treasury, the government ministry that monitors and approves its financial plans, to increase cost-saving efforts.