Meghan Markle's reportedly cost Prince Charles £1.43 million in the past year

It’s a good thing Prince Charles likes his new daughter-in-law, because Meghan Markle has reportedly cost him additional 1.43m million since joining the family.

Figures show that the amount the Prince of Wales spends on funding the activities of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry increased by 40 per cent when the 36-year-old arrived on the scene, the Telegraph reports.

Prince Charles paid £4.96m for Prince Harry, Prince William and Kate last year, compared to the previous year where they spent £3.52m.

The increase of £1.43m suggests the Duchess of Sussex hasn’t come cheap.

This spending was said to have increased at the end of 2017, when Harry and Meghan became engaged, and was thought to have been put towards her public engagements as his new fiancee.

The £56,00 Ralph & Russo dress Meghan wore for her engagement photos at Frogmore House most likely contributed towards the elevated spending.

But the money spent isn’t just to do with the increased headcount.

The upward expenditure on the young royals is thought to reflect them undertaking more royal duties, as her Majesty slows down on her yearly output.

How is Prince Charles affording all this?

Prince Charles pays for his children and their spouses through his hereditary estate, the Duchy of Cornwall, which owns 131,000 acres across 23 counties in south-west England.

This estate is thought to bring in, on average, around £21.7m a year.

Clive Alderton, the Prince’s principal private secretary, explains that a lot of the spending was to do with “moments of great joy for the Royal family”.

“The Duke and Duchess of Sussex became engaged, their wedding itself seemed to me a day when not just the sun shone but Britain itself shone – and right round the world,” he adds.

“The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge announced that they were expecting another child and the Prince of Wales’s third grandchild Prince Louis was born in April.”

He has a point: the royal family had had a busy year.

The Telegraph also reports that the royal family’s travel costs hiked from £4.5 million in 2016 to £4.7 million in 2017, with the most expensive trip being Charles and Camilla’s royal tour of India, Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore in October 2017 which cost a staggering £362,149.

There’s also the royal train – which the Queen and Meghan Markle used just weeks ago to visit Cheshire – which reportedly costs around £20,000 per trip.

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