King Charles’s $91 Million Coronation Has Enraged the British Public

When Britain celebrated the coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla in May 2023, the ancient ceremony came along with a ceremonial parade and days of celebration around the nation. On Thursday, the UK government announced that the festivities cost 72 million British pounds, or about 91 million dollars, a sum that has raised eyebrows amid the country’s ongoing economic doldrums.

In their annual report for the fiscal year that ran from March 2023 to March 2024, the UK Department for Culture, Media and Sport broke down their annual budget of 7.9 billion British pounds (about 9.9 billion dollars), and shared that approximately 50 million British pounds went towards the coronation weekend. The Home Office spent a further 22 million British pounds (about 28 million dollars) on policing for the events.

The department’s costs included the Westminster Abbey ceremony and associated programming across the weekend, including the Windsor Castle concert featuring Lionel Richie, Katy Perry, and a 300 person choir comprised of regular Britons, a day of Big Coronation Lunches across the nation, and a day of community service, which saw Prince William and Kate Middleton join in with their three children, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis. Further support for the events came from the Sovereign Grant, the public money given to the royals in exchange for their public duties and the proceeds from their historic property holdings. In their annual report, released in August, the Crown Estate shared that they spent 1.4 million British pounds (about 1.8 million dollars) on the coronation weekend over the course of two fiscal years.

Soon after Charles began his reign in September 2022, palace aides told Vanity Fair that the king wanted to stage a scaled-back coronation to avoid excessive public expense. But by December, then-Prime Minister Rishi Sunak had announced that the weekend would include an extra bank holiday in the country, directing his cabinet to ensure the event showcased “the best of Britain.”

In their report, the DCMS justified the expense of the “once-in-a-generation moment” by pointing to its global impact. The coronation weekend “provided an occasion for the entire country to come together in celebration, and offered a unique opportunity to celebrate and strengthen our national identity and showcase the UK to the world,” the report read. “The coronation achieved more than 100,000 news stories and reached an estimated global audience of 2 billion people in 125 countries.” The report noted that the coronation reached more survey participants among the G20 nations than any other event put on by the department.

Graham Smith, CEO of anti-monarchy advocacy group Republic, believes that the sum put forward by the DCMS understates the true cost to the government. “I would be very surprised if £72m was the whole cost,” he told The Guardian. “It’s a huge amount of money to spend on one person’s parade when there was no obligation whatsoever in the constitution or in law to have a coronation, and when we were facing cuts to essential services.”