THE Prince of Wales’s pre-tax income increased by one fifth last year to nearly £12 million — and some of it went to Camilla Parker Bowles.

Mrs Parker Bowles appeared by name for the first time in an official report yesterday when Clarence House published a new-style comprehensive annual review of the Prince’s activities and finances. Her role, however, is small; the report discloses that the Prince employs the equivalent of three full-time staff to deal with her correspondence, drive her car and help with her gardening.

Sir Michael Peat, the Prince’s private secretary and a former City accountant who achieved huge savings at Buckingham Palace, hotly rejected suggestions that introducing Mrs Parker Bowles into the official record was a further attempt to win public acceptance for her role as the Prince’s partner, or that her role in his life was becoming increasingly significant.

“She appears for the first time because this is the first time we have produced a comprehensive review,” Sir Michael said.

“Obviously her staff have an office here to cope with work that arises because of her connection with the Prince of Wales. We are trying to cover all angles and be as open and accountable as we can be.”

Sir Michael added that Mrs Parker Bowles never travelled by official royal transport, one of the few areas of the Prince’s life that is funded by the taxpayer. “Theirs is a private relationship; she accompanies him in private and on less official occasions. Mrs Parker Bowles herself does not want anyone to suggest that she is benefiting from public money.” Despite the fact that Mrs Parker Bowles has accompanied the Prince at several patently official functions, including a formal dinner and a garden party at Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh, Sir Michael denied that she was taking an official role. “There is a convention that if you undertake an official engagement on behalf of the Queen, it is done in a certain way, and Mrs Parker Bowles respects that. Also, you have to be a member of the Royal Family.”

Defending a journey by the Prince in the royal train last year, which cost £50,000, Sir Michael said that the train, whose continued existence causes mutterings of waste among some backbench Labour MPs, was infinitely more reliable than helicopters. The Prince had missed several engagements in the past year because the royal helicopter had been unable to take off.

The 48-page document discloses that the number of staff employed by the Prince rose last year from 91 to 112, including 84 who support him in his official duties and charity work, his farmworkers at Highgrove, and 17 personal staff who look after himself, Princes William and Harry and Mrs Parker Bowles.

Apart from security — a cost that is never disclosed but is assumed to have risen dramatically — official transport and the refurbishment of Clarence House, which are all taxpayer-funded, the Prince derives his income from the estate profits of the Duchy of Cornwall.

Last year the Duchy showed a profit of £11.9 million compared with £9.9 million the previous year, thanks mainly to increased farm rent and some smart dealing in a booming property market, selling off a number of low-value houses and investing in commercial premises in Dover, Warrington and Leeds.

By the end of the financial year the value of the 56,000-hectare landed estate, which includes such disparate properties as the Oval cricket ground and Dartmoor jail, had risen by 14 per cent to £463.1 million.

The Prince, who receives no public funding from the Civil List, now pays the full income tax rate of 40 per cent, after the Inland Revenue have made allowances for money spent on official duties. What he spends the balance on is not disclosed in yesterday’s report, which concentrates on the activities of the Duchy and on the Prince’s public life. It does, however, offer some insights into how he fills his day.

In the financial year 2003-04, he undertook 517 official engagements, including 82 abroad, during which he met an estimated 10,000 people, and entertained a further 9,000 at his private and official homes. He attended more than 150 formal briefings and meetings, received more than 33,000 letters from the public, wrote more than 2,000 himself and had his office write a further 10,000 on his behalf.

The small print of the review shows some significant cost savings. Legal and consultancy fees, for example, tumbled from £614,000 to £238,000. During the previous year the inquiry by Sir Michael and Edward Lawson QC into the alleged selling of official gifts and other matters proved a costly exercise; in addition the Prince is no longer paying fat consultancy fees to Mark Bolland, his former deputy private secretary. The review highlights the Prince’s role as Britain’ s leading charitable entrepreneur, who has raised an estimated £500 million for his 17 core charities, which are now the largest of their kind in the country.

The new transparency does not extend to Sir Michael’s own salary. The Times, however, can disclose that his remuneration package is worth around £300,000 a year.

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