Queen Elizabeth II spent more taxpayer money last fiscal year - $67.3 million in all because of overseas visits and extra security, Buckingham Palace said Wednesday.

According to Buckingham Palace accounts, it cost British taxpayers 62 pence each to support Queen Elizabeth II, pictured here, and the rest of the royal family in a manner to which they have been accustomed. [AFP\File]

Overall, the queen and her household spent 4.2 percent more than they did the previous fiscal year, the palace said in its annual expenditures report.

The government's contribution to meeting the costs of the queen's household is known as the Civil List. The palace said more than 70 percent of the list's $20 million in expenditures paid the salaries of 310 royal staff.

The queen also spent $1.8 million on catering and hospitality, up from $1.6 million in 2004.

A total of $36 million spent by the queen came from grants from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Department of Transport.

The cost of new security measures at the Palace came to about $275,000, the royal accountants said.

The increases came after the Daily Mirror reporter Ryan Parry gained access to Buckingham Palace as a royal footman in 2003 just before President Bush stayed there.

The cost of royal travel rose by 10 percent to $9.9 million, of which $8.2 million was spent on air travel. That included a reconnaissance trip by some of Prince Charles's staff to the United States ahead of his visit there, which cost more than $79,000.

By contrast, a reconnaissance trip by Buckingham Palace staff to Australia and Singapore ahead of the queen's official visit cost $27,000.

A palace spokesman said Charles's U.S. trip, his first with new wife Camilla "was a very complicated trip. There were a lot of different interests related to the engagement he was carrying out."

During the 2005-2006 fiscal year, the royal family made 14 journeys on the royal train, compared with 19 the year before. They also took 48 scheduled rail journeys.

Alan Reid, Keeper of the Privy Purse, said the royal household has asked the government for $1.8 million a year extra, plus an adjustment for inflation, to run the royal palaces.

The household receives $27 million annually for running the palaces, but Reid said the figure was set in 1998 and is now out of date.

"If we're going to maintain historic buildings that we're responsible for, we will need more money," he said.