Now it’s Air Miles SOPHIE ... so why can’t she go by car?
HER husband has already been dubbed ‘Air Miles Eddie’ for his extravagant travel arrangements.
Now, Sophie, Countess of Wessex has saddled the taxpayer with an estimated bill of £3,000 by taking three trips by helicopter to travel a total of just 87 miles.
The flights on Tuesday came only hours before accounts revealed that Royal travel cost the public £4.7 million last year.
Sophie’s jaunts began from Kensington Palace, where she went after attending an NSPCC fundraising event in exclusive private member’s club Annabel’s in Berkeley Square.
She was driven from the West London residence to a waiting Sikorsky S76C for the 22- mile journey to Harlow in Essex.
The helicopter landed 11 minutes later on a playing field, where a Range Rover was waiting to drive her just over half a mile to the town’s Playhouse Theatre.
There, s he watched a performance by the Razed Roof Theatre Group before heading back to the helicopter, clutching a bunch of flowers she had been given.
They were hardly likely to wilt during the next stage of her trip, a 14-mile flight to a field near the village of Ingatestone that took just six minutes.
From there, she was driven to the Remus Memorial Horse Sanctuary at nearby Buttsbury, which is celebrating its 35th anniversary. Sophie, a horse-lover, has been a patron of the charity since 2013.
After a tour of the facilities and a brief lunch, she returned to the helicopter for the 51-mile journey home to Bagshot Park in Surrey, landing 23 minutes later.
According to t he AA Route Planner, it would have taken just over three hours for Sophie to have been driven to both engagements and then back home, a total distance of 121 miles by the ‘OUTRAGEOUS’: How we reported one of Prince Edward’s jaunts in June fastest roads. The Countess of Wessex carried out 218 engagements in the UK and overseas last year, while Prince Harry had 209 and Prince William had 171. Last week’s Royal Household accounts showed that £1.8 million was spent on helicopter rides in the last financial year.
Norman Baker, a former Liberal Democrat Minister who still sits on the Privy Council which advises the Queen, said: ‘The continual use of helicopters by members of the Royal Family for relatively short flights is outrageous. They have no compunction about running up huge bills for taxpayers. Despite how often this is exposed, they simply carry on.
‘ These short flights are completely unnecessary and are the equivalent of sticking up two fingers to the taxpayer.’
John O’Connell, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: ‘ The Royal Household has the same responsibility to respect taxpayers as every other publicsector organisation and it’s crucial that savings are made while everyone else tightens their belts.’
But Royal biographer Penny Junor praised the Countess of Wessex as a dedicated member of the Royal Family, adding: ‘These flights are necessary for official duties. There are many occasions when logistics and the timing of several events on one day make it impossible to use any other form of public transport.’
The controversy comes only weeks after Sophie’s husband Prince Edward flew in a Cessna 560XL executive jet to attend engagement in the Midlands and the South West.
The estimated cost of the journeys, totalling 300 miles, was £10,000.
He then took a 30-minute rride in an Agusta A109S Grand helicopter to Bagshot Park after playing real ttennis in Dorset, costing a further £3,000 for a 67-mile trip that would have taken 80 minutes by road.
Travel costs for the Royal Family are met from the Sovereign Grant, paid by the Government in return for the Queen surrendering revenue from the Crown Estate. The grant was £76 million last year.
A Buckingham Palace spokeswoman said members of the Royal Family were ‘allocated whatever transport is deemed the most appropriate’ for engagements.
She added: ‘ Consideration is always given to the mode of transport, depending on the programme, safety and convenience.’
Now Air Miles Eddie takes helicopter for 67-mile hop home