Plan for royal yacht scuttled

London – What do you get for a monarch who has almost everything? Not, apparently, a new yacht, at least not one paid for with taxpayer funds.

That was the message today as a brief surge of support for the idea of providing the Queen with a new royal yacht to mark her Diamond Jubilee was quickly deflated by Prime Minister David Cameron. It is estimated it would cost at least £60 million (NZ$115M).

Cameron’s spokesman, Steve Field, said it would not be appropriate for public funds to be spent on a new yacht during times of economic hardship.

‘‘There is a difficult economic situation, there are scarce public resources, therefore, we don’t think it would be an appropriate use of public money at the present time.’’ But Cameron’s office did not rule out the possibility of helping Buckingham Palace to secure private-sector funding, if royal officials decide that the Queen needs a new vessel.

The idea was proposed by Education Secretary Michael Gove, who suggested in a leaked letter that the Queen should receive a replacement for the Britannia, which was decommissioned in 1997.

He said the jubilee offered a ‘‘tremendous opportunity’’.

Royal watchers remember that one of the few times the Queen has shown emotion in public was when she shed a tear at the decommissioning of the Britannia, which is now berthed in Edinburgh as a tourist display.