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King Charles enjoyed a fresh start to the day as he stepped out into the cold to attend a church service.
The monarch, 75, appeared on good form as he braved the chilly November morning to attend a Sunday service at the Church of St Mary Magdalene on the Sandringham estate in Norfolk.
While his wife, Camilla, 77, appeared to be absent from the service, he was joined by a number of other guests.
Charles was pictured waving cordially as he joined in conversation with Reverend Canon Paul William of the Sandringham parish.
The monarch looked smartly turned out in a long tan overcoat paired with grey trousers and chestnut coloured brogue shoes.
King Charles enjoyed a fresh start to the day as he stepped out into the cold to attend church service
Beneath his long overcoat, the monarch appeared to sport a light blue shirt.
Other guests at the service also looked smart in similar dress overcoats and warm winter hats to shield from the chill morning.
As he stood chatting to the Reverend, the King was pictured waving behind a seasonal backdrop of fields and autumnal leaves.
Meanwhile, reverend Canon, draped in an alb, was seen smiling as he strolled towards the church alongside Charles.
The outing comes after revelations the king is making millions out of the cash-strapped NHS, according to a shocking investigation into secretive royal finances by Channel 4 and the Sunday Times.
The Duchy of Lancaster, a property empire which provides a private income to the monarch, is charging one NHS trust at least £11.4 million in rent to store its ambulances over the next 15 years.
Bombshell documents reveal the duchy is earning £830,000 a year from renting a two-storey warehouse to Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust in London.
The unprecedented audit of the Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall, the Prince of Wales’s private estate, shows taypayers are shelling out millions every year to boost the wealth of the senior royals.
The Duchy of Cornwall, helmed by Prince William , says that ‘it is not a public body, nor is it funded by the taxpayer’
As well as the NHS, the Ministry of Defence, local authorities and other public bodies are swelling the coffers of the Duchies, a Channel 4 Dispatches investigation broadcast last night found.
Charities – even those where the King is patron – are also stumping up millions, the five-month investigation of more than 5,000 landholdings and properties shows.
The revelations come as struggling Britons were hit by Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s £40 billion tax hike budget last week – and will spark renewed debate about how much tax the royals should pay, and how secretive they are about their operations.
Duchy money is private income for Charles and William on top of the Sovereign Grant, which will pay the Royal Family £132 million next year, up 50 per cent on this year.
The Duchies are run as commercial enterprises, but pay no capital gains tax nor corporation tax. Both Charles and William do pay income tax, but it is not clear how much.
Dame Margaret Hodge, former chair of the Public Accounts Committee, led calls for greater transparency of royal finances – and for the tax regime to be tightened up.
The estates have helped make the British royal family one of the richest in the world, generating almost £50 million for the King and the Prince of Wales in the last year alone
She said: ‘I’d love King Charles to volunteer that he would open up the affairs of all these organisations to much greater public scrutiny at a time when people are feeling poor. It’s taxpayers’ money.’
The Duchy of Lancaster, which last year generated £27.4 million for the King, and the Duchy of Cornwall, which raised £23.6 million for William, are not required to pay business taxes.
Both estates claim they are not funded by the taxpayer, but the cache of documents obtained by Dispatches and the Sunday Times lay bare the huge income they receive from public services.
As reported in the Daily Mail, the Duchy of Cornwall said it is ‘a private estate with a commercial imperative… committed to restoring the natural environment’, and said it was ‘acting in a responsible and sustainable way’ on mining.
The Duchy of Lancaster said it ‘operates as a commercial company’ and ‘complies with all relevant UK legislation’.
Meanwhile, the king and queen are set to take a visit to Italy next year – if health permitting.
Charles, who is still undergoing cancer treatment, is said to have felt ‘lifted’ by his recent trip to Australia and Samoa, where he carried out up to ten engagements a day.
The king is now set to return to a ‘full programme’ of overseas tours next year following a new vote of confidence in his health from his doctors.
And sources close to Charles, who paused treatment to undertake the 30,000-mile, 11-day round-trip, have explained it was all part of his ‘mind, body and soul’ approach to his cancer battle.
Other guests at the service also looked smart in similar dress overcoats and warm winter hats to shield from the chill morning
It comes after the news that the king and queen will take a visit to Italy next year – if health permitting
Travelling in particular is seen as a tonic for the King, who will likely visit the capital city of Rome and schedule an audience with the Pope at the Vatican.
Charles was so buoyed by his Australia tour – as were his doctors – that he is looking at a return to normality next year.
‘We’re now working on a pretty normal-looking full overseas tour programme for next year,’ a senior royal official said, suggesting that the traditional spring and autumn tours will be back on the cards.
Speaking about a potential visit to Italy, one royal source told The Mirror: ‘The King is raring to go and incredibly positive about making plans for the future.
‘Although in the early stages, a visit to Italy would provide a fantastic opportunity for the King and Queen to represent the UK and take in some of the incredible sites of one of our closest neighbours.’
King Charles III and Queen Camilla during a farewell ceremony at Siumu Village on the final day of the royal visit to Australia and Samoa
Pictured: King Charles and Queen Camilla are hoping to visit Italy next year, with the monarch said to be keen to ‘make up for lost time’. The royal couple in Florence in 2017
Another insider said the King was ‘keen to make up for lost time’, having taken a step back to undergo treatment for cancer.
Charles is said to be optimistic and see the future as ‘bright’, which could not always be said to have been the case after the King was diagnosed earlier this year.
After the initial shock of such a ‘striking’ diagnosis, he realised ‘in a heartbeat’ how much he had in common with so many millions of people in the UK and across the Commonwealth.
It’s been a huge source of strength, they say, for him to talk to others about their shared experiences.
And he hopes others have taken comfort from the fact that even ‘a king can get cancer’.
Charles and Camilla last made an official visit to Italy in 2017, as the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall.
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