I thought I knew royal greed – but King Charles profiting from the assets of the dead is a disgusting new low

‘Over the centuries, the royals have continually bleated poverty and demanded more money from the taxpayer.’ Photograph: Reuters

As a royal author, I have come across plentiful examples of royal greed. It is standard practice for the royals to seek to minimise their personal expenditure while maximising their income from other sources, normally the public purse.

But the revelation that King Charles III’s personal slush fund, the Duchy of Lancaster, is having its already bulging coffers augmented by the estates of people who die in parts of England with historical links to the royal estate plumbs new depths of disgusting avarice.