An observation Gutcher - back in the day in the 1960s you say - that was almost 60 years ago. Of course the income from the Crown Estate existed then and it was paid directly to the Treasury. Parliament then had a debate as to what to grant as the Civil List to fund the role of Head of State. The annual grant covered some expenses associated with the Sovereign performing their official duties, including those for staff salaries, State Visits, public engagements, ceremonial functions and the upkeep of the Royal Households. Now THAT WAS taxpayer's money and only two people were entitled to it The Queen as Head of State and Prince Philip. The amount was generally set for a period of ten years, although it was reviewed annually. The last time the Civil List payment was set was in 1991 and the payment remained static until it was replaced by the Sovereign Grant in 2011. Income from the Duchy of Lancaster paid for all other members of the Royal Family, the income from the Duchy of Cornwall went to the Exchequer as Charles was too young and had not been invested as the Prince of Wales.

The Civil List payment by 2011 was totally inadequate (No other "employee" in the public sector in 2011 had been subjected to a pay freeze lasting 20 years). The Government was faced with a massive hike in the cost of the Civil List payment to cover essential and urgent repair and renovation works to "State" buildings - £365 million for Buckingham Palace alone - so as an alternative that did not waste Parliamentary time each year, they looked to the Queen's model (Costs taken from the Duchy of Lancaster) and replaced the Civil List payment with a percentage of the profits from the Crown Estate currently set at 15%. Unlike the finances of the country under the stewardship of politicians and the civil service, the Crown Estate, the Duchy of Lancaster and the Duchy of Cornwall are extremely well run and profitable commercial enterprises. It is a small percentage of those profits that covers the costs of the monarchy NOT the British taxpayer. I once saw a comparison of the costs per year of Heads of State:

UK Constitutional Monarchy - £60 million funded by The Crown Estate;
Elected President of a Republic (France) - £90 million funded by the French taxpayer;
Executive President of the United States of America - £1.5 billion funded by the American taxpayer.

I think that financially the taxpayers of the UK comes out of that rather well.