Here's Princess Beatrice on a rare official engagement... just a week after outrage at security bill

By Lizzie Smith

What's this? Princess Beatrice selects her sapling during a visit to the Woodland Trust at Heartwood Forest, Sandridge, Hertfordshire


Princess Beatrice has been in the news a lot recently, mainly over her controversial security bill.

As a university student the 21-year-old often escapes public duties, but still benefits from full-time protection - at the taxpayer's expense.

Just a week after the cost caused public outrage Beatrice has been spotted on a rare public engagement - planting a tree with schoolchildren.

She made a visit to The Woodland Trust at Heartwood Forest at Sandridge, near St Albans, Hertfordshire.

Excited pupils from Highfields Primary School in Enfield joined Beatrice as they planted saplings.

Dressed in boots, a mini skirt and warm leather jacket, she showed off her newly slender figure - following training for the London Marathon.


Royal audience: Beatrice talks to pupils from Highfield Primary School in Enfield


Beatrice is living in a four-bedroom apartment in St James’s Palace while studying history at Goldsmiths, University of London.

But Britain's top policeman has expressed concerns about the cost to the taxpayer of protecting her and other 'B-list' royals.

Metropolitan Police chief Sir Paul Stephenson is involved in a fierce dispute with ministers over the estimated £50million a year cost of protecting 22 members of the Royal Family.

He has told Home Secretary Alan Johnson the Government should pay the full amount rather than the £30million it currently provides.


Hard at work: Beatrice and a young friend dig a hole for the sapling


The decision to continue to provide Beatrice and her younger sister Princess Eugenie with 24-hour guards is said to stem from a secret deal agreed between their father, Andrew, and a senior Scotland Yard officer when his former wife Sarah, the Duchess of York, was pregnant with Beatrice in 1988.

During a private meeting, the prince is said to have forcefully requested that Scotland Yard provide lifelong armed protection to his children because he feared they might one day be targeted in a terrorist or violent attack.

The unidentified senior officer is said to have agreed.


Controversy: Protecting 22 'B-list' Royals costs an estimated £50m a year


source: dailymail