The cost of looking for Madeleine so far. £20 million?

How much has the search for Madeleine cost so far? It began at 10.00pm on Thursday 3 May when the McCanns said that Madeleine had been abducted.
 

Here is a rough calculation of the total costs so far, accompanied by a few notes:

£548,477 - The cost for Leicestershire Police's part in the search in 2007-8 was £548, 477, of which the Home Office refunded £525,069.

£4 million - A conservative estimate of the cost to the Portuguese Police of their investigation, just in 2007-8.

 

£3 million - A conservative estimate of the costs of the McCanns’ private investigations so far, made up as follows:

·         At least £300,00, maybe more, to Metodo 3

·         £½  million plus expenses to Kevin Halligen

·         Salaries and expenses to Dave Edgar, Arthur Cowley and assorted other detectives, plus trips to Germany (Hewlett), Barcelona (Victoria Beckham-lookalike) and various other trips

·         Salaries of Justine McGuinness and Clarence Mitchell plus expenses: £300,000 so far

£2 million -  the estimated cost to Interpol and an assortment of police forces around the globe, who have had to deal with hundreds, possibly thousands of ‘sightings’ of Madeleine, in countries such as the U.K., Germany, France, Portugal, Morocco, Spain, Canada, Venezuela, Australia and New Zealand.

The estimate is based on say 1,000 ‘sightings’ requiring an average of say £2,000 of police time to investigate each sighting   

£3.5 million - for the current Scotland Yard ‘Review’. The review is said to be staffed by 37 officers. If their average salary is say £40,000, and they work on the review for say at least a year, that would cost around £2 million alone (including e.g. pension and employer’s N.I. contributions), and that doesn’t include the cost of e.g. hotels and travel for visits to Portugal and Spain   

£1 million - for lawyer’s fees: Edward Smethurst (co-ordinating lawyer), Carter-Ruck (suing lots of people), Michael Caplan Q.C. (extradition), Portuguese lawyers including extradition lawyers and Isabel Duarte, International Family Law Group (wardship proceedings before ms Justice Hogg in the High Court)    

An unknown amount - for the current Portuguese investigation begun in Oporto.

 

An unknown amount - for answering various Freedom of Information Act queries from press and public about the case.