Only cash received in libel payouts to friends of Gerry and Kate McCann - dubbed the Tapas Seven - enabled the search for their daughter to go on, latest accounts show.

About £260 an hour flooded into the fund as a wave of public sympathy swept the UK after Maddie's abduction in Praia da Luz in the Algarve in May, 2007.

It had £1.4million in bank donations alone in the first 10 months of the search.

But contributions fell away after the McCanns became one-time suspects. And the fund's income dropped to £629,181 in the year up to March 31, 2009 - while spending rose from £815,113 to more than £1million.

Outgoings covered investigators, publicity and the pair's legal fight against Portuguese policeman Goncalo Amaral.

Kate and Gerry, both 41, have been granted a temporary injunction on his book claiming Maddie died the day she vanished aged three.

The couple's friends were paid £375,000 in October 2008 after false newspaper allegations about them.

In a foreword to the accounts lodged at Companies House, fund chairman, Gerry's brother John, said: "Rather than accepting libel damages, the friends requested a donation was made to the fund. This has enabled us to continue our search for Madeleine."