Finally, the Royals have discovered the sense to sack Prince Andrew, says Fleet Street Fox. But we still have questions
De-princeing someone is probably the worst punishment a member of the Royal Family can imagine. Throw in eviction from the mansion as well, and the disgrace, in their eyes, is probably complete.
Prince Andrew is, as of last night, plain old Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. He’s leaving his 30-room rent-free lodge in Windsor for smaller digs on the Sandringham estate, where potential public sightings will be limited to rudeness at dog-walkers.
Except to us plebs there’s just another free house, somewhere even more private, a double-barrelled surname and no bills. To the Royals it’s exile, but to everyone else it looks suspiciously like avoidance. Avoiding the photographers, the public, the headlines, and most importantly all the unanswered questions about the things he has strenuously denied, but is still being asked about.
Royal bletherers are using words like “punishment”, “shame” and “fall from grace”, but it’s all still a long way from honesty. Why did it take 15 years from the moment when Andrew was snapped strolling in Central Park, oh-too-honourably saying a fond farewell to his friend the convicted sex offender, for Royalty to meet reality? Why isn’t he paying for his own damned house? Why are they still protecting him?
The taxpayer questions
For 20 years, Andrew lived at Royal Lodge rent-free. He spent £7.5m on refurbishments – which photos show were clearly done by the same builder used by Basil Fawlty in 1975 – but that still works out to just £375,000 per year. On the open market the same property would have got three times that, and had proper upkeep. Andrew hasn’t been a working Royal, officially, since 2019, and before that was restricted to holding events for entrepreneurs.
Not long ago he was able to find millions to pay off his accuser Virginia Giuffre, who he still insists he’s never met, for something he says he never did. Why can he not buy his own house and fund his own lifestyle? Does the king fear that, if totally cut off, his troublesome brother or his ex-wife might do a Meghan, and sit down with Netflix or Oprah – and if so, what might they say?
Every penny of taxpayer cash is subject to value-for-money assessments. Who decided that his sweetheart lease was fine because he was generating more than he cost? Show the working. And let the Public Accounts Committee scrutinise every Royal lease – for William, Edward, Anne, and all the others – in the same vein.
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The ethics questions
Andrew was friends with a billionaire whose wealth was suspect and whose friends were equally so. That should have been enough to raise a flag when his association began, never mind when Jeffrey Epstein was investigated by the FBI over allegations made by dozens of under-age girls and young women, the youngest of whom was just 14.
Did the FBI tip off the UK government that the monarch’s son was cavorting with a deeply-unsavoury character? Did it get passed on to the Palace? Was the Queen informed? When did Charles know? What happened, internally, when those pictures of Andrew and a paedophile were first published in 2010? WHAT BIT OF THAT SEEMED TOTALLY OKAY?
Whenever a Royal travels, two police officers go in advance to recce the route and the base, suss out the risks and give it the all-clear. It happens every time, even if they’ve visited before. What did officers see on touring Epstein’s New York and Florida mansions, where Andrew stayed and which when the FBI later raided them were found to be full of sexualised art, nick-nacks, cameras, and a high turnover of ‘masseuses’? What contact did they have with US law enforcement about Epstein? Did they pass it up the chain, to whom, how often, and who did what to stop Andrew’s friendship, before and after the conviction and prison sentence? Why didn’t he listen?
Why won’t the government insist that every working Royal, who represents us and is funded by us, is subject to the Seven Nolan Principles of Public Life? Is it because they’d all fail, or because they refuse to be subject to the same rules as 6million public sector staff who don’t get gold sofas to sit on?
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The police questions
It has been reported that when Virginia’s allegations first surfaced of being trafficked at the age of 17 – which was underage in her home state – to have sex with Andrew, he sent emails to his co-accused Epstein to say he’d asked his royal protection officer to dig up dirt on her. Whether that officer did so or not, Andrew may have committed an offence by inciting a police officer to commit misconduct in public office.
As a trade envoy appointed by successive governments, Andrew was dragged into multiple scandals. Aside from Epstein, there were Wikileaks revelations about his behaviour on foreign jaunts, claims that during his Dragon’s Den-style business initiative he used the phrase “n***** in the woodpile” to a person of colour, and associations with foreign leaders and businessmen for whom he appears to have acted in business deals.
Whether he was under public instruction, provided with public servants, or freelancing when he shouldn’t have been, all could have constituted misconduct, if it harmed someone else. The Met’s own inquiry into Virginia closed after three years, and if it had continued she might not have succumbed to suicide. Did investigators ever speak to Andrew? Were there grounds to prosecute anyone? Did the Palace lean on Scotland Yard? Did the nation’s police force turn a blind eye to Royal wrongdoing? Someone, somewhere, has a file on Andrew, and it is high time it was produced from whichever drawer it was buried in.
No-one intends to answer, or even ask, those questions. Make no mistake – Andrew’s ‘exile’ is purely a Royal firebreak, intended to cut him off from the increasingly-angry public and media while keeping him firmly inside the tent. Fed, watered and housed, they hope he will no longer need the dodgy billionaires who flock around him like flies on fresh dung. The secondary hope is that he’ll be so beholden he’ll never snitch, and drop the rest of the gang in it.
But that assumes the most entitled, boorish and petulant of the late Queen’s sons, who had a hand-made electric-powered Aston Martin DB7 pedal car as a toddler, visited the Rhondda by helicopter and on sojurns abroad preferred to stay with paedophiles than the local British ambassador, will accept a downgrade in status without complaint. That he’ll never walk to church on Boxing Day, attend a funeral, or write a book. Someone like that, history shows, reacts to shame the same way as a cat to water: claws out.
The first rule of Royalty is the same as that of the Godfather: protect the Family. Andrew has had an almighty fall, but he’s landed on a well-cushioned backside. The question now is whether the scandal dies before he does – and unless these questions are answered, it never will.