Meet the royal Fab Four... withCopy-Kate Meghan
IT was the day the royal trio became a quartet. Prince Harry has already teamed up for several years with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to highlight their charity work.
Yesterday they were joined by Harry’s fiancee Meghan Markle to form a Fab Four. And as with any new member of a supergroup, the US actress brought her own ideas – insisting she wanted to ‘hit the ground running’ as a member of the Royal Family.
She also showed she has no intention of steering away from controversy as she championed female empowerment.
Harry, Kate and Wills formed their Royal Foundation in 2011 as the main vehicle for their philanthropic work. Meghan will become its fourth patron after her wedding to Harry in May.
The foundation has already resulted in the hugely successful mental health campaign Heads Together, as well as Harry’s Invictus Games for injured service personnel.
During its first annual forum in the City yesterday, William formally welcomed his future sisterin-law, while Harry said: ‘I am personally incredibly proud and excited that my soon-to-be wife, who is equally passionate about seeing positive change in the world, will soon be joining us with this work.’
In a question and answer session, Miss Markle, 36, vowed to maximise her impact on the foundation’s work.
But she also made a bold public endorsement of the MeToo and TimesUp campaigns against sex harassment and inequality.
‘There is no better time than to really continue to shine a light on women feeling empowered and people really helping to support them – men included in that,’ she said. ‘It makes such a tremendous difference. So, yeah... I guess we wait a couple of months and we can hit the ground running.’
Harry, 33, could be quietly heard joking ‘wedding first’ as she spoke, prompting her to insist playfully: ‘We can multi-task!’
Warming to her theme, she added: ‘You’ll often hear people say, “Well you are helping people find their voices” – and I fundamentally disagree with that because women don’t need to find a voice. They have a voice, they need to feel empowered to use it and people need to be encouraged to listen.’
Miss Markle’s confident performance went down well with Harry, who said: ‘I think it’s really good we’ve got four different personalities, we’ve all got that same passion to want to make a difference, but different opinions. And I think those opinions work really, really well.’ He added: ‘We’re pretty tied up with planning a wedding at the moment, but we’re really looking forward to working as a pair and as a four going forward, hoping to make as much of a difference where we can.’
Quizzed over whether they ever had disagreements when working together, William remarked comically: ‘ Oooh, yeeesss...’ Harry intervened, saying: ‘Healthy disagreements! Working as family does have its challenges, of course it does... the fact everyone is laughing means you know exactly [what I mean] – but we’re stuck together for the rest of our lives.’
Kate, heavily pregnant with her third child, appeared to get on well with her future sister-in-law.
The pair frequently laughed and smiled together and Kate clapped enthusiastically as her husband mentioned Meghan’s name.
Later William and Harry set out their vision for a modern monarchy, paying tribute to their family but making clear they want to do things their way.
In a speech, William said that while the princes want to incorporate the best of what their parents and grandparents taught them, both want to make their public work ‘relevant to their generation’ and the ‘ever-changing times’.
He said: ‘Both our parents had provided for us an example of diligence, compassion and duty in all they did.
‘The task for us would not be to reinvent the wheel.’
‘Four different personalities’