THE MARKLE DEBACLE
That’s what courtiers are whispering about ... but aren’t they to blame?
it clear they were available for advice at all times.
The feeling is that if Glenalmond-educated arch-fixer Sir Christopher Geidt, the Queen’s former private secretary, was still around, things could have been so very different.
Sir Christopher was surprisingly forced out last year in the fall-out from Prince Philip’s retirement which left Prince Charles with significantly more powers in royal affairs. ‘Christopher would have known how to handle things,’ says one of his former palace colleagues. ‘In particular, he would have known how to handle Harry.’
This is a reference to the Prince’s hot-headedness — which was most notably apparent in 2016 when he issued an intemperate official statement, firing off scattergun accusations against those who had reported and commented on his relationship with Meghan.
Perhaps most astonishing of all is the fact that, six months after he and Meghan got engaged, Harry has yet to meet his future fatherin-law. And indeed, as things stand, it may still be quite some time before he does.
After all this time, he and Mr Markle have only talked on the phone but not met in person. Now, of course, it’s too late. Added to which, just imagine how he must be feeling today as Meghan’s relatives, some of whom are still bad-mouthing the bride on TV chat shows, have flown to London from the U.S. — not as guests of the royals — but as paid-up TV pundits.
And make no mistake, Prince Harry, well-meaning but woefully inexperienced, has been making the key decisions about his wedding, just as his brother William did when he married Kate.
Understandably, the treatment of their mother by the paparazzi has left them both with deep suspicions of the media and obsessed by controlling events they are involved in. In particular, Harry has overseen every name on the wedding guest list which, as the Mail’s Shakespeare Diary revealed yesterday, has some surprising family omissions.
The children and grandchildren of the Queen’s cousins, the Duke of Kent, the Duke of Gloucester, Prince Michael of Kent and Princess Alexandra have not been invited, while, surprisingly, vacuous celebrities such as David and Victoria Beckham have.
But with the exception of Princess Alexandra, who has lived for years in Thatched House Lodge in Richmond Park, William and Harry grew up with these relatives as neighbours at Kensington Palace. Among cousins who are invited are Harry’s Spencer cousins, those blood relatives who are the children of Princess Diana’s brother Charles and sisters Sarah and Jane.
Inevitably, some of these royals, however distant, are angry at not being invited and it’s difficult to see how this will not leave a legacy of bitterness and dissent that won’t help Meghan’s acceptance into the wider royal family.
No doubt, one day, she and Harry will be able to look back on the troubled wedding preparations and laugh about them. But right now no one is laughing.
Indeed, palace staff are wickedly referring to the chaos surrounding the wedding plans as ‘the Markle debacle’.
One of the problems is that many palace staff have been kept in the dark about the arrangements.
About 140 of the Queen’s staff will be on duty at Windsor Castle on Saturday but one senior figure says simply: ‘We won’t know until the day itself exactly what our instructions are and what we are meant to be doing. Normally we would have known a good week in advance, just as we did with Prince William’s wedding.
‘It would all have been written down and printed out for us. But this time, so far, we’ve got nothing. It’s being kept secret until the day. It’s all very unsettling.’
Equally troubling for these key members of the royal machine is the fact that, to their surprise, hardly any have been introduced to the bride.
‘Before William got married, we got to know Kate quite well,’ says the staff member. ‘But hardly anyone has met Meghan.’
The general feeling below stairs, where Harry is very popular, is that he is ‘trying to do too much by himself.’
AND the stumbling and inadequate performance of the most senior palace advisers is being blamed by some on the fact that the three royal ‘courts’ — Kensington Palace, Clarence House (where Charles is based) and Buckingham Palace — are pulling against each other.
Such a problem was the very thing that the now-departed Sir Christopher Geidt was trying to prevent.
In fact, neither Clarence House officials nor those at Buckingham Palace have been intimately involved in the wedding planning, which has been directed by Harry’s small team at Kensington Palace.
Friends of Charles, who is hosting the party for 200 on Saturday evening at Frogmore House in Windsor Great Park, say the prince is concerned that Harry’s wedding has become the subject of ‘nasty parlour gossip’.
They say the fact that Meghan’s father’s predicament was being discussed on Radio 4’s flagship Today programme yesterday, at a time when Prince Charles usually listens, would have seriously worried him.
Yes, everything will probably work out magnificently in the end, but, oh, what a messy affair it has been so far.