The Sandringham ‘snub’
Harry claims Queen cancelled Megxit meeting at the last minute – after she was badly advised
THE Queen said she was too busy to meet Prince Harry after he asked to step back from royal life, he claimed yesterday.
He said she invited him to dinner at Sandringham but cancelled because of a diary clash – and said she was busy all week.
The sixth in line to the throne blamed royal aides for the apparent change of heart, and appeared to suggest his grandmother was swayed by ‘really bad’ advice.
Harry and Meghan said they had asked to see the monarch after deciding they no longer wanted to continue as senior members of the Royal Family.
The Queen invited them for tea and ‘a chat’ and told them to stay for dinner, Harry said, describing her offer as ‘wonderful’.
But when the Duke and Duchess of Sussex flew to Britain ahead of the meeting, Harry said he received a message cancelling the invitation and telling him not to come to Sandringham, in Norfolk.
In previously unseen footage from the couple’s Oprah interview that was released by US broadcaster CBS yesterday, Harry told how his private secretary forwarded a message from the Queen’s private secretary, which said she was busy all week and that he should not go to Norfolk.
When Harry phoned the Queen, he said she explained she had a diary engagement which meant she could no longer meet him.
He told Miss Winfrey: ‘I said,
“Well, what about the rest of the week?”. She said, “That’s busy now as well”.
‘I didn’t want to push because I kind of knew what was going on.’
Miss Winfrey questioned why the Queen could not make time to see her grandson and his wife.
Harry replied: ‘When you’re the head of The Firm, there’s people around you that give you advice.
‘What has also made me really sad is that some of that advice has been really bad.’
Harry and Meghan took a sixweek break from royal duties in December 2019 to spend time with
‘She is busy... do not come here’
their baby son Archie in Canada. They said they wrote to the Royal Family before they flew back to Britain to set out their decision to step back from their duties as senior royals.
Harry, 36, said the Queen told them warmly: ‘The moment you land, come up to Sandringham, we would love to have a chat.’
He described his own response as, ‘Wonderful, I would love that’, but said he received the message cancelling the invitation when he arrived in the UK on January 6. Harry recalled that the message from the Queen’s private secretary said: ‘Please pass on to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex that he cannot come to Norfolk, the Queen is busy, she’s busy all week, do not come up here.’
Harry and Meghan then made their bombshell public announcement on January 8, revealing on Instagram that they intended to step back as senior members of the Royal Family.
In their statement, they insisted they continued to ‘fully support’ the Queen. At the time, Buckingham Palace said discussions with the couple were ‘at an early stage’, and warned there were ‘complicated issues that will take time to work through’.
Meghan flew back to Canada almost immediately and Harry eventually met his grandmother, Prince Charles and Prince William for the so-called ‘Sandringham Summit’ on January 13.
Harry is understood to have arrived early and spent some time talking to the Queen privately about his future.
After the emotional 90-minute meeting, the Queen reluctantly gave in to Harry and Meghan’s demands for a new life. In a deeply
personal statement written with her closest advisers, she made her sadness at the couple’s decision clear, but insisted they would remain ‘a valued part of my family’.
The Queen said she understood their desire to live a ‘more independent life’ and insisted she and the Royal Family were ‘entirely supportive’ of the couple. Harry has always enjoyed a good relationship with his grandmother, and said the pair remained close.
He told Miss Winfrey they had spoken more during the last year than they had for many years, and that they had ‘an understanding’.
He also spoke of his ‘deep respect’ for her, adding: ‘She’s my colonelin-chief. She always will be.’