POLL: NOW STRIP THEM OF TITLES
Queen pointedly says ‘recollections may vary’ on race row Mail survey shows huge public backlash against the Sussexes
Harry and Meghan should be stripped of their royal titles, a survey said last night.
As Buckingham Palace finally broke its silence on the couple’s explosive interview, a poll found that 51 per cent of Britons would back such a sanction, compared with 28 per cent against.
Conducted after millions of viewers watched the broadcast on Monday night, the Daily Mail survey also found a majority think the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were wrong to have given the interview to Oprah Winfrey and had let the Queen down.
Amid a toxic race row, the Palace publicly addressed the couple’s allegations last night, with a statement issued on behalf of the monarch saying ‘recollections may vary’ about
past events. Responding to allegations about their treatment at the hands of senior royals, the Queen said that the family was ‘saddened’ to learn how ‘challenging’ life had been for the couple.
She admitted their claims about racism were ‘concerning’ and would be taken ‘very seriously’. Her three-paragraph, 61-word statement issued at 5.30pm – after more 36 hours of highly-damaging conjecture following the bombshell Oprah interview – also made clear it would be her last word on the subject.
She now intends, says Buckingham Palace, to deal with the bitter family rift privately.
There was no immediate reaction from the Duke and Duchess of Sussex but the Mail understands their representatives were sent the monarch’s statement prior to its publication.
Buckingham Palace officials drew up a draft statement on Monday but it was held back because the Queen wanted more time to consider her response.
While many publicly questioned why the Palace would leave such damaging allegations unanswered for a day and a half after the interview aired on CBS in the US on Sunday evening, senior royal sources told the Mail last night that they believed a ‘measured’ approach was right.
The Mail understands there is definite resentment in some quarters of the royal household about the couple’s decision to give the interview, just as there was when they blindsided the Queen by publicly announcing their intentions to step down as working royals last year without informing her first.
With the plan inside palace corridors being to treat the couple with ‘kindness and compassion’ while also ‘standing their ground’:
■Piers Morgan dramatically quit ITV’s breakfast show Good Morning Britain following a row over his criticism of the duchess;
■The announcement came just over an hour after media regulator Ofcom said it was investigating the show following a tide of complaints about his comments on Monday’s programme;
■The poll for the Mail also revealed that the monarchy had been damaged, with even the Queen’s personal popularity taking a hit;
■Meghan’s father Thomas Markle spoke for the first time since the
‘Second-rate treatment’
interview to insist that the Royal Family were not racists;
■The duchess’s estranged father also branded his son-in-law ‘snotty’;
■A previously unseen clip from the interview showed Meghan hitting back at claims she and Harry were hypocrites for trying to control what people write about them;
■Boris Johnson maintained his silence on the row engulfing the Royal Family;
■Charles made his first public appearance since the interview at a north London church serving as a vaccine centre;
■ITV said the interview was watched by 12.4million viewers, the biggest peak audience of the year;
■One of Meghan’s former Suits costars criticised the Sussexes for staging an interview while the world was in the ‘throes of death’.
The decision of the Sussexes to bare their souls to one of the most powerful women in the US entertainment industry has plunged the Royal Family into the biggest, and potentially most damaging, crisis since the tragic death of Harry’s mother, Diana.
Among their most incendiary claims, broadcast on Monday, was that a member of Harry’s family expressed concern about how dark their first-born child would be.
The allegation has sparked a global guessing game after the couple refused to name the person concerned, saying it would be ‘too damaging’ for their reputation.
Meghan also alleged that racism was at the heart of what she believed was the couple’s secondrate treatment by senior royals and officials.
She further accused them of trying to strip her son, Archie, of his future title and security. And she claimed that when she became suicidal, officials blocked her from receiving professional help as it would have been damaging to ‘the institution’.
The allegations plunged the Palace into turmoil, prompting crisis talks between the Queen and her two immediate heirs, the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge.
Some courtiers favoured a pointfor-point rebuttal of the claims, but others believed that a more ‘gentle’ approach was required in the face of Harry and Meghan’s clear anger and hurt.
Courtiers also said they believed it was only right to allow viewers in the UK to watch the programme for themselves when it aired a day later, on ITV on Monday night, before issuing a statement.
‘It has been important for us to carefully consider any response before issuing and of course releasing something today [Tuesday] meant viewers in the UK had the opportunity to watch the interview, if they wished to, first,’ said one.
The statement was at pains to stress the family’s ‘love’ for Harry and Meghan, but the final result was far more bullish – in a typically elegant and refined manner – than many observers had expected.
Issued by the Palace on behalf of Her Majesty, it made clear that she refused to let everything Harry and Meghan said go unchallenged. But sources also stressed that she wanted to bring the couple back into the fold.
One royal insider told the Mail that ‘no one benefited from a tit for tat’ battle and that there was ‘immense sadness’ that such a deeply personal rift was being played out on a public stage.
The carefully-worded statement was a ‘clear olive branch’ to the Sussexes, who have made no secret of their righteous fury at being asked to completely step down as working royals and hand back their official patronages following their acrimonious decision to quit the UK and move to the US in pursuit of lucrative commercial careers.
But it was a bitter pill for some to swallow. There was no further clarity last night about what the differences in ‘recollections’ were, although it was clear, by the juxtaposition in the statement, that race was one of them.
It is believed that senior royals strongly consider the vast majority of the issues aired by Harry and Meghan were ‘family matters’, including Meghan’s claim that she was denied the chance to seek support for her mental health issues.
The poll for the Mail found that even among the younger generation – the couple’s biggest fans – a greater number felt they should lose their titles.
Among those aged 45 and over, 62 per cent were in favour of them losing their royal titles, with only 21 per cent saying the Duke and Duchess of Sussex should retain them.
For those aged 18 to 44, the divide was less severe, but still in favour – with 38 per cent calling for them to forgo being royal, compared with 36 per cent saying they should keep their status.
Harry could never be stripped of his birth title, Prince Harry, although he could personally choose not to use it.
His late mother, Princess Diana, agreed to give up her HRH title when she and Prince Charles divorced, although Palace officials are known to have ruled this out last year as an option for her son and his wife as it would be seen to be ‘punitive’.
Theoretically, the couple could also have their titles, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, removed.
Again, though, Palace officials have also said this would never happen, because they were given to the couple as a ‘wedding gift’ by the Queen. If it were ever to happen, Meghan would become Princess Henry of Wales.
‘Plunged into turmoil’