Anne first to support her brother – as ever
The royal world has changed once again but the Princess Royal will keep the show on the road
‘Charles and Anne’s relationship is very good now. They have a great mutual respect’
‘There are plenty in palace circles who believe she is the best king we will never have’
Over the years, she has tumbled down the line of succession to a lowly 17th place in the Windsor pecking order. On paper, the Princess Royal may not be the most prominent royal, lagging well behind the likes of her nephew Prince Harry and her brother the Duke of York – even though they are no longer “working” royals.
But when it comes to putting in the hours on behalf of the family Firm, few could dispute Anne’s status as one of the King’s most stalwart supporters.
As the 75-year-old monarch on Monday began what Buckingham Palace has described as a “schedule of regular treatments” following his shock cancer diagnosis, his sister, 73, was the first to ride to the royal rescue. With typical gusto, the grandmotherof-five put her best foot forward to carry out an investiture at Windsor Castle at 11am yesterday, before turning her attention to three further royal engagements.
After handing out gongs to the likes of media doyenne Elisabeth Murdoch, conductor Ivor Bolton, tenor Nicky Spence and wheelchair rugby league player James Simpson, the Princess then made her way up to the Midlands for yet more pressing of the flesh.
Yesterday afternoon, she was due to visit Nottingham West Primary Care Network at Eastwood Primary Care Centre in her capacity as patron of the Royal College of Occupational Therapists, as well as popping in on woolmaker GH Hurt and Son.
She then planned to travel the 128 miles back to London to present The Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering at the Science Museum.
Although the jobs will have been in the royal diary for months, they reiterate the importance of the Princess’s role as the Royal family’s resident trooper.
Last year, she was once again crowned the hardest-working royal, clocking up an impressive 457 engagements in 2023, 32 more than the 425 carried out by the King. Not that there is any sibling rivalry between the pair. Although they used to “fight like cats and dogs” when they were little, according to veteran royal author and commentator Ingrid Seward: “Charles and Anne’s relationship is very good now.
“They have a great mutual respect. Before the prospect of Charles marrying Camilla became a possibility, the late Queen always thought it would be Anne at Charles’s side, acting as a sort of incognito Queen. Elizabeth II always had that vision – that Anne would play a hugely significant supporting role.”
Her bond with the King was plain to see during their mother’s funeral, when the Princess was the only woman to join the solemn march behind the coffin for the procession to Westminster Abbey.
As her brother’s eyes threatened to overflow with tears, his characteristically calm and collected sister looked him straight in the eye with a silent show of support.
In her 2022 book The Palace Papers, journalist Tina Brown even went so far as to suggest: “There are plenty in palace circles who believe she is the best king we will never have.”
Stalwart, straightforward and surprisingly down to earth (despite being an unapologetic stickler for royal protocol), the Princess’s popularity within the household and beyond has been built on her reputation for getting on with it with little fuss or fanfare.
As Valentine Low explained in his 2022 book, Courtiers: “That was Harry and Meghan’s downfall: there was too much ego. Anne has no ego. She recognises that this is the job, and you just get on with it.”
It is a testament to the Princess’s work ethic that Buckingham Palace has stressed that the King will not need to use Counsellors of State – royals authorised to carry out the monarch’s official duties should they be incapacitated or overseas.
Historically, they are the sovereign’s spouse, and the next four people in the line of succession who are over the age of 21.
Until recently, the King’s were Queen Camilla, Prince William, Prince Harry, Prince Andrew and Princess Beatrice.
Amid concern that Princes Harry and Andrew no longer undertake official royal duties and that the former doesn’t even live in the country, a change was made to the historic Regency Act of 1937 to include the Princess along with her youngest brother, Prince Edward, the Duke of Edinburgh. Both will be expected to increase their workload in light of the King’s cancer diagnosis – which has forced him to cancel all forward-facing public engagements to minimise any health risks.
As heir to the throne, the Prince of Wales will also undertake royal engagements on behalf of his father along with the Queen.
Yet with the Princess of Wales also out of action until after Easter after undergoing abdominal surgery, the monarchy has never looked more “slimmed down”.
Naturally, Anne was one of the first to identify the potential pitfalls of stripping back the number of “working” royals.
“Well, I think the ‘slimmed-down’ [monarchy] was said in a day when there were a few more people around to make that seem like a justifiable comment,” she said in an interview last year.
When it was put to her that the world changes, she added: “It changes a bit. I mean, it doesn’t sound like a good idea from where I’m standing,”
The royal world has changed once again – and, as ever, industrious Princess Anne is front and centre of efforts to keep the show on the road.