Why Harry must now offer to step aside from the line of succession
As ex-PM, who’s accused of acting as if he’s still in No 10, gets the vaccine at 67...
FEW could doubt the anger and frustration felt by Prince Harry as he lost his Royal patronages this week. His military titles were given to him by the Queen after years of dedication, including two tours of duty in Afghanistan. The patronages meant a huge deal to him on a deeply personal level – that is not in question.
Even so, it is time for him to accept the logic of the position that he and Meghan have so very deliberately carved out for themselves.
In moving to the States and making his own money, Harry has chosen a life which is incompatible with that of a working Royal.
If you wish to be Captain General of the Royal Marines – as the Duke of Edinburgh was before him for 60 years – then lying barefoot in the Californian sunshine under a fertility tree does not, I’m afraid, quite cut it.
Harry is no longer fully able to support his Royal titles from that distance, although a lucrative deal with Netflix suggests he is willing to cash in on them nonetheless.
And he is certainly doing little for hi s nati on i n comparison with the many hard-working – and less senior – Royals who toil in their duties uncomplainingly.
That is why I now believe Harry must take one step further still and do the only honourable thing in the circumstances: offer to step aside from the line of succession.
As the sixth in line to the throne, it would take a catastrophic turn of events for him to be called upon as King. But there remains the chance, and it is only sensible that Harry and the Palace advisers at least consider the possibility.
It is not a comfortable prospect – particularly in t he l i ght of t he approach he has shown in recent times. Harry and Meghan have turned their backs on the Royal Family. Their public statements have shown disrespect to the Queen.
In forging their own paths, they have also strayed into the political arena. These are hardly the distinguishing features of senior Royals. The Sussexes had been handed roles as president and vice-president of the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust, a hugely important cause for the Monarch, and faced rewarding lives fostering environmental and economic cooperation between nations. But that, it seems, was not enough. Then there is the prospect of Queen Meghan, which no one wants. The idea that she could end up representing our country is impossible. It simply cannot be.
Today, the Queen finds herself in a delicate position – one of Harry’s making. Her Majesty cannot remove her grandson from the line of succession without it seeming vindictive, something she is most certainly not. Duty comes first, but she is fond of her family.
Yet the alternative, that Harry maintains a claim to the throne, is equally unthinkable. Harry has already made it very clear that he was unhappy in his role as a working member of the Royals. So why would he not take the final step and move aside?
The fact is that the Americans are impressed with lineage and inheritance. Plain ol d Harry Windsor wouldn’t get much of a look in.
In the first (and sole) episode of their Archewell Audio podcast, the couple introduce themselves simply as Harry and Meghan. But the credits at the end are more formal.
‘The executive producers… are the Duke and Duchess of Sussex,’ a voiceover notes.
The fact is, they will need their Royal links and titles more than ever if they are to make it on their own.
Harry is easy enough to market in his full military regalia, resplendent in a horse-drawn carriage.
But with a backpack and woolly beard, he’s a different prospect altogether. Harry is valued as a member of the Royal Family, not as a tech entrepreneur.
Perhaps there is a more personal l e s s o n. Aft e r hi s o wn par e nt s divorced, Princess Diana was asked by the Queen whether she wanted to keep her HRH title.
Her response was clear. ‘No,’ she said. ‘No, I don’t.’
Losing the formal HRH title gave her at least part of the freedom she craved.
Harry, in that respect, is much like his mother. He has shown no desire to be King.
It’s likely that he would not want it for his own children, either, having grown up in the shadow of what it means.
It would be far kinder to his grandmother, to the rest of the Royal Family and to himself for Harry to accept that his place in the succession is no longer tenable.
That sacrifice would prove that Harry is respectful of everything his grandmother stands for.
He would retain his dignity, regardless of title, and we would all respect him for it.
He is doing less for his country than many less senior Royals
MATT Hancock has ‘stopped talking’ to Tony Blair amid accusations that the former Prime Minister pinched Government anti-Covid ideas to pass them off as his own, it was claimed last night.
The Health Secretary is said to be livid after two key proposals allegedly mentioned in private conversations – an initial priority one-jab vaccine policy and mass testing – later emerged as Mr Blair’s own suggestions.
A well-placed Government source told The Mail on Sunday that Mr Hancock had now broken off contact with the 67-yearold ex-premier – who yesterday posted a picture of himself receiving his Covid jab on Twitter – over the breaches.
The source said: ‘Matt was briefing Blair as a courtesy to a previous Prime Minister. But he cottoned on that Blair was milking these conversations.
‘And that’s when Hancock said, “I’m not going to talk to you any more.” ’
Tory MPs have also privately complained at the way ‘Tony Blair appears to be going round still pretending he is PM’.
The Health Secretary declined to comment last night. However, a source said: ‘Matt has spoken with all the living prime ministers in the course of the pandemic.’
However, Mr Blair’s office dismissed the accusations, insisting he had not taken the one- jab policy from Mr Hancock as he had never discussed it with him.
But the claims may tarnish Mr Blair’s burgeoning reputation for being way ahead of the game in the fight against Covid, with even Nigel Farage claiming ‘he seems to have a grip on this far more than the Cabinet’.
Mr Blair’s apparent far-sightedness includes being one of the first to call for the UK’s ground-breaking ‘first-jab priority’ vaccination in a newspaper last December – seven days before vaccine chiefs and the country’s four chief medical officers approved such a plan. Earlier last year, he appeared to anticipate the Government’s decision to introduce mass testing for the virus regardless of whether people had symptoms.
The Sunday Times reported last month how Mr Blair was offering ‘strategic advice’ to Mr Hancock while his think-tank, the Tony Blair Institute For Global Change, had been repurposed to address Covid19 policy. One Blair ally even boasted l ast week: ‘ Quite frequently, what Tony suggests today, the Government does tomorrow.’
But last night, the idea that the Cabinet followed Mr Blair was dismissed by one senior Government figure as ‘complete b******s’.
He told The Mail on Sunday: ‘Blair influencing the Government? I tell you it’s the opposite.
‘It’s just stuff that he [Mr Blair] picked up on the phone when he was talking to Matt. Then he goes out and goes public with it.’
The source said that the Health Secretary was happy ‘in the beginning’ to have private conversations with the former Prime Minister.
But he said that came to a stop after Mr Blair appeared to claim credit ‘out of the blue’ for the onejab dosing interval.
He said: ‘We were already looking at changing the dosing, talking to the manufacturers, before he even published his article on it or went on the Today programme. It was an informal chat. Matt was briefing him as a courtesy and the next thing, he’s freelancing, he’s the world expert himself on this.’
However, the ally of Mr Blair insisted he was probably ‘acting in concert with the Government’ by proposing pandemic policies which were then adopted by Ministers.
He said: ‘I think there is some degree of co- ordination. I don’t think it’s in any way illicit or bad.
‘ Mr Blair is aware of what the Government is doing. And quite frequently what Tony suggests today the Government does tomorrow.’
Last night, a spokeswoman for Mr Blair insisted his call for a one-jab policy ‘ arose out of discussions with experts and from the recognition that there would be a threemonth gap between the first and second AstraZeneca jab’.
Mr Blair’s office insisted the mass testing idea was first aired by his institute as early as last March.
A s ource al s o pl ayed down reports of a rift with Mr Hancock, saying that he had spoken to him since December.
‘An informal chat, then Blair’s a world expert’