Dolly’s on song as stars gets vaccine
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DOLLY Parton has reworked her classic hit Jolene in a bid to encourage fans to get the coronavirus vaccine. The country music legend was filmed at the Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville on Tuesday receiving her first dose of the Moderna jab, which she helped fund with $1million of her own cash. The 75-year-old had a message for anti-vaxxers, who she described as “cowards”, adding that the vaccine is key to getting life back to normal. Dolly even rewrote one her most famed songs to get that message home.
She sang: “Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, I’m begging of you please don’t hesitate.
“Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, because once you’re dead then that’s a bit too late.”
Scots singer Lulu, 72, yesterday gave the vaccination programme the thumbs up as she received her jab.
Posting the image on Instagram, she told her followers: “Felt really hopeful today when Sarah gave me my AstraZeneca vaccine.”
BUCKINGHAM Palace acted on orders “from the very top” when they ordered a probe into claims the Duchess of Sussex bullied her staff during her time as a working royal.
The investigation will examine allegations from former aides who accuse Meghan of “emotional cruelty and manipulation”.
The probe, sanctioned by the Queen as the Duke of Edinburgh battled illness and infection in hospital, will revisit a complaint made about Meghan in 2018 by one of her closest advisers.
A Times story stated Jason Knauf, the Sussexes’ communications secretary, claimed Meghan “drove two personal assistants out of the household and was undermining the confidence of a third”.
Meghan’s lawyers hit back suggesting the newspaper was “being used by Buckingham Palace to peddle a wholly false narrative”, before the Sussexes’ interview with US chat show queen Oprah Winfrey is broadcast on Sunday.
Palace sources said that aides were “incandescent” after being accused of a “smear campaign”.
A senior palace source said: “It is totally disingenuous, frankly ludicrous and wholly untrue to suggest anyone at the Palace has been peddling disinformation. We have not been briefing around the Oprah Winfrey programme.
“There are far, far more important things going on right now than the circus surrounding a media appearance. To be accused by lawyers of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex is astonishing.”
The Queen is understood to have demanded action in a meeting yesterday with her advisers.
A Buckingham Palace statement said: “We are clearly very concerned about allegations in The Times following claims made by former staff of The Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Accordingly our HR team will look into the circumstances outlined in the article.”
The statement was unprecedented. The Queen has never publicly ordered such an investigation, letalone into a member of her own family. Royal sources told how the “situation rapidly escalated” within a few hours yesterday after senior royals were briefed on the nature of the claims of bullying detailed in The Times. It is understood at least six former members of royal staff will be asked to give evidence “in strictest confidence”. Palace sources said Harry and Meghan would not be invited to give their accounts until the allegations are considered. Senior royals are understood to be “dismayed” at reports of staff being reduced to tears, with one aide, reportedly anticipating a confrontation with Meghan, telling a colleague: “I can’t stop shaking.”
Sources said the family’s “sole focus” is on Prince Philip, 99, who has been in hospital for two weeks having tests for a heart condition
There are far, far more important things going on than the media appearance circus SENIOR ROYAL SOURCE ON HARRY & MEGHAN’S SMEAR CAMPAIGN CLAIMS
and treatment for an infection. The Duchess of Cornwall yesterday spoke of him on a visit to a vaccination centre in Croydon, south London, saying: “He’s slightly improving. So that’s very good news.”
The Times report on Meghan claims sources came forward “because they felt that only a partial version had emerged of her two years as a working member of the Royal Family”. Sources said they thought Meghan wanted to be a “victim” so her “unbearable experience” would convince Harry to leave the UK, which her lawyers deny.
Mr Knauf made the complaint in October 2018 in an apparent attempt to force Buckingham Palace to protect staff. A source told the newspaper Harry begged him not to take it further, which the Sussexes deny. Mr Knauf reportedly sent an email outlining the duchess’s alleged actions to Simon Case, Prince William’s then private secretary, after conversations with HR head Samantha Carruthers.
Mr Knauf reportedly wrote in his email: “The duchess seems intent on always having someone in her sights.” The Times report alleged Samantha
Cohen, who worked for the Queen for almost 20 years, was also targeted when she worked as a private secretary for the Sussexes, a source saying “nothing was ever good enough”.
Lawyers for the Sussexes said they denied they bullied her. After the story appeared, Meghan’s spokesman said: “The duchess is saddened by this latest attack on her character.”
The Times also revealed earrings worn by Meghan on a visit to Fiji in 2018 were a wedding gift from Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia, blamed for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
Trailers for the Oprah interview, which will be screened on ITV on Monday and follows Harry’s surprise appearance on James Corden’s Late Late Show, show the host asking “were you silent, or were you silenced?” Kensington Palace did not comment.