Wills needs a lesson in duty from his grandad

Prince or pauper, few of us ever really know the place we hold in other people’s hearts while we’re alive. The loving words, the expressions of pride, the memories shared, are mostly saved for obituaries and funerals.

So it must be gratifying even for a man as phlegmatic as Prince Philip that, aged 95 and stepping down from formal duties while still full of vigour, has learned what we — his larger family — think of him.

This week, there has been an outpouring of affection and gratitude which, i suspect, probably left him mystified. To the Duke, the past 70 years have simply been a matter of doing his duty for Queen and country.

now, as he retires from a life of dedication, ‘Team Windsor’ has decreed that his children and grandchildren will step up to the plate. Particularly Prince William.

Yet here’s the rub. William may have inherited his grandad’s regal bearing and bloody-mindedness, yet he shows little of the Duke’s selfless dedication to duty.

in the week that Prince Philip stood down, William’s lawyers were in court suing a French magazine for £1.3 million in damages for publishing topless pictures of Kate five years ago.

Yes, the european paparazzi are deplorable, but such pictures will never be taken again — as long as Kate remembers to keep her top on while she’s sunning herself on holiday. What’s the point of raking all this up now? Doesn’t it just remind people of that intensely embarrassing episode, and encourage leery blokes to look for them on the internet all over again?

And should William really have allowed his lawyers to argue the images were all the more painful because they reminded him of ‘the harassment that led to the death of my mother’? One can hardly compare the pain incurred by topless photos of Kate with the loss of Diana.

Of course, William’s grandfather Philip is not unaccustomed to scandal. His alleged trysts with other women have been hinted at or even openly referred to in the media. Yet he has never complained. He’s just got on with the job. Duty first.

William is now 34, older than Philip when he took up his role, yet he still appears workshy, stroppy and insular. His desire to have his own way borders on petulance and smacks of an unattractive assumption of privilege. it’s time he grew up and took a leaf out of Grandpa’s book.

That way, perhaps, he will receive the same kind of adulation in

his old age.