🔗 Share this article

The saga started with a single photograph, possibly the most consequential ever snapped of a royal family member.

Present was the Duke of York, arm-in-arm a teenage girl, while a companion grinned conspiratorially in the backdrop.

Lacking that snapshot, taken at a party in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the claims of a adolescent who declared she was trafficked across the Atlantic and obliged to have cursory relations with a individual of the monarchy?

A strange, revealing action by someone who had openly stated to have never been aware of her, said he could no have had intimate contact with her, and yet provided a substantial sum of his mother's money to avert a long-delayed court action.

Over a Decade of Disgrace

In this context, discussions of the monarchy acting firmly to cut Andrew off are misguided. This controversy has persisted for the better part of 15 years since that photograph, and an additional snapshot of Andrew walking congenially with a notorious individual surfaced.

• Hubris: To what extent did his siblings, maybe even his mother and father, realize that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Problematic Connections: They must have understood, if his aides and the authorities were doing their jobs, that he had some extremely unsavory friends given he unabashedly hosted them to estates.
• Monetary Excess: If the household did not know about his personal conduct, they certainly knew about his wastefulness with state resources.

Trips were printed in public records: helicopter transfers from the estate to a sporting venue and back again in time for midday meal, chartered planes instead of scheduled services, all for the comfort of "the frequent flyer".

Existence of Entitlement

Additionally the arrogance which demanded subservience when he appeared in a room or the supreme obsession about his royal titles used on his letterheads in communication to his friends.

He could get away with it while his parent, who strangely indulged him, was still surviving. The sovereign did at least remove him of royal responsibilities and ceremonial ranks in the aftermath of his ill-fated and, it is now clear, untruthful television interview six years ago.

Recent Developments

Merely in the last fortnight that events accelerated, following the publication of books giving more disturbing particulars of his conduct and that of his connections.

Additional revelations have again highlighted Andrew's assumption that he could avoid lying about his relationship with a convicted criminal.

People (and the media) were far more perceptive of the monarchy. There was nobody of any importance to speak up for him, a result of all those years of hubris.

Institutional Fears

The more intelligent family members realized that. The key objective is to pass on the crown, if not as heretofore at least intact and unblemished.

Over time the last 190 years trying to undo the reputation of past sovereigns, demonstrating they are beneficial, responsible and attentive to their citizens.

Andrew was putting all that in peril in an age when deference and privacy is no longer adequate.

The Fallout

Ultimately, the well-known hesitant sovereign was pushed additional. There was no alternative. The institution had relinquished authority of the narrative.

Currently the loss of titles and the persistent and life-long social disgrace that will hurt Andrew most deeply.

• Demotion: Lowered to just a commoner
• Past Example: The first royal to forfeit his honorifics in modern times
• Naval Career: Especially painful given his role in the conflict

He continues to be a constitutional officer, theoretically able to substitute for the king, and he is still in the lineage to the throne, but none of these will truly come to pass.

Coming Developments

Will people he comes across still acknowledge him? Could they still forget themselves and call him Prince? Would they say Andrew,

Of course, he is not moving to an ordinary town, but to the monarchy's extensive property at a royal residence.

At that location, he will be supplied by the king with one of the estate properties and given some type of personal stipend.

It is not his previous residence, where he paid a token lease for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit distant, but even so it may not be adequate distance.

Pending Matters

This is not over. There are still records in the possession of overseas authorities to be made public.

• Political Pressure: Will parliament demand more
• Financial Investigation: Or investigate the misuse of state resources
• Judicial Potential: There may even be a criminal probe into his behavior

Possibly for the moment the reputational impact to the institution is contained. The narrative from the palace was clearly that the revocation of honorifics was what the king, and particularly other senior royals, wanted.

A Shift in Position

An end to pretence that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, notably, the concise communication showed clearly that the royals were supporting the complainant's narrative of occurrences.

Furthermore, for the premiere occasion they ultimately showed consideration for the affected individuals: "The measures are judged required, notwithstanding the truth that he continues to deny the accusations against him."

In the end it is arrogance, self-interest and indolence that will kill the monarchy. In his folly, self-gratification and greed, Andrew seems never to have grasped that lesson.