🔗 Share this article

The saga started with a isolated photograph, possibly the most significant ever taken of a member of the monarchy.

There stood the Baron Killyleagh, standing closely beside a teenage girl, while another individual beamed suggestively in the background.

Absent that photograph, shot at a party in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the assertions of a adolescent who said she was trafficked across the Atlantic and forced to have cursory relations with a prince of the royal family?

A curious, revealing action by someone who had publicly claimed to have never heard of her, claimed he could never have had relations with her, and yet provided millions of his mother's funds to resolve a long-delayed legal case.

Over a Decade of Disgrace

Against this backdrop, conversations of the royal family acting decisively to distance themselves from Andrew are misguided. This controversy has persisted for the largest portion of 15 years since that image, and a further photo of Andrew strolling congenially with a convicted sex offender came to light.

• Arrogance: How long did his siblings, perhaps even his parents, understand that Andrew was so self-entitled?
• Dubious Friendships: They must have understood, if his staff and the police were performing their duties, that he had some highly questionable friends given he unabashedly hosted them to royal residences.
• Financial Extravagance: If the monarchy did not know about his intimate behaviors, they certainly knew about his extravagance with state resources.

Journeys were listed in royal annual reports: chopper travel from the estate to a golf course and back again in time for dining, exclusive air travel instead of commercial flights, all for the convenience of "the travel enthusiast".

A Life of Privilege

Furthermore the presumption which expected respect when he entered a room or the profound awareness about his honorifics used on his letterheads in letters to his associates.

He managed to escape consequences while his mother, who unaccountably spoiled him, was still alive. The sovereign did at least remove him of royal responsibilities and ceremonial ranks in the consequence of his disastrous and, it is now clear, untruthful public statement six years ago.

Recent Developments

Merely in the last 14 days that events sped up, following the release of books giving more troubling particulars of his behavior and that of his connections.

Additional revelations have again exposed Andrew's thinking that he could avoid being untruthful about his contact with a notorious figure.

The public (and the journalists) were far in advance of the monarchy. There was nobody of any consequence to defend him, a outcome of all those years of presumption.

Royal Worries

The more intelligent monarchical figures recognized that. The one imperative is to transfer the crown, if not as before at least whole and untarnished.

Over time the last 190 years trying to reverse the legacy of previous monarchs, showing they are valuable, responsible and responsive to their citizens.

His actions endangered all that in danger in an time when respect and privacy is no longer adequate.

Consequences

Eventually, the well-known uncertain king was pushed additional. There was little choice. The royal household had surrendered command of the account.

Presently the loss of titles and the ongoing and lifetime public humiliation that will pain Andrew most deeply.

• Downgrading: Lowered to just a private citizen
• Past Example: The initial royal to surrender his honorifics in contemporary era
• Naval Career: Particularly stinging given his duty in the Falklands war

He continues to be a counsellor of state, theoretically able to stand in for the king, and he is still in the succession to the crown, but none of these will truly come to pass.

Future Prospects

Will people he encounters still show respect to him? Might they still forget themselves and call him Prince? Will they even say Andrew,

Of course, he is not retiring to suburbia, but to the sovereign's extensive property at a monarchical property.

In that place, he will be provided by the monarch with one of the grace and favour houses and given some type of personal stipend.

It is not his prior accommodation, where he paid a nominal payment for more than 20 years, and Norfolk is a bit remote, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Unresolved Issues

The situation continues. There are still records in the possession of US Congress to be made public.

• Political Pressure: Could parliament seek further action
• Monetary Probe: Or examine the waste of state resources
• Legal Possibility: There may even be a police investigation into his conduct

Possibly for the time being the harm to the monarchy to the institution is contained. The statement from the institution was evidently that the revocation of designations was what the king, and especially other senior monarchical figures, desired.

Altered Approach

The cessation of deception that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, significantly, the short communication showed plainly that the monarchy were aligning with the victim's account of occurrences.

Even more, for the premiere occasion they finally showed concern for the survivors: "The censures are deemed necessary, despite the fact that he continues to deny the claims against him."

In the end it is presumption, selfishness and laziness that will undermine the monarchy. In his stupidity, self-indulgence and venality, Andrew appears never to have learned that lesson.