🔗 Share this article

This episode commenced with a single photograph, arguably the most consequential ever snapped of a royal family member.

There stood the Baron Killyleagh, arm-in-arm a young woman, while another individual smiled suggestively in the background.

Lacking that snapshot, taken at a party in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the assertions of a adolescent who declared she was moved across the sea and compelled to have perfunctory sexual encounters with a prince of the royal family?

A curious, indicative move by someone who had openly stated to have not known about her, asserted he could not have had intimate contact with her, and yet provided a substantial sum of family money to resolve a long-delayed lawsuit.

A Long Period of Controversy

Against this backdrop, discussions of the monarchy acting decisively to cut Andrew off are wide of the mark. This affair has endured for the largest portion of 15 years since that image, and an additional snapshot of Andrew ambling pleasantly with a disgraced financier surfaced.

• Arrogance: For what duration did his brothers and sisters, perhaps even his relatives, know that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Questionable Associations: They must have realized, if his staff and the authorities were fulfilling their roles, that he had some extremely unsavory friends given he publicly invited them to estates.
• Fiscal Irresponsibility: If the household did not know about his personal conduct, they certainly knew about his extravagance with state resources.

Trips were documented in royal annual reports: chopper transfers from the royal residence to a golf course and back again in time for lunch, private flights instead of commercial flights, all for the benefit of "Airmiles Andy".

A Life of Privilege

Additionally the arrogance which demanded deference when he walked into a room or the supreme obsession about his royal titles used on his official documents in messages to his friends.

He could get away with it while his parent, who unaccountably indulged him, was still living. The sovereign did at least strip him of public duties and ceremonial ranks in the consequence of his ill-fated and, it is now clear, untruthful television interview six years ago.

Current Situation

Just in the last 14 days that events accelerated, following the release of biographical works giving more troubling details of his conduct and that of his connections.

Additional revelations have again exposed Andrew's thinking that he could avoid deceiving about his interaction with a convicted criminal.

The public (and the media) were far ahead of the royal family. There was not a single person of any significance to support him, a outcome of all those years of presumption.

Royal Worries

The more astute monarchical figures realized that. The primary concern is to transfer the monarchy, if not as before at least intact and unstained.

For generations the last 190 years trying to overcome the legacy of past sovereigns, proving they are valuable, responsible and attentive to their people.

He was placing all that in jeopardy in an time when deference and secrecy is no longer sufficient.

Consequences

Ultimately, the notoriously hesitant monarch was pushed more. There was little choice. The royal household had surrendered command of the narrative.

Presently the removal of designations and the continued and lifetime social disgrace that will afflict Andrew most deeply.

• Demotion: Demoted to just a private citizen
• Prior Instance: The first monarch to lose his designations in modern times
• Naval Career: Particularly hurtful given his role in the engagement

He is still a royal advisor, theoretically able to substitute for the monarch, and he is still eighth in line to the crown, but none of these will ever come to pass.

Coming Developments

Can persons he meets still defer to him? Will they still make mistakes and call him Prince? Would they say Sir,

Naturally, he is not moving to a common area, but to the monarchy's vast grounds at a monarchical property.

There, he will be supplied by the king with one of the grace and favour houses and given some sort of financial support.

This differs from his former home, where he paid a token payment for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit distant, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Unresolved Issues

The situation continues. There are still files in the custody of US Congress to be revealed.

• Political Pressure: Might legislators request additional information
• Financial Investigation: Or investigate the improper use of taxpayer funds
• Judicial Potential: There may even be a law enforcement inquiry into his conduct

Maybe for the time being the reputational impact to the institution is restricted. The statement from the royal household was evidently that the stripping of honorifics was what the monarch, and particularly other senior monarchical figures, wanted.

Changed Stance

An end to deception that Andrew was acting willingly. And, remarkably, the short communication showed evidently that the monarchy were aligning with the complainant's account of occurrences.

Even more, for the first time they eventually showed regard for the survivors: "These actions are considered essential, despite the reality that he persists in refuting the claims against him."

Finally it is arrogance, self-interest and inactivity that will undermine the crown. In his stupidity, personal excess and venality, Andrew appears never to have understood that truth.