🔗 Share this article

This episode commenced with a isolated photograph, arguably the most impactful ever taken of a royal family member.

In the frame appeared the Earl of Inverness, arm-in-arm a female youth, while an associate smiled knowingly in the rear.

Lacking that snapshot, captured at a gathering in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the claims of a adolescent who said she was transported across the sea and forced to have cursory intimate contact with a member of the monarchy?

A curious, telling action by someone who had openly asserted to have no heard of her, said he could no have had sex with her, and yet provided millions of family money to settle a long-delayed lawsuit.

Years of Scandal

Against this backdrop, discussions of the monarchy acting firmly to distance themselves from Andrew are misguided. This affair has endured for the better part of 15 years since that photograph, and another snapshot of Andrew ambling amiably with a convicted sex offender came to light.

• Arrogance: For what duration did his siblings, maybe even his mother and father, understand that Andrew was so presumptuous?
• Problematic Connections: They must have realized, if his employees and the law enforcement were doing their jobs, that he had some deeply disreputable associates given he unabashedly welcomed them to palaces.
• Financial Extravagance: If the family did not know about his intimate behaviors, they certainly knew about his overspending with public money.

Journeys were printed in public records: chopper transfers from the palace to a golf course and back again in time for lunch, private flights instead of regular transport, all for the benefit of "Airmiles Andy".

A Life of Privilege

Furthermore the presumption which expected subservience when he walked into a area or the extreme obsession about his designations used on his correspondence in communication to his friends.

He avoided accountability while his mother, who unaccountably pampered him, was still living. The sovereign did at least remove him of public duties and military positions in the consequence of his disastrous and, we now know, untruthful public statement six years ago.

Recent Developments

Just in the last two weeks that events progressed rapidly, following the release of accounts giving more disturbing particulars of his actions and that of his companions.

More information have again exposed Andrew's assumption that he could get away with lying about his relationship with a disgraced individual.

The public (and the press) were far ahead of the monarchy. There was nobody of any consequence to support him, a outcome of all those years of arrogance.

Royal Worries

The more astute royals recognized that. The primary concern is to pass on the monarchy, if not as previously at least whole and unstained.

Over time the last 190 years trying to reverse the legacy of earlier rulers, proving they are beneficial, responsible and reactive to their people.

He was placing all that in danger in an era when deference and privacy is no longer sufficient.

The Fallout

Ultimately, the well-known hesitant sovereign was pushed additional. There was no alternative. The royal household had surrendered command of the account.

Now it is the loss of honorifics and the persistent and life-long personal shame that will hurt Andrew most severely.

• Reduction: Lowered to just a private citizen
• Past Example: The initial member to lose his designations in contemporary era
• Naval Career: Especially painful given his service in the engagement

He remains a counsellor of state, in principle able to stand in for the sovereign, and he is still in the succession to the crown, but none of these will actually occur.

Future Prospects

Will people he encounters still show respect to him? Might they still make mistakes and call him Prince? Would they say Mr,

Certainly, he is not moving to an ordinary town, but to the royal family's extensive estate at a monarchical property.

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

This differs from his previous residence, where he paid a nominal rent for more than 20 years, and the county is a bit far, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Pending Matters

This is not over. There are still files in the possession of American legislators to be disclosed.

• Parliamentary Interest: Might legislators request additional information
• Financial Investigation: Or investigate the misuse of taxpayer funds
• Legal Possibility: There may even be a police investigation into his actions

Possibly for the present the institutional damage to the institution is limited. The message from the institution was evidently that the removal of titles was what the sovereign, and notably other senior royals, sought.

Changed Stance

The cessation of pretence that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, notably, the concise announcement showed evidently that the institution were aligning with the victim's narrative of events.

Furthermore, for the initial instance they finally showed concern for the victims: "The measures are considered essential, notwithstanding the fact that he continues to deny the accusations against him."

Ultimately it is arrogance, self-seeking and inactivity that will undermine the institution. In his stupidity, self-indulgence and greed, Andrew gives the impression never to have understood that lesson.