The Royal News

Latest news (updated weekly)

(1) Sophie scandal enters a third week

The NEWS OF THE WORLD, the tabloid that entrapped the Countess of Wessex and led to her resignation from her PR company (see the April and May editions of The Royal Report), is today seeking to take the story into a third week. The paper - Britain's biggest-selling newspaper - leads its front page today with the headline: 'Wills' fury at Sophie'. The story claims that Prince William has confided in a friend that he cannot forgive the Countess for what she said to an undercover reporter about the late Princess of Wales. In what it describes as 'one of the most vitriolic outbursts made by a senior royal in recent times', it claims the Prince told a friend: 'My mother never trusted her and told me never to trust her - and now we know she was right all along. People should know what she's like.' He is reported as saying that the Countess 'does nothing for the family'. The story goes on to quote Princess Diana as telling her son that 'Sophie was on the make and out for all she could get'. By contrast, the Prince and his brother Harry were encouraged by their mother to see their lives as 'all about duty, not about making ourselves more comfortable'. The Countess suggested last week in an official interview with the NEWS OF THE WORLD that Princess Diana had 'armies of hairdressers and make-up artists at the drop of the hat'; earlier, in a secretly recorded conversation with an undercover reporter from the paper, she made comments about the late Princess 'turning up every day in different outfits opening children's homes' and arriving at hospitals in the middle of the night wearing make-up. 'How dare she compare herself to my mother - my mother was a princess, a grand lady,' William is alleged to have said to friends by phone this week from South Africa, where he is working on a conservation project. He has apparently been reading the full tabloid coverage on his laptop, after the stories were emailed to him last week.

The broadsheet SUNDAY TIMES, meanwhile, reports today that the Earl and Countess of Wessex are to be given an ultimatum by Buckingham Palace over their future business interests. The paper says that Sir Robin Janvrin, the Queen's private secretary, as well as the Prince of Wales and Princess Royal, are insisting on a tough new line to prevent apparent conflicts of interest in the future. Under the plans, family members would need to choose between their business dealings and their official duties, and would also lose many royal perks. The paper's sources within the palace believe that Edward and Sophie will insist on pursuing their careers; as the paper points out, this would mean losing their privileged status and no longer participating in royal engagements. They would also face cuts in their payments from the Queen, and the loss of privileges such as full security protection. Elsewhere in the SUNDAY TIMES, Patrick Jephson, who was private secretary to Diana, Princess of Wales, for eight years, writes a comment piece that suggests the Prince of Wales is seeking to gain advantage from the family's current difficulties. 'He is a tinkerer, and a self-indulgent one at that,' Jephson writes. 'His well-publicised desire to jettison the 'minor royals' sometimes looks like a handy way to bag the remaining deckchairs for himself.' Jephson suggests that the best way to protect the monarchy is to draw up plans 'for Prince William's early accession'.