The Royal Family has turned into EastEnders.
Just like in the soap opera, every little move by Prince Harry or Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor causes sensationalist chaos. Both have a magnetic attraction to foot-in-mouth disasters. Any decent exile would quit the family, or the country – or the soap opera – and go and live in peace and quiet.
But Harry and Andrew have – strikingly obvious differences aside – a similar combination of self-regard, wounded pride, rampant egomania and shortage of grey cells that mean they go on courting catastrophe.
At least Andrew doesn’t have a multi-million dollar relationship with the media. But Harry has a huge incentive to light the touchpaper and stand by while the fireworks go off. How he would have loved to announce a win in his catastrophic case against Associated Newspapers, in the forecourt of Buckingham Palace.
After his phone-hacking complaint was dismissed in full in the High Court, the King’s decision not to let him stay in the palace looks wiser than ever. Harry would only have weaponised his temporary palace accommodation, as his grievances against the press and the “Establishment” intensified. Hell hath no fury like a prince scorned.
