Could the ‘peace summit’ in London involving the King’s trusted Press Secretary and two of the Sussexes’ key media executives really herald the distant possibility of an end to the bitter feud between Harry and Meghan and the rest of the Royal Family?
Friends say that despite all the pain Harry has caused him, King Charles is a ‘deeply loving and forgiving father’, so a small step towards a rapprochement between father and son certainly seems plausible.
The trouble is that, while Charles may forgive Harry, hell will freeze over before William does too. Or for that matter, Kate. And here is why.
We all had such high hopes that we were witnessing a new generation of working royals and a harmonious, modern vision of the future.
It was just two years later in 2020 that the Sussexes decided to step down as working royals, abandoning honour, duty, Harry’s family and these shores for riches in California.
The immediate result was huge gaps in the meticulously planned royal calendar which is worked out not just months but years ahead. With the Sussexes abandoning ship, there were suddenly gaping holes in the schedule.
Following the death of her beloved Prince Philip, the late Queen continued in frail health to soldier on with her public duties. Meanwhile, Princess Anne increased her already huge workload, as did the Edinburghs Sophie and Edward.
Prince Harry, the Duchess of Sussex, the Princess of Wales and Prince William in 2018 – a time when the Press hailed them as ‘The Fab Four’
If Harry and Meghan had been around they could have shouldered some of the load following the Royal Family’s cancer diagnoses, writes AMANDA PLATELL
William and Kate stepped up, too, despite the pressures of parenting young children George, Charlotte and Louis.
William’s passionate wish was that they would never experience the dysfunctional family life he had endured. Even though George is heir to the throne, he wanted to give his children as normal and stable a family upbringing as possible, with Mum and Dad at home as much as they could be.
Yet such hopes were dented by the petulant departure of Harry and Meghan. That is a hurt that does not heal.
In the years afterwards, with Harry and Megs spewing bile about the Royal Family, William and Kate soldiered on, filling the gaps, flying the flag for Britain and the monarchy which, after the Sussexes left and with an ailing Queen Elizabeth, was certainly fragile.
And then came the double-whammy. First, the King shockingly revealed he had been diagnosed with cancer.
Then the news one month later that Kate too had cancer and was removing herself from public duties for treatment and to take time to heal with her family.
Where was Harry’s conscience then? Did he not regret abandoning his brother when the Royal Family needed him most?
As Kate endured her chemotherapy, William was still having to carry out his public engagements when all he probably wanted to do was to be at home.
If Harry and Meghan had been around they could have shouldered some of the load – but that prospect was denied William with their selfish departure. Unforgivable.
The King’s communications secretary, Tobyn Andreae, Harry and Meghan’s chief communications officer Meredith Maines, and Liam Maguire, who runs the Sussexes’ public relations team in the UK, meet in London for a secret peace summit last week
I don’t know how Harry sleeps at night knowing he has not just betrayed his brother with his constant stream of vitriol about the royals, but has also been absent at the time of William’s greatest need – coping with both his father and his wife’s cancer ordeals while ploughing on with his royal duties.
The King may be forgiving of the extra burden he has had to bear without Harry in the fold, as well as the pain caused by the fact he has never got to know his grandchildren, Archie and Lilibet. He may even forgive Harry for his vilification of Camilla in his memoir Spare (although I doubt Queen Camilla will be so accommodating).
But William will never forgive him. Those close to the Prince of Wales say he is beyond anger and never even talks about the brother he was once so close to. Harry has ceased to exist for William, who is now said now to be completely ‘indifferent’ towards him.
Tellingly, as my colleague Richard Eden reports today, such is the ill-feeling that Prince William and Kate were apparently not even told about last week’s ‘peace summit‘.
If this summit between Charles’s representative and Harry’s team eventually succeeds, it may heal some of the wounds of father and son. But nothing will ever repair the bond with William and Kate – and, I believe, Camilla – after Harry’s multiple betrayals of them.
When the sad day comes and King Charles is no longer with us, the Sussexes and their children will be about as welcome as the Kardashians in the new court of King William. It is easy to understand why.
