Prince Andrew’s fall from grace complete as monarchy cuts him loose | Prince Andrew

This was ultimately the outcome King Charles and the Prince of Wales were hoping for: Andrew, the subject of so many toxic headlines unhelpful to the royal family and the institution of the monarchy, has finally done the “honorable” thing.

It’s been six long years since his disastrous Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis accelerated his fall from public grace.

Immediately after this, he appeared to be stepping back from public duties “for the foreseeable future.” The HRH style was set aside and deprived of all military and charitable patronage.

So humiliation will be difficult for a man who so clearly values ​​his status. It’s now complete.

As well as the titles of Earl of Inverness and Baron Killyleagh, he has always clung doggedly to the dukedom, a gift from his mother on the morning of their wedding in 1986. And to the prestigious role of Garter as a Royal Knight Companion of the Order of the Garter. He will no longer use any of them, effective immediately.

And he has always strongly denied the allegations against him, including agreeing to a moratorium on those allegations in his statement on Friday. She claims to have paid millions to settle a civil sexual assault lawsuit in which she claims she did not have sexual intercourse with and had never met Epstein’s victim, Virginia Giuffre, who died by suicide in April at the age of 41.

Titles will not disappear. With each one, the risk of damage to the monarchy’s reputation becomes more serious. Behind the walls of Buckingham Palace, it was decided enough was enough.

Andrew’s acceptance of his fate came on the eve of the posthumous publication of Giuffre’s memoir; Exclusive extracts from these memoirs were published by the Guardian this week. More unwelcome news was perhaps inevitable. Of course, palace aides would be afraid of this.

Charles will make a historic visit to the Vatican next week, becoming the first British monarch to pray publicly with the pope and the head of the Catholic church since Henry VIII left Rome in 1534. The King would not want news of this event to be marred by more vocal cries for Andrew to renounce his titles.

Pressure has clearly been stepped up by other senior royals, eighth in line to the throne.

It was a bad week when Andrew found himself linked to the Chinese spy case when it was revealed that Andrew had been holding meetings with Cai Qi, the Chinese politburo member at the center of the spy scandal. They met at least three times between 2018 and 2019, and the prince invited her to lunch at Buckingham Palace in 2018.

The week had begun with leaked emails showing that Epstein had apparently been in contact with the disgraced US financier in February 2011, far from cutting off contact with him in December 2010 as he claimed in a 2019 Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis.

The emails allegedly show Andrew texting Epstein to say they were “in this together” after the famous photo of the prince with his arm around Giuffre was published.

Friday’s statement presents this as Andrew’s decision, but it would certainly have been made by the palace. Charles would not be happy to take such a drastic step as removing the dukedom by force. The last time the dukedom was taken away from a senior royal was 100 years ago, historian Anthony Seldon told the BBC: “It was in 1919 that Prince Charles Edward, a grandson of Queen Victoria, lost his title as Duke of Albany because he was fighting on the side of Germany during the First World War.”

This would also require an act of parliament.

Andrew is also a brother: a brother with whom Charles has so far been faithfully involved in family events, but Andrew will not be present at the royal family’s Christmas celebrations this year.

The prince’s insistence on doing the “honorable” thing will have upset and frustrated the king, who has finally grasped the nettle and seems to have found a way to convince his brother that it is in the best interest of the family and the monarchy.

So what was left to the late Queen Elizabeth’s son? He is a prince and remains eighth in the line of succession. He is also theoretically still a state advisor; He is the king’s deputy if he is abroad or ill. This is only theoretical because the palace has already made it clear that, as a non-working royal, he will never be offered an offer. Like many of his works, it is classified as “inactive”.

But all vestiges of what was once a senior royal role are now gone.