These days they are more inventive. On 20 November 2003 the Royal Family awoke to the news that for the last two months they had had an impostor in their midst. Ryan Parry, a Daily Mirror reporter, had applied for a job as a trainee footman at Buckingham Palace, and, despite giving dodgy references, had been given a job which brought him into direct contact with members of the Royal Family. He was given a security pass that allowed him access to all areas and within days he had been shown the hiding place for skeleton keys to open every door in the Palace. He was still in situ when President Bush arrived on his state visit, amidst one of the tightest and most expensive security operations ever mounted in Britain. Not once was Parry questioned and not once were bags that he brought into the Palace checked. For two months he carried a camera in his pocket and the photographs he took of private areas, including bedrooms, were spread across the pages of the Daily Mirror for two days until the Palace sought an injunction to stop any more material being published.
It was a terrifying breach of security. Parry repeatedly pointed out that, had he been a terrorist, he could have killed the Queen or any member of the Royal Family. He could even have killed the President of the United States.
But as Edward Griffiths, the Deputy Master of the Household who employed the man, points out, he wasn’t. ‘He was neither a criminal nor had links with terrorists. In that sense he passed all the security checks.’ What the system doesn’t allow for is journalists posing as would-be terrorists.
Parry’s stunt was dressed up as a security alert. And, post 9/11, terrorism is a very real threat, although I’d have thought today’s suicide bombers are unlikely to go through the charade of applying for a post as an under-footman at Buckingham Palace. There must be quicker and more spectacular methods of blowing up the Queen or annihilating the British Royal Family. This was simply the most audacious assault yet on the Queen’s privacy and the privacy of other members of her family. And that was what had copies of the Daily Mirror flying off the shelves and newspapers and television channels all over the world reproducing the pictures. It was nothing more noble than the desire to see how the most famous family in Britain, notoriously secretive about its private life, actually lives. And the surprise was that the Queen, who lives in such grand palaces and castles, wears priceless diamonds and jewels and is reputed to be one of the richest women in the world, keeps her breakfast cornflakes in plastic Tupperware boxes, and when she’s not hosting state banquets for 160 she has supper in front of the television watching serials and soaps.
The word dysfunctional has often been used to describe the House of Windsor and it’s hard to find a better word. It’s equally hard to know why they behave so strangely. It is not that there is a lack of affection. The Prince of Wales has a tricky relationship with his father but that aside, the family are all very fond of one another, and in private there are great displays of affection when they meet and a lot of jokes and laughter. But they don’t talk to one another in the way that most families who enjoy one another’s company do. They don’t pick up the phone when they have something to say, and would never dream of saying ‘What a brilliant speech you gave last Wednesday’ – praise for each other’s achievements is not something they go in for – or ‘I’ve got a free evening, what are you up to?’ They write memos to each other or liaise through private secretaries.
And yet it seems to be only contact within the family that they find so difficult. They all make phone calls perfectly happily to courtiers, friends, government ministers and the people running their charities. Indeed, the Prince of Wales is seldom off the phone, as his private secretaries, and more particularly their wives, know all too well. He often makes calls himself – although ever since he announced who was calling and the voice at the other end said, ‘Yes, and I’m the Queen of Sheba’, he has said it is his Private Secretary calling until he is certain he has the person he wants.
The inter-family formality is perhaps a result of there being no clear distinction between their business and personal lives. They are on duty so much of the time and live so much on top of the job that they see more of their private secretaries than they do of their spouses or children. Yet although the relationship with their private secretaries is close, it is almost never a personal one. While the private secretaries are in post they are indispensable, not just in running their principals’ lives but also as sounding boards and occasionally confidants. They know everything that goes on, everything that passes through their bosses’ heads. But they are never friends, and as soon as they have gone, and someone else is in post, with very few exceptions they are lucky if they get a Christmas card.
The time of my first meeting with Michael Shea in 1981 were heady days for the House of Windsor. The wedding had been a triumph – ‘the stuff of which fairy tales are made’ as the Archbishop of Canterbury had said in his address. Diana, who was tall, leggy and gloriously photogenic, was on her way to becoming a superstar, and after months of recession, depression and inner-city riots, extravagant though it was, a full-blown state wedding with grand coaches and all the paraphernalia was just what the country needed. For most people it was a welcome distraction, a wonderful opportunity to celebrate; it was a boost to the nation’s morale, to tourism and to the security and popularity of the monarchy.
Diana had very exceptional qualities. I remember watching her during her first visit to Wales with the Prince, immediately after the honeymoon. As she climbed out of the car at their first stop, she looked briefly to her husband for reassurance and then set off into the crowds with a big smile on her face and arms outstretched to shake as many hands as she could reach. She was a natural; there wasn’t an elderly person in a wheelchair or a babe in arms that she didn’t notice and single out for attention. A thirty-second conversation is going to be banal at the best of times, but she seemed to find just the right words. ‘What nice shiny medals,’ she said to one hunchbacked old soldier, and then to his beaming wife, ‘Did you polish them for him?’ And when a seven-year-old boy called out from a couple of rows back, ‘My dad says give us a kiss’, she smiled and responded, ‘Well then, you’d better have one’, and leaning right forward gave the boy a kiss on the cheek.
The crowds were contained behind barriers on either side of the street, as with all such visits, leaving the middle clear for the royal party. Diana and Charles took one side each and there were audible groans of disappointment when people realized that they would get Charles rather than Diana. It was no secret that the enthusiasm and the flowers were all for Diana. ‘Do you want me to give those to her?’ Charles said time and time again as people held posies aloft and looked longingly in her direction. ‘I seem to do nothing but collect flowers these days. I know my role.’ He was laughing, and I have no doubt at all that at that time he was terribly proud of his wife and pleased that people liked her, but as time went by and the pattern repeated itself endlessly, his laughter began to ring hollow.
He was not used to sharing the limelight. He had been the centre of attention wherever he went for thirty-two years – and he was being eclipsed by his wife. His work, his speeches, his visits, everything was being overshadowed by Diana; and through no fault of her own. Later it became a deliberate ploy but at that time she was as surprised as anyone by the mania which gripped the nation. Every day some trivial story provided an excuse to have her on the front page of the newspapers. Charles began to lose heart – and who can blame him? There were so many serious and important issues that needed airing but no one seemed to be listening. All they seemed to care about was Diana’s wardrobe. Diana wore pearl chokers that had scarcely been seen since