The Firm: The Troubled Life of the House of Windsor

by Penny Junor

  But there was another, more sinister strand to George Smith’s story, which was said also to have been on the missing ‘rape tape’ and which began dribbling out over the next year and more. He claimed to have taken breakfast on a tray to a principal member of the family and witnessed an ‘incident’ between a member of the Royal Family and a Palace servant. Once again, the story had been circulating in Fleet Street and among people in the know for a long time; the implication was that it was a homosexual incident. Some people thought it referred to the Prince of Wales, others that it might have been the Duke of York or Prince Edward. Either way it seemed unlikely the story would ever see the light of day. George Smith was a likeable and honourable character, no doubt, who had had a rotten time of it, but, with his history of alcohol, post-traumatic stress and depression, he was not a reliable witness and it was widely accepted that there was no evidence at all for the allegation. As a money-spinner this story was irresistible and in November 2003 the Mail on Sunday, which had been looking after Smith, now out of work, divorced and a broken man, prepared to publish a second interview with him in which he told the story of what he had seen, naming both the servant and the member of the Royal Family. It was a gamble – the evidence was insubstantial and they knew it – but it was one that paid off. On the Saturday night in advance of publication, an injunction was obtained to stop the story appearing in all its detail, giving the Mail on Sunday the best of all possible outcomes – a banner headline that couldn’t have been more tantalizing, ‘Royal Servant Gags Mail On Sunday In Court Drama’.

  But the injunction was not enforceable in Scotland and, although they were not seen south of the border, the Sunday Herald published the allegations. Meanwhile, the same royal servant tried to stop the Guardian from naming him, but the newspaper, which had been intrigued by the curious nature of the injunction, successfully mounted a challenge in the High Court and won the right to name the man who had sought the injunction to gag the Mail on Sunday – but not to specify the allegation.

  It was becoming a farce. Those people who knew what it was all about were greatly amused; those who didn’t were simply bemused. And to add to their confusion, four days later Sir Michael Peat issued a statement from Clarence House which said:

  In recent days, there have been media reports concerning an allegation that a former royal household employee witnessed an incident some years ago involving a senior member of the Royal Family.

  The speculation needs to be brought to an end.

  The allegation was that the Prince of Wales was involved in the incident.

  This allegation is untrue. The incident which the former employee claims to have witnessed did not take place.

  Many thought Peat’s statement was lunacy – to be denying an unnamed accusation, to be involving the Prince in tawdry tabloid tat – but the story had already appeared in an Italian newspaper, it was floating around the internet and was the subject of much sniggering in saloon bars. I happened to think it was rather a good idea; confronting the issue head-on did take the sting out of it.

  No one knows exactly why the Prince of Wales is so reckless in his determination to keep Michael Fawcett. The press has repeatedly tried to assassinate his character – this is the man, it was revealed, whose job had been to put toothpaste on the royal toothbrush during his years as a valet. One answer is that he is very good at what he does. He is a brilliant fixer and he has very good taste. Parties he organizes – and I have been to several – run like clockwork; the decor is rich and flamboyant – as is he – the parking arrangements perfect, the food delicious, the wine excellent, the service good and everyone feels that they have been somewhere special – as they should if they have been entertained by the heir to the throne. The Prince entertains on a grand scale – nearly nine thousand people a year. Every Christmas he gives a couple of parties at Highgrove, which is a goodwill exercise for neighbours and locals; but most of the people he entertains are big-time donors to his charities, or stars and show-business personalities who have donated their time and talent to the Prince’s Trust. Either that or they are experts and advisers from any one of his fields of interest who have volunteered time and expertise in some way, and it is important that these people should leave Highgrove or Clarence House feeling their generosity has been appreciated and having had a very good party. Fawcett organizes the Prince’s shooting weekends at Sandringham, and any private or charitable entertaining in any of the other royal residences he may use. He also organizes the Prince’s family events. Shortly after moving into Clarence House (where Fawcett had been involved in the refurbishment), the Prince held a dinner for his parents and other members of the family (to which Camilla was invited) to mark the 50th anniversary of the Queen’s coronation. It was just weeks after the Peat Report, just weeks after Michael Fawcett’s resignation, and yet he organized it. He also organized Prince William’s twenty-first birthday party at Windsor Castle, which was overshadowed by a gate-crasher dressed as Osama bin Laden in a pink frock. Aaron Barschak called himself a ‘comedy terrorist’; not only did he manage to get into the castle grounds without being stopped, it wasn’t until he was on stage with microphone in hand, before the entire Royal Family, that anyone realized he was not part of the cabaret.

  Charles knows that if Fawcett is in charge, barring the odd intruder everything will be perfect. After so many years in close proximity, both as the Prince’s valet and his party organizer, Fawcett knows, probably more than anyone else alive, the Prince’s likes and dislikes. And Camilla likes him and leans on him, as she once did on Mark Bolland. She has known him for nearly twenty years and he was a friend to her when the press were camped outside her door and the hate mail was at its height. The Prince sent him and Bolland to look after her on her first trip to New York in 2000; he helped her refurbish Birkhall, the house in Scotland that Charles inherited from his grandmother; he helped with her house in Wiltshire and he helps her when she entertains.

  So that is one explanation as to why he keeps him; he knows he can trust Fawcett to provide what he wants and it’s easier to stick with the devil he knows. His advisers will also say it’s because the Prince is fiercely loyal and he is rewarding the loyalty that Fawcett has shown him over the years. I find that one hard to swallow. The Prince can be fiercely loyal – and has been with Camilla – but there are plenty of people to whom the Prince has not been terribly loyal, including some in the early days of his marriage who went quite unjustly because Diana didn’t want them around. Another explanation is that Fawcett was with the Prince during the Wars of the Waleses and for all the years since; he knows every last detail of the Prince’s life down to his brand of toothpaste. His memories, were he to commit them to paper, would make every other treacherous ex-royal servant’s book read like Enid Blyton.

  ‘He has a very forceful personality,’ says a key figure at Clarence House, who has watched the relationship for years, ‘and he hasn’t been managed at all well.’

  Fawcett is unusually able – he came from the bottom of the pile – and he’s very poor at reading and writing. I’ve never seen anything on paper from him, but he has the real talent of a salesman and has flair, brings style to a party – and he manages to get people to cough up money. He’s also known the Prince a very long time. The Prince knows he’s a bully – a delegation from the staff went and told him so – but the Prince did nothing about it, I think out of a mixture of naivety and niceness. Until Peat came along he had far too much influence.

  Peat is a different calibre of person from previous private secretaries. He is intensely serious, very clever and he’s tough. He’s not the greatest manager; but he’s very tough, and much more systematic than any of the others. I’d give him six marks out of ten as a manager; Stephen Lamport, three or four out of ten. He was a nice guy but he didn’t have much of a system; he was such a gent you never knew what went on in his head. Mark Bolland was a very clever operator but there was a total absence of management or systems with him; it rather fel
t as though he was being managed by the Daily Mail. Peat is respected – not universally liked – but he has brought order, increased income – he has an accountant’s pen – he’s concentrated on performances and he’s incorruptible. He’s more deferential than I would have anticipated – does a lot of Your Royal Highnessing and bowing, but he is very tough minded, stealthy, determined and he is certainly not a man who says ‘Yes, sir, no, sir, three bags full, sir’ – and in that environment it’s quite hard not to be. Red-carpet fever is a very serious disease; it gets in the way and a lot of people suffer from it.

  But for all Peat’s virtues, Michael Fawcett still seems to have far too much influence. Someone running an event at Windsor Castle recently, for a charity of which the Prince of Wales is patron, was astonished by the tone and authority that Fawcett displayed in the planning process. He appeared to speak categorically on behalf of the Prince. This man was also less than chuffed to learn that the money raised at the event would be shared between his charity and the Prince’s Trust (a common complaint, but nothing to do with Fawcett, more with the Prince’s private secretaries who decide which charities will benefit.) The organizers of other charities have been similarly dismayed by Fawcett’s high-handedness – if nothing more, he is a bad ambassador for the Prince of Wales.

  And although he is self-employed and no longer the responsibility of the Prince’s household, and technically, therefore, no longer a liability, his influence is as great as ever. At the beginning of 2004 he was back in the driving seat – albeit temporarily – at the shop at Highgrove. After his resignation in March 2003, much to the relief of everyone who has to deal with the shop, the business was run by Duchy Originals. The new buyer of all non-Duchy products worked closely with the shop manager and built up a good relationship with suppliers, many of whom are small local businesses who had found Fawcett’s manner tough to take. Last January they were informed that Duchy Originals were no longer responsible for buying and branding – and phone calls to the friendly Duchy buyer to ask what was going on were met with ignorance. ‘If you find out would you let us know, please?’ Fawcett had moved back and immediately requested meetings with all the suppliers. He announced that he was changing the branding, the packaging and point-of-sale material and, although supposedly only assisting the acting managing director, Nigel Price (from the cutlery company Arthur Price of England), he has already put backs up. Two shop managers have gone in less than a year. Fawcett and Price have been hopelessly inefficient and introduced some highly questionable supply contracts which seem to go against everything that the Prince of Wales, as a supporter of small businesses, ought to stand for. Ownership of the goods goes to the shop on delivery (as opposed to on payment, which is more usual); invoices are to be raised by the supplier no more frequently than quarterly and will be paid within sixty days from the date of the invoice. So a supplier delivering on 4 January could have to wait until the end of May for payment, which could cause severe enough cash-flow problems to put a small company out of business. Highly advantageous for the Prince of Wales’s Charitable Foundation but not the best way of raising money for charity.

  I would be very surprised if the Prince was aware of what was being done in his name, but if there is just one lesson for him to have learned from the Peat Report it is that, before putting the rest of the world in order, he needs to take a closer look at what is happening under his own roof.

  FORTY

  Bear Traps

  On Mike Gretton’s second day in the job as director of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award he was asked to go to London to see Sophie Rhys-Jones, who, a year later, was to become the Countess of Wessex. Sophie, who at the time was working as a consultant for the Award as well as running her own public relations company, was writing a feature on the new director. After more than an hour’s grilling about his past career, which he admits he found very agreeable, Gretton went back to his office in Windsor. The next day the phone rang and his PA said she had ‘Sophie’ on the line. ‘Hello, darling,’ said Gretton, thinking it was his daughter Sophy, who was in the middle of exams at medical school. ‘How really good to hear from you.’ There was a pause and a bit of a hush. ‘Michael,’ said the voice, ‘I didn’t know we knew each other quite so well, and quite so quickly.’ ‘Oh God, Sophie,’ he said, to peals of laughter in his ear, realizing his mistake. ‘I told you yesterday I had a daughter called Sophy. I thought it was her.’ Later that day he was in a meeting in his office when a head suddenly appeared around the open door and said, ‘Hello, darling.’ It was the Queen’s future daughter-in-law.

  Mike Gretton is not the only person who thinks Sophie is fantastic or that she has been fantastically good for Prince Edward. She has a lot of fans within the handful of charities she has taken on, such as Brainwave, in Somerset, which offers hope to brain-damaged children, and Chase Children’s Hospice in Guildford. They all say she is warm, relaxed, interested, easy and very good for fundraising. She also has fans at Buckingham Palace, where staff love her because she is courteous and friendly. And Edward is considerably less pompous than he once was, more relaxed, infinitely more mature and also friendlier.

  But Sophie was not born to the position she now holds, and for a while it looked as if she might turn out to be the third daughter-in-law who looked so promising at the start but turned into an embarrassing liability. Sophie was a middleclass girl with a career that, quite commendably, she wanted to keep going. But she failed to see the pitfalls and the bear traps that awaited her, and there was no one at Buckingham Palace capable of reining in an HRH. They couldn’t do it with the Princess of Wales and they couldn’t control the Duchess of York either; and because each member of the family has its own household and its own set of advisers and staff there is no mechanism for central control. Lord Luce, the Lord Chamberlain, spent three months looking into the subject, but only as an afterthought once the damage had been done.

  In April 2001, Mazher Mahmood, an investigative journalist from the News of the World, dressed up as an Arab sheik, hired an expensive suite at the Dorchester Hotel in London and invited the Countess and her business partner for a working lunch to discuss the possibility of giving her company R-JH a contract worth £20,000 per month. The room was bugged and, despite knowing nothing about the stranger she had only just met, Sophie chatted confidently, and very indiscreetly, about members of the Royal Family and figures in British politics and government. She referred to the Queen as ‘the old dear’, described Prince Charles and Camilla as ‘number one on the unpopular list’, only likely to marry once the Queen Mother, ‘the old lady’, was dead; she called Tony Blair too ‘presidential’, William Hague, then leader of the Tory Party, ‘deformed’, and Cherie Blair ‘absolutely horrid, horrid, horrid’. Worse, she made it clear that her royal connections were ‘an unspoken benefit’ to her clients.

  First she denied she had said any such things, then she issued grovelling apologies to those public figures about whom she had been rude, and then, to make matters worse, she made a pact with the News of the World. To prevent them using the tape recording, she agreed to give the paper an exclusive personal interview. It couldn’t have been more personal or more bizarre. She talked about her life and marriage, the rumours about her husband’s sexuality (a constant feature of his adult life) and their determination to have a baby, saying they were even contemplating in vitro fertilization – all of which the newspaper published with great glee under the headline ‘My Edward’s Not Gay’. But Sophie had been ‘had’ a second time. The tapes didn’t appear in the News of the World – the tapes were tame compared to what they had in exchange – but they found their way to other newspapers which gave maximum exposure to edited highlights of the secretly recorded conversation.

  But the sting was not the first of Sophie’s faux pas. She was in trouble for appearing in a photograph with a Rover car – a royal endorsing a commercial brand was clearly not on. She then took on the Miele electrical appliances account whose closest competitor in the v
acuum cleaner market was the British firm Dyson – not clever, when her PR material, with her name on the letterhead, effectively tried to rubbish the firm. One of the company’s directors went to see Robert Fellowes about it. ‘He didn’t think it was on either but there’s a limit to what the Queen can do. I know Sophie must have got a frightful ticking off because a friend we have in common was staying somewhere and the Wessexes were also guests. My name came up and Sophie spat blood. But there’s a problem; there’s no command and control system within the family other than Prince Philip, so that tends to put people into camps.’

  Prince Edward was doing no better. He had been much criticized for trading on the family name and using his connections to make films. He made a string of royal documentaries that no other television company would have been given the access to make. His films were criticized, his company, Ardent, was losing money – almost £2 million over ten years – and he was getting flak for doing too little to support the Family Firm. In August 2001 he and Sophie announced that they were intending to concentrate on their careers and would only carry out one public engagement in the following four months. The Daily Mail noted that during that same period Princess Anne had undertaken to do 166, the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester 39 and Prince Andrew 27 – and a Labour MP called it ‘scandalous’ that they were being paid £141,000 by the taxpayer to do so little. (In fact they were not being paid by the taxpayer – since 1993 all money paid to the Queen’s children, apart from Charles, is paid by the Queen out of her income from the Duchy of Lancaster, although newspapers, like MPs, continue to inflame us all by suggesting we are paying for them.) Then there was the St Andrews fiasco, with an Ardent film crew staying on in the university town after every other journalist and film crew had left at the request of the Prince of Wales’s office, which incensed the Prince of Wales and led to a rather public and unfortunate family falling-out.