The Prince and Princess of Wales are planning to make a fresh start in a new home, after a tumultuous few years that included Queen Elizabeth II's death, the controversial departure of the Sussexes to the US, and a series of major health scares.

A Kensington Palace spokesman confirmed that William, Kate, and their children George, Charlotte and Louis will leave their current residence, Adelaide Cottage, in the grounds of Windsor Castle, and move into Forest Lodge, an eight-bedroom Grade II-listed Georgian property in Windsor Great Park.

Private home, no live-in staff

Windsor Great Park is part of the Crown Estate and is largely open to the public. Forest Lodge, in one of the private areas of the park, was built in the 1770s and acquired by the Crown in 1829. Over the years, it has been home to Edward VIII's equerry and Princess Margaret's private secretary. It's thought Sarah Ferguson wanted to move there in the 1990s after her divorce from Prince Andrew but, apparently, her request was vetoed by Prince Philip. A more recent occupant was wealthy US philanthropist and socialite Alisa Swidler, dubbed "London's most connected woman", before her sudden death in 2019.

The house is said to be worth up to £16 million. Its eight bedrooms and six bathrooms spread across three floors, and there's a ballroom and a tennis court. In 2001, it underwent a £1.5 million restoration before being put on the rental market. But a planning application approved earlier this year suggests further work will be done before the Wales' moves in.

William and Kate are paying for the rent and the move themselves "at no extra cost to the taxpayer", said The Sun. They are also footing the renovation costs, unlike Harry and Meghan who "splashed £2.4 million of taxpayers' money" on doing up Frogmore Cottage before decamping to the US.

The family will continue not to have any live-in staff as they focus on creating as private a family home as possible. The house is only a few miles from Lambrook, the private prep school attended by all three children.

William and Kate's desire for privacy has had consequences for other residents of Windsor Great Park, however. "Earlier this summer, two separate families who lived in cottages next to the country mansion were asked to vacate their properties," said The Mail on Sunday. The families were said to have been "surprised" at being asked to leave but "no evictions orders were served" and "the tenants have moved to similar or better housing elsewhere" in the the 4,800-acre park.

'String of challenges'

According to insiders, "the royal couple see this as a move for the long-term and view Forest Lodge as their forever home", said the BBC.

It therefore "appears unlikely", said the Mail on Sunday, that William and his family will ever live in the 775-room Buckingham Palace, official home to the British monarch since 1837, "raising the possibility of it being opened up to the public and used for only major royal functions".

It also means William may "become the first monarch not to live in a palace or castle when he succeeds Charles as King".

The Wales' have lived in the four-bedroomed Adelaide Cottage since 2022, when they relocated from apartments at Kensington Palace. In their three years there, they have dealt with "a string of challenges", including the King's cancer diagnosis and Kate's own cancer treatment, said The Independent.

"Moving is an opportunity to leave some of the more unhappy memories behind," a royal source told the BBC. And this home, they hope, will be a place they can make some happier memories somewhere new.

The Princess of Wales has made her first official outing since her chemotherapy ended, visiting the bereaved families of the Southport stabbing victims on Thursday. Alongside Prince William, she met the relatives of six-year-old Bebe King, seven-year-old Elsie Dot Stancombe and nine-year-old Alice Dasilva Aguiar. The three girls were fatally stabbed at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class on 29 July.

She also met the emergency responders who attended the scene of the attack, hugging members of the rescue teams who "rushed to save children stabbed in the ordeal", said The Mirror.

The visit was "initially billed as a solo public engagement for the Prince", said The Telegraph, but it is "understood that just hours earlier the Princess decided to join him". The couple were said to have felt that it was important to "show the community that it has not been forgotten and that they will continue to offer their support".

During the meeting with first responders, the Princess told the fire crews, police officers and paramedics that attended the scene on the "traumatic day" that they had supported the families of the victims through their "darkest" times, reported The Mirror. "On behalf of them, thank you", she said. Later on, the Royal Foundation of the Prince and Princess of Wales made a donation to the National Police and Wellbeing service to fast track psychological and physical support for emergency responders involved in the attack.

The "royal mother-of-three has appeared in public on merely a few occasions this year as she underwent treatment for cancer", said Tatler, so this is another sign that she is "recovering well from her health battles of the past year".

The Princess of Wales has held her first official meeting since announcing the end of her cancer treatment a week ago, a milestone on her return to public life following her diagnosis with the disease earlier this year.

According to the Court Circular, which lists all official royal engagements, Catherine held a meeting at Windsor Castle yesterday afternoon with her Early Years team. The Early Years Centre is part of the Royal Foundation, of which the princess is co-patron along with her husband, and aims to improve education and care for children under five. "The palace has not issued any pictures of the meeting or shared specific details of what was discussed," said Sky News, but the project "has long been a cornerstone of the princess's charitable work".

Catherine is believed to have started carrying out some work from home, but this is "the first official meeting to appear under her name in 2024", said The Times. Health permitting, Catherine "will attend more meetings to assess the progress of her projects with the royal foundation".

The meeting is part of the princess's "carefully managed return", said the BBC, which also includes planned appearances later this year at Remembrance events in November and her annual Christmas carol concert. Catherine made limited public appearances over the summer, attending a Trooping the Colour ceremony in June and the Wimbledon men's tennis finals in July.

There is still "great caution about her health", however. In her video message last week, the princess said her "path to healing and full recovery is long and I must continue to take each day as it comes".

"I am however looking forward to being back at work and undertaking a few more public engagements in the coming months when I can," she added.

The Princess of Wales has released a new video confirming that she has completed a course of chemotherapy treatment following her cancer diagnosis.

In the three-minute message released by Kensington Palace, Catherine said this year had been an "incredibly tough" journey through "stormy waters", describing the experience as "scary and unpredictable".

The footage, filmed by videographer Will Warr and filmed in Norfolk last month, shows the Princess of Wales alongside the Prince of Wales and their three children, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis, enjoying time in nature together. Other moments show Kate on her own, wandering through a forest and driving, symbolically suggesting that "she is in control of her life", said The Telegraph. "Much of the footage is shot in an old-fashioned grainy style," reminiscent of "royal videos of old" from the late Queen's reign showing "Royal family holidays at Balmoral or on the Royal Yacht Britannia".

In the video, Catherine says she is "looking forward to being back at work and undertaking a few more public engagements in the coming months when I can". It is thought she hopes to attend the Cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday, and plans to host a Christmas carol concert at Westminster Abbey in December, said The Times.

In March, amid global speculation over her absence from public duties, Catherine announced that she had been diagnosed with an undisclosed form of cancer following abdominal surgery. The diagnosis was made public a month after King Charles revealed that he had been diagnosed with cancer. The king is still believed to be undergoing treatment. In a video statement released at the time, the princess said that it had taken time to explain the news to her children and reassure them that "I am going to be OK".

Catherine made her first public appearance following the announcement at the Trooping the Colour in June, and was also at Wimbledon for the Men's Singles finals in July, where she received a standing ovation from the crowd.

The Princess of Wales's statement about her cancer diagnosis marked the culmination of weeks of speculation about her whereabouts and well-being. 

Prior to the release of her video message last Friday, the royal rumours had become a news story in their own right, with press outlets reporting on the spread of conspiracy theories. But while social media fuelled the "Katespiracy" mania, some critics say the media must accept some of the blame.

'Co-dependent relationship' 

Kate Middleton's "continued absence" from public life sparked a "frenzy of ever more deranged internet speculation", said Mary Harrington on UnHerd. "The legacy press vacillated between fawning and the usual barely-disguised rubbernecking", and the internet, in turn, "went bananas". 

Arguably, the royal family has "embraced" a level of "symbiosis with the legacy press". Diana, Princess of Wales, "was ahead of her time in grasping" this "symbiotic nature" of the "celebrity ecosystem". Public figures have a "co-dependent relationship with their audiences", said Harrington – and if that were true in the "mass-media age, it has grown still more so in the social media one". 

But "until recently", Britain's "relatively fierce libel laws plus the threat of exclusion from the Royal Rota system controlled legacy press reporting". Now, the "globalisation and digitisation of the news cycle" has seen "wilder" coverage from US outlets "routinely" bleeding into the UK, creating a "dissonance that has fuelled digital madness". 

British tabloids "pioneered the celebri-fication of the House of Windsor", said Michael M. Grynbaum in The New York Times (NYT). Fleet Street and the royals "are a pair of British institutions whose fates and fortunes have long been intertwined". 

Yet in recent weeks, the newspapers "largely showed an unusual level of restraint". Reporters covered "the frenzy of rumours, but mostly in the guise of scolding social media users for spreading conspiracy theories". 

They did acknowledge, however, that a level of "blame" lay with the teams at Kensington Palace, who allowed "an information vacuum to develop" in the months since Middleton stepped back from public duties. 

'Impossible to pinpoint blame' 

We shouldn't "blame" the British press for "the miseries heaped" on the Princess of Wales and her family, said Hugo Rifkind in The Times. True, the newspapers "didn't help". Newsrooms could have "simply pretended" conspiracy theories were not swirling, but they were – "and it wasn't driven by us". 

Still, it's "impossible to pinpoint precisely where blame should land". A "small handful of prominent online voices" have apologised for weighing in on the story before Middleton addressed the "dirty speculation", but "it would be madness" to suggest they were "the direct cause of anything much", or that "anybody else in particular was". 

In the digital age, the "gatekeepers who once controlled the official flow of information – be it palace press secretaries or tabloid editors – are increasingly powerless against the online tide", said Grynbaum in the NYT.

"Perhaps lessons have been learnt on both sides" of this story, said Kate Strick in the London Evening Standard. Kensington Palace's communications teams "will certainly have been reminded of quite how delicate a balancing act" royal news is "in a digital age". With AI and image manipulation tools "rife", they must take "great care" and "mistakes must be avoided". 

So-called Katespiracies have "proved that no subject or person is off-limits in the digital quest for the truth", said Strick. But Middleton's "unflinching cancer reveal" is an "urgent reminder" that she has a "right to privacy" and "that perhaps limits are necessary, sometimes". 

The internet, said Lord Leveson in his 2012 report into phone hacking, "does not claim to operate by express ethical standards". "Maybe one day" it will, said Rifkind, "but I wouldn't hold your breath". Newspapers "can't fix" this issue. "Only people can."

'"Follow the science"' leads to ruin'

Bjorn Lomborg in The Wall Street Journal

"Draconian net-zero" policies to end fossil fuel use "will have costs far greater than climate change itself," says Bjorn Lomborg. A better response to global warming is focusing on "lifting the billions of people still in poverty out of it," because that will improve their lives and "make them more resilient against extreme weather." Meanwhile, governments and companies can "invest in green-energy research and development" to make "fossil-fuel alternatives" cheaper and more reliable

Read more

'The Kate Middleton mess should terrify brands on social media'

Beth Kowitt at Bloomberg

The British royal family is "essentially a massive global brand," says Beth Kowitt. It blundered into a "mess" trying to use a "carefully manufactured image" to stamp out a conspiracy theory about the health of Kate Middleton, the Princess of Wales. Kensington Palace "learned the hard way what every big company brand should already know: If you're going to play on social media and court an engaged and active audience, you better know what you're doing."

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'What abortion rights have to do with voting rights'

Melissa Gira Grant in The New Republic

"Attacks on democracy and attacks on bodily autonomy are more closely connected than some might imagine," says Melissa Gira Grant. They're both part of what a new report from the Movement Advancement Project calls a wave of attacks on education, health care access, recognition of people's identities, freedom of speech and other rights with the common goals of "mainstreaming exclusion and undermining democracy." To defend democracy, you have to start by defending people.

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'Trump's TikTok flip raises concerns over billionaire clout'

Brendan Bordelon in Politico

Donald Trump's flip on TikTok was "part of a pattern," says Brendan Bordelon. During his presidency, Trump tried to ban the Chinese-owned short-video social media app over concerns Beijing could use it to threaten U.S. national security. But, as he has done before, Trump changed course after lobbying by a GOP donor, this time one with a huge stake in TikTok's owner, ByteDance. This shows Trump supports "whatever policy will best serve his billionaire backers."

Read more

What happened?

Britain's royal family posted a Mother's Day photo of Catherine, Princess of Wales, and her children, the first official image of the former Kate Middleton since she was hospitalized for abdominal surgery in January. The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse, Reuters and Getty news agencies retracted the photo with "kill" notices Sunday night.

Who said what?

A caption attributed to Kate thanked people for their "kind wishes and continued support" since January. "It appears that the source has manipulated the image" in violation of editorial standards, AP said.

The commentary

The photo was "meant to dampen" the "storm of rumors and conspiracy theories" whirling around Kate, who has not appeared in public since Christmas, The New York Times said. Instead, it is "damaging for the royals," said former BBC royal correspondent Peter Hunt. "People will now question whether they can be trusted and believed when they next issue a health update" on Kate.

What next?

Kensington Palace has said Kate will not resume public duties until March 31, and it will provide only "significant updates" on her health.

The Princess of Wales will remain in hospital for up to two weeks following successful abdominal surgery, while King Charles will be admitted to hospital next week to receive treatment for an enlarged prostate.

Kate Middleton attended a private clinic in London for planned surgery on Tuesday and is recovering well, Kensington Palace said. It is unclear what the surgery was for, but it is "understood not to be cancerous", said the Daily Mail.

The 42-year-old's admission was not due to a "sudden development", said The Telegraph. "As recently as the end of last week" her aides had been "planning engagements" and had "appeared to expect the forthcoming tours to go ahead". Two overseas trips have been postponed, while Prince William has also cancelled upcoming engagements as he remains "committed to caring for her".

Meanwhile, Buckingham Palace announced – just 90 minutes after Kensington Palace had put out its statement – that the King would be required to attend hospital for his own procedure. The timing of the revelations is "understood to have been an unavoidable coincidence", The Telegraph reported.

The King, 75, has also postponed some engagements "on his doctor's advice", said The Sun, as he prepares for surgery on an enlarged prostate that should require an overnight stay in hospital. Unlike the Princess of Wales's condition, which has been kept under wraps so far, the King wanted to "share the details of his treatment to encourage other men to go for checks" if they were experiencing symptoms, the paper said.

The King was staying "at his private home" on the Balmoral estate when he received his diagnosis, reported the Daily Mail, but it is unclear whether he will remain in Scotland for the treatment or return to London.

A new book that promises to make the royal family feel "ashamed" may prevent a "thawing in relations" between the King and Prince Harry, experts warn. 

In "Endgame: Inside the Royal Family and the Monarchy's Fight for Survival", Omid Scobie, who is "famous for writing about Harry and Meghan", makes a number of "highly controversial allegations" about the royals, said The Telegraph.

These days, "warts-and-all tell-alls seem to be as integral to the Windsor brand as weddings, jubilees and blockbuster funerals", said The New York Times. But what is in this book and what has the reaction been?

The background

Scobie is one of the UK's most prominent commentators on the royal family, and has taken a particular interest in the lives and thoughts of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.

In 2020, Scobie co-authored a book about the couple with US journalist Carolyn Durand. "Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family" sold more than 31,000 copies in the UK in its first five days on the shelves.

"In revealing the depth of the divide that developed between William and Harry after Meghan came on the scene, it cemented Scobie in many people's eyes as Meghan's cheerleader, crusader and chum," said The Sunday Times.

The latest

His new book promises to be as explosive as its predecessor. "Tone-deaf, racist and financially reckless” are three charges "hurled" by Scobie at the monarchy, said The New York Times. 

Scobie writes that "when Queen Elizabeth II was at the helm she managed to keep much of it at bay". But the new King "comes in for a walloping", with allegations that  Charles is "often envious" of his sons' popularity. 

The book is equally critical of Prince William, who is portrayed as "snapping at Charles' heels" as the "ambitious" prince eyes the throne, said The Independent. The heir apparent is cast as a "hot-headed" company man who is "increasingly comfortable with the Palace's dirty tricks and the courtiers who dream them up".

Scobie claims that Harry was "left completely by himself" after the Queen's death. Meanwhile, the Princess of Wales considered her future sister-in-law Meghan a "rival" from the moment she appeared on the scene in 2016, according to Scobie.

Indeed, the book "rips into every member of the royal family – apart from a certain couple in California", said The Sunday Times. Harry and Meghan have denied any connection to "Endgame". Asked by the paper if Meghan contributed to the book, Scobie replied: "No, and I'm not her friend." But he admitted that he does share "mutual friends" with the duchess – something he says "helps with getting information and breaking details" about the royal family.

The reaction

Readers "hoping for a final death blow of gossip will be disappointed", said The New York Times, because "we've heard much of it before". But the book is "crammed with gripping gems about the bilious backbiting among the royal family" and is a "pacey, well-written account of where the modern monarchy could be heading if it doesn't adapt and appeal to a new generation".

Experts said that the new biography is "threatening a potential thawing in relations between the King and his youngest son", the Daily Mailreported. The royal family is in for a "bumpy ride", said Honey.

Buckingham Palace has declined to comment on the extracts from Scobie's book. Nevertheless, said the BBC, the royal family "continues to provide inspiration for authors, book editors and television commissioners", so we can expect plenty more. 

For "royal critics, fans and observers alike", it's "not going to be a quiet week", said Deadline.

The Princess of Wales has hired a PR guru known for her “straight talking” to “shake things up a bit” after the turmoil that followed the publication of Prince Harry’s autobiography.

Alison Corfield, a “brand management expert”, replaces Hannah Cockburn-Logie, a former diplomat with the Foreign Office, with Kate having “actively sought out a ‘different kind of courtier’” for the private secretary role, according to The Telegraph.

Corfield, 51, is “‘loud’, ‘persuasive’ and ‘straight talking’”, a source told the paper, and is expected to “shake things up a bit”. The princess is seeking to “step up her public work” and have it “make more of an impact”.

The position of private secretary is “a vital role within any royal household” and is a “ varied and important” job, said Tatler. Responsibilities include the “smooth-running of the princess’s day” including tasks like “event briefings; overseeing the scheduling of engagements; or co-ordinating social media output”.

Who is Alison Corfield?

Corfield grew up in Croydon, south London, and unlike many royal appointments, she “doesn’t have a background in the civil service”, wrote Tatler. She began her career working as cabin crew at Virgin Atlantic in 1993, before taking on numerous roles within Virgin. She worked her way up at the British company to eventually become brand director of Virgin Media in 2005.

Since leaving Virgin in 2006, she has become “no stranger to working for high profile people”, said the Evening Standard. Most notably, she is “credited with masterminding Jamie Oliver’s childhood obesity and free school meals campaigns”, added Tatler, which will “will no doubt prove valuable experience” when working on the Princess of Wales’s charitable endeavours.

As well as Oliver, the mum of three has worked with Irish chef Clodagh McKenna, as well as Labour MP Stella Creasy, “on her campaign to recruit more mothers as Labour parliamentary candidates”, according to the Daily Mail.

Corfield is known as a “ball-breaker, a real straight-talker, very passionate, dynamic and genuinely funny”, a source told The Sunday Times. “She makes things happen and will really push things forward at the palace.”

Why has she been hired?

Corfield replaces Hannah Cockburn-Logie, who held the role for two and a half years and was often described as Kate’s “right-hand woman”, said Hello!.

The hiring of Corfield is a “highly significant gear change from what has gone before”, said The Telegraph, and she’ll be charged with taking “Brand Kate to the next level” as well as taking on the “the task of besting Meghan Markle”.

Since the publication of Prince Harry’s book Spare, the Princess of Wales has “rarely been out of the public eye” while the Duchess of Sussex, “who has unquestionably become her nemesis, has retreated to the shadows”, the paper said.

The princess unveiled her “life’s work” last week, launching a charitable initiative called Shaping Us, aimed at “shining a spotlight on the critical importance of early childhood”, said the Mail.

It is thought that Corfield will spearhead this campaign and turn it into the “sort of brand that will outlive the Princess” and make it “part of the national psyche”, like the Duke of Edinburgh awards and the Invictus Games, said The Telegraph.

The new initiative and the hiring of Corfield is a clear sign the Princess of Wales “is redefining herself now that she has this new role”, a source told the paper. And now she has a “greater platform”, she needs “the right team to deliver for her”.

A trailer for the new Netflix documentary Harry & Meghan has added a new twist to the royal saga between Princes Harry and William.

The series, which comprises six episodes and is rated 15, will tell the inside story of why the couple decided to step down from royal duties. Although the show has no official release date, the teaser trailer itself revealed a series of previously unseen photographs as well as footage of Meghan wiping away tears.

‘Declaration of war’

The trailer’s release “could hardly have been timed for more explosive impact”, said Louis Chilton in The Independent. The appetiser for the “unprecedented new documentary” comes “just a day after the late Queen’s lady-in-waiting, Lady Susan Hussey, resigned from the palace over a racism scandal”.

And it was only last year that the Duchess of Sussex told Oprah Winfrey in a two-hour TV interview that when she was pregnant with her first child Archie there had been “concerns and conversations” among unnamed members of the royal family “about how dark his skin might be when he was born”.

Dan Wootton, writing for Mail Online, described the 59-second “vile” Netflix trailer as a declaration of “all out war on the British Royal Family”.

Wootton also focused on the timing of the release, but instead claimed it was “specifically designed to derail William and Kate’s already troubled US tour”, the Prince and Princess of Wales having arrived in Boston on Wednesday for a three-day trip centred around William’s Earthshot Prize climate charity.

“It’s confirmation that, despite the hopes of a grieving King Charles, the relationship with his youngest son and daughter-in-law is now forever smashed,” Wootton continued. He added that “there’s no going back after this full-throttled attack on the British monarchy” and called on the King to “go nuclear too by stripping his son and his wife of their royal titles”.

Writing in The Times, Hilary Rose agreed with Wootton, sarcastically declaring the timing of the trailer release a “happy, scene-stealing coincidence”. Rose believes the Sussexes, while their true motivation is anyone’s guess, are attempting to “suck the oxygen out of every single thing the Waleses do between now and kingdom come”. She even admitted to feeling sorry for William and Kate despite their “lives of unimaginable wealth and privilege” for what William’s brother and his Hollywood wife are putting them through.

‘Winning the battle but losing the war’

“What were you both thinking?!” asked Paul Baldwin of the Sussexes in the Daily Express. Baldwin said that before the trailer’s release and in light of the Lady Hussey racism scandal, he had started to think that maybe Harry and Meghan “really were victims”. However, his sympathies have since waned with the release of what he described as a “toe-curling, truly bizarre promo-video”.

In the Daily Mail, Maureen Callahan concluded that while “Harry and Meghan are winning the battle” they are certainly “going to lose this war”. Callahan added that “it’s as if Harry and Meghan have nothing better to do than go through the royal schedule and figure out ways to screw the family over”.

In her conclusion, Callahan asserted that ultimately “these two have nothing new to say”. The couple will not win the attrition war they’re fighting with the royal family because “they exist only in opposition to the royals. They have nothing to offer.”

While criticism of the Sussexes was plentiful across the mainstream media, the New York Post did highlight some support for Harry and Meghan, citing a tweet that argued “imagine being right that staff in the royal household are racist but no-one believed you”, in reference to the widely criticised comments from Lady Hussey.

The Prince and Princess of Wales visited the nation for the first time since being given their new titles – but a petition calling to end the use of the title has won tens of thousands of signatures.

The Times reported that the royal couple were given a “warm” welcome in Holyhead on Tuesday as they visited a lifeboat station. William revealed during the day that he needs to brush up on his Welsh language skills and reminisced about time spent nearby on Anglesey, where he and his wife lived for three years after their marriage in 2011.

Despite the welcome, a petition calling for the title of Prince of Wales to be scrapped “out of respect for Wales” has been gathering pace, gaining over 35,000 signatures over the past three weeks.

It argues that the title has “been held exclusively by Englishmen as a symbol of dominance over Wales” and those that have been given the title “have no genuine connection to our country”.

Why is it controversial?

The title of Prince of Wales has long been a controversial one. King Charles himself – who held the title from the age of nine until his ascension to the throne – faced “violent protests” and even a bomb plot co-ordinated by a Welsh paramilitary group at the time of his official investiture ceremony at Caernarfon Castle in 1969, said Nation Cymru.

The dispute has its roots way back in history, to when the last Welsh prince of Wales, Dafydd ap Gruffydd, was “brutally killed” on the orders of Edward I of England in 1283, according to Wales Online. Edward I then went on to make his 16-year-old son, the future Edward II, the first English Prince of Wales in 1301.

The title has since been conferred by English, and then British, monarchs on their heirs – although there have been long periods in history where the title fell out of use. The most recent person to hold the title of Prince of Wales before Charles was Prince Edward, who went on to become King Edward VIII and then the Duke of Windsor after his 1936 abdication.

The petition claims that the use of the title “remains an insult to Wales and is a symbol of historical oppression”. It implies that “Wales is still a principality” thereby “undermining Wales’ status as a nation and a country”.

“In addition, the title has absolutely no constitutional role for Wales, which is now a devolved country with a national Parliament,” the petition adds.

Does the title have a future?

The title of Prince of Wales is not one which is automatically inherited – King Charles declared William, his eldest son, the Prince of Wales during his first speech as monarch after the death of the Queen. Catherine also became Princess of Wales, the first time the title has been used since the death of Princess Diana in 1997.

Kensington Palace said yesterday that there were no plans for Prince William to have a formal investiture ceremony “anything like his father had”.

Charles himself waited 11 years for the formal ceremony to take place after he was officially made the Prince of Wales by the Queen as a child in 1958; his investiture did not take place until 1969.

Lord Elis-Thomas, a former speaker of the Senedd, “revealed earlier this month that he had once told Prince Charles, as he was then, that he hoped there would never again be an investiture at Caernarfon Castle”, reported The Telegraph.

Elis-Thomas claimed Charles had laughed and replied: “Do you think I want to put William through what I went through?”

The paper added that the tradition of a formal investiture ceremony at Caernarfon Castle was only revived in 1911, when George V gave the title to his son, Edward. Before then, the ceremony had not taken place at the castle “for several hundred years”.

The Prince Andrew scandal is threatening to bring down the monarchy, unless drastic action is taken to quarantine him from the rest of the royal family.

That is the view of commentators and royal watchers from across the political spectrum after new revelations concerning his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. A newly released email – dated 28 February 2011 and containing the message “we are in this together” – appears to directly contradict claims made by the prince in his now infamous “Newsnight” interview with Emily Maitlis that he severed all ties with the disgraced financier in 2010.

The BBC said the allegations were “intensely damaging” for the Duke of York, “but perhaps still more significant are the consequences of this never-ending saga on the image of the monarchy”, said Richard Kay in the Daily Mail.

“Every good deed” carried out by the royals in recent years “risks being drowned out by the relentless wave of the Andrew scandal”. It “corrodes public support for the royals and emboldens republican voices, which gleefully seize on every indiscretion to scorn the House of Windsor’s credibility”.

Many question whether the institution is fit for the 21st century and what value it brings. Here are the arguments for and against keeping the centuries-old institution.

Pro: popular with public

The monarchy as a whole “has long enjoyed broad, albeit declining, support among Britons, even if several of its individual members have not”, said Time magazine.

Just over half (51%) of people in Britain believe that it is “very” or "quite important" for Britain to have a monarchy, according to the most recent British Social Attitudes survey, conducted by the National Centre for Social Research in 2024. This is a dramatic decline from 86% in 1983, but it’s worth noting that only 15% of those surveyed actually think the monarchy should be abolished entirely.

While there is overall positivity towards the monarchy across most age groups, “there is a sharp generational divide”, said the BBC. According to a new poll on Statista, 81% of 65-year-olds want the monarchy to continue but the younger the person polled, the more likely they are to want to replace the King with an elected head of state, a majority view among 18- to 24-year-olds.

“Modern monarchy no longer depends on divine grace, but the consent of the people,” said Robert Hazell, professor of government and the constitution at University College London, in a 2022 paper for the Institute for Government. He warned that if public support continues to decline, the government might come under pressure to reduce funding for the royals, as has happened in Spain.

Con: cost to taxpayers

The monarchy is supported financially by UK taxpayers via the Sovereign Grant, which covers central staffing costs and expenses for the monarch’s official households, maintenance of the royal palaces in England, and travel and royal engagements and visits.

Accounts for 2024/25 show that the Sovereign Grant that financial year remained at £86.3 million. Yet the “real cost” to taxpayers is nearly six times more, said anti-monarchy campaigners.

Republic, which calls for the abolition of the monarchy, claims the official figure does not account for security, and other "lost income" for taxpayers, including from property businesses controlled by the duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall, which go directly to the King and the Prince of Wales respectively. Republic says the royals' total annual bill is in fact £510 million. "How can we talk about cutting the winter fuel allowance while wasting half a billion pounds on the royals?" Republic's chief executive, Graham Smith, told the BBC last September.

The question of whether the monarchy continues to offer value for money is one that – like positivity towards it in general – divides along generational lines. According to YouGov polling in 2024, 75% of the over-65s believe they do, but only 34% of 18 to 24-year-olds feel the same.

Pro: 'soft' power benefits UK

Like his mother before him, the King is a source of British "soft power" and diplomatic influence, holding state visits and foreign tours that bring benefits for national security, influence and trade.

A 2017 report by consultancy agency Brand Finance said that the monarchy generated an estimated £150 million worth of trade for the UK each year. And combined with contributions including surplus revenues from the Crown Estate, which go to the Treasury, and money from tourism, the total estimated gain for the UK economy was almost £1.8 billion.

"Measuring the wealth-generation of a brand is no easy task, especially when it comes to the royal family," said Sebastian Shehadi at Investment Monitor, but their influence on the UK economy "spans the likes of trade, tourism, media, real estate and heritage sites, foreign investment and much more".

Con: no place in equal society

Critics of the monarchy argue that having a system of hereditary power at the top of the country's political, military and religious institutions perpetuates class divisions and inequality.

The royal family "exist as a glaring symbol of the unearned privilege and inequality that pervades the roots of British society", said political journalist and author Eve Livingston in The Independent.

And it is not just in Britain that the monarch’s role as head of state is increasingly under scrutiny. The late Queen's reign was "bookended by periods of great uncertainty about Britain’s role on the world stage", said Foreign Policy. She "was crowned in 1953 as the sun was beginning to set on the British Empire" and her death came "as the country reexamines its place in the world". There are increasing calls for the UK to "reckon with its colonial history", while republican sentiment is gaining traction in the Caribbean.

Pro: boosts national unity

Supporters of a constitutional monarchy say it "represents a constant and lasting connection to the country's past" and they stress the importance of having a head of state who is "above party politics or factional interests", said Politics.co.uk. This neutrality means "the Crown can help secure smooth and peaceful handovers of political power and restrain abuses of authority", said The Telegraph.

The royal family's official website said that the monarch provides "a focus for national identity, unity and pride; gives a sense of stability and continuity; officially recognises success and excellence; and supports the ideal of voluntary service".

The Queen’s seven decades on the throne was "a low-key but extremely effective unifying force", said Martin Kettle in The Guardian, but it was one "her heirs cannot assume they will be able to replicate".

Con: undemocratic

Republic and other anti-monarchists argue that "hereditary public office goes against every democratic principle". The public cannot hold the royal family to account at the ballot box, so "there's nothing to stop them abusing their privilege, misusing their influence or simply wasting our money". The monarch should be replaced with an elected head of state.

In reality, the king or queen "can only ever act in the interests of the government of the day and does not represent ordinary voters", say campaigners. Therefore, "the monarchy is a broken institution" that should be scrapped in favour of an elected head of state who "could really represent our hopes and aspirations – and help us keep politicians in check".

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are reportedly set to snub the Cambridges during a planned visit to the UK next month.

A spokesperson for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle said the couple would attend charity events in Manchester and London, as well as popping over to Germany, during their first trip back since the Platinum Jubilee celebrations in early June.

Following the announcement, The Daily Mirror’s royal editor Russell Myers said that the California-based couple were “in line for a dramatic reunion” with Prince William and Kate Middleton. But according to The Telegraph’s royal correspondent Victoria Ward, despite speculation that Harry “might take the opportunity to reconcile with his brother, with whom tensions remain”, the Sussexes “have no plans” for a catch-up.

Although the two couples are expected to be staying “just a stone’s throw” from each other on the Windsor estate, “there is no current expectation that they will meet”, Ward reported.

The two brothers are not believed to have spoken face-to-face since last summer, when they unveiled a statue of their mother, Diana, at Kensington Palace. Harry and Meghan have returned to the UK only twice since quitting their royal roles and moving to the US more than two years ago.

The Sun reported last month that the Queen had invited them to join her at the Balmoral estate in Scotland. An insider told the paper that “staff have been told to expect the full list of royals including Harry, Meghan and their children Archie and Lilibet”.

But celebrity news site Page Six said the claims had been denied by “multiple sources close to the couple”.

The September visit is being planned at a particularly tense time for the Royal Family, as Harry prepares to publish a “tell-all memoir” later this year.

The Cambridge children are anything but camera shy, but Princess Charlotte can give her brothers a run for their money in the photo-op stakes.

During a “surprise” appearance with her parents at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham this week, “cheeky” Charlotte amused onlookers by pulling a “variety of funny faces” and “rolling her eyes following a comment from her father” as they watched swimmers compete, said LBC.

The seven-year-old was “clearly in her element”, said Women & Home, and is “just as cheeky as her dad at the same age”.

Charlotte has also been compared to her late grandmother Princess Diana. Body language expert Judi James told the Daily Express that like Diana, the young princess “gives the initial impression of shyness but beneath that appears to be an outgoing, fun personality”.

“She grins, she grimaces, she pouts,” said The Times, which concluded that Charlotte “is a royal photographer’s delight”.

Here are some of the most memorable snaps of her playing up to the cameras.

Charlotte’s Commonwealth Games visit was her first public appearance with her parents without either of her brothers, four-year-old Louis and nine-year-old George. The princess looked “curious and, occassionally, a little apprehensive” as the crowd cheered on competitors in the 1,500m freestyle race, said The Times.

Charlotte and her brothers didn’t seem to enjoy the Trooping The Colour quite as much as the crowds along The Mall in London during her great grandmother’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations in June.

And Charlotte wasn’t a big fan back in 2019 either, when she stood with her family on Buckingham Palace’s balcony on the Queen’s 93rd birthday.

The princess stole the show once again at the inaugural King’s Cup regatta, hosted by her parents on the Isle of Wight in August 2019. Charlotte was reportedly sticking her tongue out at her grandfather Michael Middleton.

Charlotte has repeatedly been snapped sticking out her tongue, including during celebrations in July 2018 of the centenary of the Royal Air Force. The then three-year-old struck her signature pose while peeking through a Buckingham Palace alongside Prince George as a royal aide looked on.

Charlotte had “showed off her sunny personality” weeks earlier by “entertaining” her family “with quite the gymnastics display” during a day out at the Maserati Royal Charity Polo Trophy at the Beaufort Polo Club in Gloucestershire, said Hello! magazine.

At just 16 months old, Charlotte was already accepting flowers from well-wishers like a true royal pro – including a balloon version made by a magician at a children’s party for military families during the Cambridge’s Royal Tour to Canada.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are set to move into Adelaide Cottage, a “modest” property ten minutes’ walk from the Queen’s new official residence, Windsor Castle, according to reports.

In March this year, the Queen made the historic castle, founded by William the Conqueror in the 11th century, her permanent home and official residence. In the past, she tended to use Windsor Castle only at weekends or during Easter and Royal Ascot week, with Buckingham Palace being her official home.

The monarch appears to have started a trend. Prince William and Kate Middleton are now set to relocate to Windsor, along with their three children: George, nine, Charlotte, seven, and Louis, four, in the “coming two or three weeks”, said The Telegraph.

While life at Kensington Palace “has often been likened to living in a goldfish bowl”, Adelaide Cottage will provide the family with “much more scope for horse riding, walking the family dog and playing away from prying eyes”.

The four-bedroom home needs “no extra taxpayer-funded security or costly refurb”, according to The Sun, and the move means that their three children will be able to start school in the area in the autumn.

According to the Daily Mail royal correspondent Rebecca English, the Cambridges have been planning a move to Berkshire since 2021 and “have enrolled Prince George in a new school there, where he is expected to be joined this September by his siblings”.

Along with being near the Queen, Adelaide Cottage is also closer to Kate’s parents, Michael and Carole Middleton, who have lived for a decade in Bucklebury Manor, a seven-bedroom Grade II-listed Georgian property which is also in Berkshire.

‘Grace and favour’ residence

Built in 1831 as a retreat for William IV’s wife, Queen Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, the Grade-II listed Adelaide Cottage is the Cambridges’ “best and only option”, a royal insider revealed to The Sun’s royal correspondent Matt Wilkinson. The property is thought to have been refurbished as recently as 2015, and is located in the 4,800-acre Windsor Great Park.

Over the years, Adelaide Cottage has been used as a “grace and favour” residence for royal friends including Peter Townsend, the Battle of Britain pilot and equerry to King George VI who became the divorced lover of the Queen’s sister, Princess Margaret, between 1944 and 1952.

Princess Margaret reportedly spent “many Sunday visits” at the residence while Townsend lived there with his first wife, Rosemary. The princess "played with the children on the lawn and Peter Townsend, off duty, sat back in a deckchair”, according to a 1950 newspaper report, republished The Sun.

It was “also known to be a favourite home of Queen Victoria”, said the Daily Mail, and she “frequently enjoyed taking her breakfast there”.

The property most recently hosted Simon Rhodes, son of the Queen’s cousin and best friend Margaret Rhodes, who died in 2016, said English in the Daily Mail. It is thought to boast “original features including a marble Graeco-Egyptian fireplace and a principal bedroom with a coved ceiling featuring gilded dolphins”.

Along with being used for royal friends, the cottage was famously favoured by Queen Victoria, “who would often have tea or breakfast in this quaint location”, said Women and Home magazine.

The house is “much smaller” than the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s other two homes, said Hello! magazine. Anmer Hall boasts ten bedrooms while their Kensington Palace apartment “also features living quarters for staff”.

Fort Belvedere and Frogmore House, both in Windsor, have also been slated as potential new homes for the Cambridges, but it was thought that the latter would “require significant renovations to become a suitable home”.

The Cambridges are reportedly “very keen for a modest home” when they move to Windsor, a source told The Sun. The pair believe that Adelaide Cottage “fits the bill because it is a four-bedroom home and they do not need any more as they have no live-in staff”.

They are “adamant they didn’t want anything too showy or anything that needed renovating or extra security so as not to be a burden on the taxpayer”, a source told the paper. “The added bonus is they can send George, Charlotte and Louis to school together locally. The three children will enjoy running around and playing in the gardens, which is the kind of life they enjoy so much when at Anmer Hall.”

A ‘new era’

As the family “continue to cement their place among the most influential members of The Firm”, said the Daily Mail, the move will “usher in a new era for the Cambridge clan”, said The Telegraph. The three children will “no longer have their nanny, Maria Borrallo, “on hand 24/7”, making the move to Windsor a “significant change”.

Borrallo, a Spanish Norland nanny, “has been a regular fixture at the family’s side” since she was first hired in 2014. She will remain in full-time employment with the Cambridges, but will “live elsewhere” along with a “handful of other support staff”.

The move “is in keeping” with the wishes of Princess Diana, William’s late mother, “who is said to have strived for a ‘normal life’ for him and his brother”, said the Mail.

Kate’s uncle, Gary Goldsmith, told The Sun this month that she and William would have their “hands full this summer”, as they prepare for the move, but said he believed they “are ready for the next chapter in their lives”. A source told The Mirror that the couple are “extremely excited” about relocating.

Prince William has defended the right of any country to become a republic after returning from a turbulent eight-day tour of the Caribbean with Kate Middleton.

Following what The Mirror described as “a series of PR disasters” during the “tone-deaf” trip to Belize, Jamaica and the Bahamas, the Duke of Cambridge insisted that he was not interested in “telling people what to do”. The tour had “brought into even sharper focus questions about the past and the future”, and the path ahead for the Commonwealth countries was “for the people to decide upon”, he said in a series of posts on the Cambridges’ official Twitter account.

Sources said the duke had done “a lot of thinking” about what kind of king he wanted to be, according to The Telegraph. Although he recognised that the Royal Family’s “long-held mantra of ‘never complain, never explain’ had proved effective for decades”, the paper reported, William was “also keen to have his own voice”.

‘The Cambridge way’

The question of how much power a constitutional monarch should exercise appears to have been on William’s mind for some time. In 2016, he told the BBC’s royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell that the issue “occupies a lot of my thinking space”.

It was essential that the Royal Family “stay relevant”, a challenge that he would face as king, said William, who is second in line to the throne after his father, Prince Charles. While the Queen had set an “extraordinary example” during her reign, William said, he would pursue his own “vision” for the role of head of state.

The Caribbean tour has now strengthened his resolve, according to reports. William is said to have held emergency talks with senior aides as criticism mounted.

A source told The Sun that the Cambridges were “bruised” by allegations that their visit “harked back to the colonial age”.

“In future they will rip up the rule-book and do things ‘the Cambridge way’,” the source said. “They’re trying to work out what that will look like.

“It is not a criticism of how it was done in the past. But times are changing.”

An insider told the Daily Mail that William believed that “if the monarchy has something to say then it should say it”. He was said to “respect” the approach favoured by monarch grandmother and father, Prince Charles, but believed the Royals needed to be “agile” to survive and thrive.

‘People’s King’

US Weekly reported last month that William had “high ambitions to be known as the People’s King”. A source claimed that along with his father, William had made “the big decision [of] making and creating a slimmed-down monarchy” that was more relatable to the public.

“The way William and Charles see it, less people means less drama,” the insider said.

And “proving he has his own methods”, said The Sun, “William plans to have around 70 fewer aides when he succeeds Charles as Prince of Wales”.

“He will instead nearly halve the estimated 137 staff his dad relies on to create a more cost-effective and less formal team,” the paper continued.

The Cambridges “will also employ a small staff working on ‘comfortable and credible’ good causes – five or six in total”. Fewer staff will mean “shorter, solo trips” too, along the lines of the duchess’s recent trip to Denmark.

“William and Kate will modernise how they work,” said The Sun’s source. “It’s a breath of fresh air.”

1. It’ll take a radical plan to save the royals now

Clare Foges at The Times

on looking ahead

Seeing Prince William and Kate Middleton in the Caribbean, “waving at locals from an open-top Land Rover… we were catapulted back almost a century”, says Clare Foges at The Times. “Poor William and Kate. They are plainly decent, charming people but they looked like relics. The trip’s PR failures will have been gratifying for those who long to abolish the monarchy”, but not this writer. Foges loves “the pomp and flummery”. But “even” she “can sense – sadly – that people are tiring of this stuff”. Attitudes “are shifting fast”, and though “respect for Her Majesty the Queen has seen off threats to the monarchy for decades… alas, she is not immortal”. Foges says: “Republicans are sharpening their guillotines” as Prince Charles prepares to take the throne. And she thinks that “to secure the monarchy for another century” in the “public’s affections”, the royal family “should leap several steps ahead” of public opinion. “The new king will need to out-revolutionise the revolutionaries”. “Radical reform” is what this writer thinks is needed.

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2. Will Smith’s unbelievable Oscars moment was straight out of Hollywood

Andrew Buncombe at The Independent

on acting or anger?

Twenty years ago, Will Smith was nominated for an Oscar for his portrayal of Muhammad Ali in the film Ali “partly because of his ability to know how to throw a punch”, writes Andrew Buncombe at The Independent. “The ring scenes looked convincing, as did the training regimen. But we all knew it was acting.” That, Buncombe says, is “what everybody thought when Smith walked up to comedian and presenter Chris Rock and took a swing at his face. Hollywood! Ha! What jokers!” But then “the sound was cut” and the actor returned to his seat “looking very, very angry indeed. If he was acting, he was doing a good job.” TV audiences “reached for their phones. What was that? Was that real?” The end of the drama “was literally crafted in Hollywood”. Smith returned to the stage, “this time accepting the award for Best Actor”. As he gave his speech, “his face streaked with tears”. In that moment, “it seemed pretty certain that Smith was not acting”.

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3. Why the UK can’t rely on boosters to get through each new wave of Covid

Danny Altmann at The Guardian

on a fragile situation

Covid-19 vaccines have greatly reduced the likelihood of hospitalisation or death from the virus, but “viral evolution had plenty more to throw at us”, writes professor of immunology Danny Altmann at The Guardian. “The onslaught of highly immune-evasive variants was”, for many experts, “unforeseen”. “Having started out brilliantly, the real-life state of play today is self-evidently suboptimal.” Despite having one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, the UK faces an “unhappy equilibrium” of “more than 300,000 new cases a day… with hospital admissions and excess deaths holding steady at a new – high – setpoint”. Now we face “a precarious truce imposed through frequent mRNA boosters to keep the viral caseload ‘manageable’. But there are signs this isn’t sustainable.” Recent surges in Hong Kong, Denmark and Scotland “emphasise the fragility” of the situation. The pandemic “is very much with us and evolving dynamically, with a long, bumpy road ahead”, says Altmann. “The option to sleepwalk through this… is one we adopt at our peril”.

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4. Beware a phony peace in Ukraine

Thomas D. Grant at The Wall Street Journal

on endgames

“Russia’s war against Ukraine is failing,” writes Thomas D. Grant at The Wall Street Journal. “But serious dangers remain” and “among them are ‘peace’ terms that, like those Russia imposed on past victims of its aggression, would set up Ukraine – and others – for bloodshed in years to come.” Vladimir Putin “is likely to propose terms that look like concessions but are calculated to hobble Ukraine and threaten security far beyond its borders”, writes the senior security adviser. Ceasefire terms have “deliberately debilitated” countries that Russia has previously attacked “by entrenching proxies on each country’s territory and stipulating ‘peace processes’ that Moscow used not to pursue peace, but to prevent countries from stabilising or escaping Russia’s shadow”. It seems Putin hopes to “gain lasting ground from his botched invasion” in the same vein, but “tolerating such an outcome in Ukraine would be a mistake”. “If the world wants peace,” says Grant, “then it shouldn’t impose a settlement on Ukraine that ignores lessons from places where Russia got the endgames it demanded.”

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5. Fertiliser inflation presages a global food supply crisis

Rana Foroohar at the Financial Times

on rising prices

War between Russia and Ukraine has led to rises in food and fuel prices. “This in turn has sparked concern that we may see a repeat of the famine and food riots that took place in 22 countries in the years following the global financial crisis, caused by a perfect storm of rising commodities prices,” writes Rana Foroohar at the Financial Times. US wheat farmers “should be in a good position to help buffer some of the pain” from disruptions to supply, but “they are worried about inflation of another sort – in fertiliser”. Costs “have increased far beyond the levels that agricultural simulation models would have predicted” and “farmers say price gouging is part of the problem”. There are “deafening calls for monopoly actions in the US”. Foroohar says: “Geopolitical instability will certainly lead to more ‘local for local’ production and calls for insourcing…But antitrust actions will be as much about curbing domestic players as foreign ones.” For shifts in the market to take place, we need to “fundamentally” reconsider “how we eat”.

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1. As a historian of slavery, I know just how much the royal family has to answer for in Jamaica

Trevor Burnard at The Guardian

on royal recognition

Royal tours are usually “full of cheering people lining the streets and gushy accounts of glamorous dresses”, writes Trevor Burnard at The Guardian. “There has been some of that” during Prince William and Kate Middleton’s trip to the Caribbean. “But there have also been protests, especially in Jamaica.” And, he adds: “To top it all off”, the country has reportedly “begun the process of removing the Queen as head of state”. Burnard, the University of Hull’s Wilberforce professor of slavery and emancipation, says: “Such a reckoning with Britain and its state is long overdue.” Jamaica “enriched Britain by filling the coffers of the Treasury from taxes levied on sugar and rum” in the 18th century. “Black people suffered greatly for white people’s enjoyment of sweet things”, he writes. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge “might have acknowledged” the fact that “more Africans arrived in Kingston to become plantation slaves than arrived in any other place in British empire… rather than kicking a football around and playing bongos in Trench Town”. Jamaica is today “a poor country”, and it would be a “good thing if Britain recognised its historical responsibility for creating those conditions of poverty, while benefiting from Jamaican wealth”. That recognition could “start with the royal family”.

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2. The art market cannot get enough Andy Warhol Marilyns

John Gapper at The Financial Times

on an ‘artist’s market’

“Amid the world’s problems, the top echelon of the art market is doing just fine,” writes John Gapper at the Financial Times. That’s in response to the news that an Andy Warhol silkscreen of Marilyn Monroe is expected to sell for around $200m when it goes up for auction in May. And while the auction house describes it as “an unmatched example of 20th-century art by the most important American artist”, Gapper says that’s true “up to a point: it is matched extremely closely by four other Marilyn prints” produced by Warhol in 1964. Warhol “grasped early on” that “mechanical reproduction helps to establish an artist’s market”. He was “intrigued by finance” and “multiple prints provide liquidity and price-setting benchmarks”. Gapper says that “a painting becomes a token of something more psychologically valuable – admission to a club of wealthy aesthetes… Buying a Warhol or a Jasper Johns absolves a billionaire of being a mere philistine.” Warhol was “ahead of his time in producing plenty of Marilyns, Maos and Elvises”.

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3. Biden’s Rohingya genocide declaration can’t just be empty words

Josh Rogin at The Washington Post

on stopping atrocities

This week, the US announced that Russia was committing war crimes in Ukraine – “28 days into the invasion”, says The Washington Post’s Josh Rogin. When the same government “announced on Monday that it had determined that Myanmar’s military had committed genocide against the Rohingya, it was more than five years after the violence there began”. The “close timing” of the two statements “is likely no coincidence”, writes Rogin. The Biden administration “wants to signal that the Ukraine crisis hasn’t completely consumed its foreign policy bandwidth”. Of course, “the Ukraine crisis and the Myanmar situation are not the same”. Vladimir Putin’s crimes “are nowhere near the scope and scale of the Myanmar military’s broad campaigns of mass murder, mass torture, mass rape, ethnic cleansing and other horrors – at least not yet. But that’s kind of the point.” That “there have been eight genocides since the Holocaust should tell us that we are not doing enough to stop mass atrocities or hold perpetrators accountable”. If genocide is “normalized, it will imperil our greater goals of stability, security and a common humanity”.

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4. Where are all the gender neutral baby clothes?

Rose Stokes at Metro

on beyond pink and blue

Rose Stokes says it was around her 20-week scan that people started asking “about the sex of my growing baby”. Writing at Metro, she says “it makes sense”, given that’s when “expectant parents can choose to find out the genitals of their child. A lot of parents opt not to find out for a variety of reasons”, but for others, “being able to know the slightest detail about your child in gestation helps to provide some stable ground in the sea of unknowns of impending parenthood”. Stokes and her partner did find out – and her friends wanted to know too, so they could buy clothes in the “appropriate colour: pink or blue”. This writer doesn’t “subscribe to normative gender stereotypes”, and she was “shocked that in 2022, the offering of most high-street brands when it comes to baby clothes is still so antiquated”. While boys clothes “are plastered in words that inspire adventure and physical play”, girls “are offered princesses and unicorns, with words emphasising their physical beauty or fragility”. Given “all the progress” that’s been made, “how have we not all moved on from these rigid stereotypes that do real harm to absolutely everyone?” Only “a few brands” provide “more gender neutral offerings”, and this writer is opting for clothes “in a full kaleidoscope of colours”.

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5. Why everyone, even feminists, likes Mother’s Day

Melanie McDonagh at The Irish Times

on an inclusive festival

Mother’s Day “wasn’t always a thing in Ireland”, writes Melanie McDonagh at The Irish Times. “Until the 1960s it didn’t feature; by the 70s the highlight was a bunch of daffodils” and a card – a far cry from today’s “orgy of consumption”. Mothering Sunday is largely “a southern English custom”, with some early evidence from the 17th century indicating that “servants returned to their own parish church and visited their mothers” on the Sunday midway through Lent. Today’s “full-blown, commercial, sentimental festival” owes “everything to Anna Jarvis of Philadelphia”, who campaigned for a day to “honour all mothers; the first was held in the US in 1908”. McDonagh says: “It took next to no time for US florists, confectioners and greeting-card manufacturers to realise the commercial possibilities” of the occasion – something Jarvis later “revolted at”. “What’s interesting” about Mothering Sunday today “is that it has survived despite being a celebration of the most traditional aspect of women’s identity: being a mother”. This writer says it’s “probably the most inclusive” of festivals in the calendar, “since everyone had or has a mother”.

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The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have faced a mixed reaction at the start of their “charm offensive” in the Caribbean.

The royal couple were greeted by a guard of honour from the Belize Defence Force as they landed at Belize City’s airport. The prime minister, Johnny Briceño, told the couple: “We’re so happy you’re here.”

However, Sky News reported, William and Kate cancelled a visit to a cacao farm in the village of Indian Creek on Sunday morning after villagers protested over plans for the couple’s helicopter to land on their football pitch. The village is also involved in a dispute relating to ancestral land with Fauna & Flora International, a conservation group of which Prince William is patron.

On day two, the royals danced with locals and sampled chocolate at a different cacao farm. “They were shaking their waists like nobody’s business,” Laura Cacho, a local festival organiser who danced with William, told the BBC.

There is more controversy on the horizon, said The Independent. A protest calling for slavery reparations is due to take place near the British High Commission in the Jamaican capital of Kingston tomorrow morning.

The tour of Belize, Jamaica and the Bahamas is marking the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee and is the couple’s first major overseas tour in more than two years due to the pandemic.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arrive at Philip S.W. Goldson International Airport in Belize City on Saturday to begin their tour of the Caribbean on behalf of the Queen to mark her Platinum Jubilee

The royals meet Belize’s Prime Minister Johnny Briceño and his wife Rossana. The Cambridges will also visit Jamaica and the Bahamas

William and Kate travel to Hopkins, a small village on the coast of Belize, considered the cultural centre of the Garifuna community

William dances with locals in Hopkins. Organiser Laura Cacho claimed the duke had “beautiful rhythm”, while the Daily Mail called it “proper dad dancing”

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge learn about local food in Hopkins

Visiting a local chocolate farm, the Duchess of Cambridge apparently said their children would be “very jealous”

Kate meets one of the younger members of the Garifuna community in Hopkins, which has a reputation for being the “friendliest village in the whole of Belize”, said the Evening Standard

From chopping wood to playing on children’s slides, Kate Middleton’s first overseas work trip since 2019 has certainly been an active one.

The Duchess of Cambridge embarked on a “two-day fact finding mission with her Centre for Early Childhood” this week, said the Daily Mail. She travelled to Denmark, to find out how the country has become a world leader in early childhood development.

During the trip, Middleton met Danish royalty, as well as spending time talking to parents at Copenhagen’s Children’s Museum. Wearing a red jacket and white blouse, she “dressed in Denmark’s national colours” on day one of the trip, said Metro.

The Duchess “showcased her winning ways with children” during the visit, and “appeared in her element” during a woodland ramble with youngsters, the Daily Mail continued. And she even suggested that a “fourth child may not be out of the question”, added Metro.

“Two future queens – who have much in common after coming from ordinary families to marry princes – were reunited” in Copenhagen this week, said Town and Country. Middleton first met Crown Princess Mary of Denmark in Copenhagen in 2011, and this week the Crown Princess welcomed the Duchess back to the city.

The Duchess was given an official Royal welcome by Crown Princess Mary and Denmark’s Queen Margrethe. “The visit was in part to pay tribute to the historic ties between the two countries, which are both celebrating jubilees this year”, said The Independent.

On a vist to Stenurten Forest Kindergarten, a teaching assistant told Middleton to have a go at some of the activities, including wood chopping. Hammer in hand, “she took just three blows to split the log and was applauded for her efforts”, the Daily Mail reported.

The Duchess of Cambridge has spoken often of her fondness for children – and they too seem to warm to her quickly. A video taken during the visit “appears to show one child say ‘I love you’ to Kate before she seemingly repeats the sentiment as they share a cuddle”, said the Daily Mail.

During her stay, Kate told some of the mothers she met that she gets broody, and “joked that Prince William worries about her working with under-ones” as she sometimes comes home saying, “‘let’s have another one’”, The Mirror reported.

Kate met with parents at the Children’s Museum in Frederiksberg, where the broody comment was made. Here, she learnt about a project called Understanding Your Baby, which trains health visitors to support new parents. “She also praised dads who take paternity leave”, reported Metro.

While “having a good old nosey” around the University College Copenhagen’s Lego Foundation PlayLab, Kate spotted a slide – “and, in what may well be a royal first, decided to give it a go rather than taking the stairs”, said Cosmopolitan. Royal fans were “quick to share their delight” at a video capturing the moment.

Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge celebrated her 40th birthday by releasing three new photos Sunday.

According to BBC, fashion photographer Paolo Roversi took the portraits, all of which show Kate in Alexander McQueen dresses, and described the experience as a "true honor" and "a moment of pure joy."

In the only color shot of the three, the duchess stands at an angle, the ruffled sleeve of her red off-the-shoulder dress covering one shoulder in the foreground while the other, left bare, blends into the gray background. Her hands disappear into the folds of her dress as she smiles, her hair blowing in the wind and an earring borrowed from the queen sparkling on her right ear.

One of the two black-and-white shots is a close-up, shot with a slight blur that gives the duchess' features a soft, youthful look and makes her pearl earring, which once belonged to Princess Diana, glow fuzzily in the midst of her hair.

The final shot shows Prince William's wife of 10 years in profile. A different white dress, tied with simple bows at the shoulders, leaves her collarbone bare. The bows trail off into long white ribbons, one of which she clasps between her fingers as it falls over her skirt. The portrait seems almost Victorian. She looks every inch the future queen — stoic, strong, and confident.

Today is the 39th birthday of Prince William, the father-of-three who is second in line to the throne.

It has been a difficult year for the Duke of Cambridge, who not only lost his grandfather, Prince Philip, but has also had to navigate his brother’s move to Los Angeles and high-profile falling out with the Royal Family.

Back in March, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle revealed to Oprah Winfrey that an unnamed member of what they dubbed “the firm” had discussed how dark their baby would be.

Meghan also told the TV host that a 2018 rumour that she had made Kate Middleton cry ahead of Princess Charlotte’s bridesmaid dress fitting was untrue - and in fact the Duchess of Cambridge had been the one to leave the former Suits star in tears.

Kate will “be aware that this year has been tough for William and will want both his birthday and Father's Day to be special for him”, royal expert Katie Nicholl told OK! Magazine. Nicholl predicted that William would spend the day at Kensington Palace with his wife and children, George (seven), Charlotte (six) and Louis (three).

On Father’s Day, the day before William’s birthday, the Duke of Cambridge and his two eldest children thrilled participants of an inaugural race around the Queen’s Sandringham Estate in Norfolk by making a surprise appearance.

“William, George and Charlotte arrived just before the half marathon got underway,” reports the Eastern Daily Press. “They walked to the stage holding hands, before sending runners on their way.”

William’s birthday had initially fallen on “freedom day” - the day the UK’s remaining lockdown restrictions had been set to ease and normality to resume.

But the rapid spread of the Delta variant and the UK’s increasing coronavirus infection rate has led the big day to be pushed to July 19 - meaning that the Duke of Cambridge will have to wait another four weeks before throwing any major birthday celebrations.

The charitable foundations of Prince Harry and Prince William have been reported to the Charity Commission over alleged “conflicts of interest, inappropriate use of funds and a lack of independence”.

Anti-monarchy campaign group Republic claims that Prince William and Kate Middleton’s Royal Foundation gave £145,000 as a grant to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s now-defunct charity Sussex Royal, reports the Daily Mail.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s foundation is also alleged to have handed a further £144,901 to Travalyst, “which was then under the umbrella of the Sussexes’ charity as ‘an activity in the sustainable tourism space’”, adds The Telegraph.

The Republic campaigners argue that “the only rationale” for the grants decision “was the personal relationship between two patrons, the Duke of Sussex and the Duke of Cambridge”.

In a letter to the charities watchdog, the campaign group’s chief executive Graham Smith added: “Neither patrons are trustees of the Royal Foundation, so there is also a question mark over the independence of the trustees of the Royal Foundation.

“The Sussex Royal charity has since decided to close, and it is reported that they will transfer all their funds to Travalyst.

“Again, this appears to be a personal decision by a trustee [the Duke of Sussex] to fund another of his projects, rather than to ensure the funds are being used for the original purposes for which they were donated.”

A spokesperson for Prince Harry said the claims were “false” and “salaciously created”, reports Sky News.

“To this point, it is deeply offensive to today see false claims made about the Duke of Sussex and his charitable work. It is both defamatory and insulting to all the outstanding organisations and people he has partnered with,” the representative said.

Harry has never had any “personal financial interest” and all of his charitable work has been “transparent and above board”, according to the Royal’s legal team. “To suggest otherwise is unequivocally wrong and will be acted upon accordingly with the weight of the law,” the lawyers said.

A Royal Foundation spokesperson added that the grants made to Sussex Royal “were fully in line with governance requirements and were reported transparently”.

The Charity Commission said it was assessing the information in the complaint to decide whether it was appropriate to investigate. A spokesperson added: “We have not made any determination of wrongdoing.”

A rabbi has warned that a biblical prophecy shows the coronavirus outbreak will plunge the world into its toughest periods for hundreds of years. The Israeli mystic Rabbi Yosef Pinto says the lethal disease was predicted in the Book of Ezekiel. Warning that the catastrophe could kill more people than the Holocaust, he urged people to “pray and repent”.

Woman plays violin during brain surgery

A woman has had a brain tumour removed while playing her violin during the procedure. Dagmar Turner, a professional musician, started the operation under general anaesthetics, but surgeons woke her to play her instrument, to help the medics avoid the area of her brain used in playing the violin.

Kensington Palace haunted by deformed ghost

Kensington Palace is haunted by a deformed ghost that lives in Prince Louis' room. According to reports, there have been multiple reported ghost sightings in 1A, the apartment where Prince William and Kate Middleton reside with their three young children. The spirit is said to be the ghost of a feral boy who was discovered naked and alone in a German forest in 1725.

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We've all been there: You're expected to attend the annual Diplomatic Corps reception at Buckingham Palace, but you just can't figure out which tiara to wear.

For the record, the prevailing theory is that Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge, will wear the century-old "Lover's Knot" tiara, which consists of diamonds and pearls bound in pretzel-shaped knots.

If you're looking for a similar effect without breaking the bank, we hear your local Burger King may still have some of those cardboard crowns in the back room. Read more at People.

The Princess of Wales has become the most popular living British royal, beating her husband William, the Prince of Wales.

A YouGov poll carried out in the first three months of the year found that she is "the most well-thought-of royal among the public". Three-quarters of Britons said they had a positive view of Kate Middleton, who revealed in March that she had been diagnosed with cancer.

Overall, 58% of Britons have a positive view of the royal family, said the polling firm, with "younger Britons continuing to have a more negative view".

Princess of Wales (positive favourability 76)

Kate Middleton has developed an "elegant but accessible image" in recent years, said Alexander Smith at NBC News, and that has "cemented her as Britain's favourite royal".

Her popularity has recovered from the aftermath of the "very public" fallout with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, and she has been front and centre of royal family news since the saga of health rumours unfolded earlier this year. 

The Princess has an "inoffensive persona that partly explained the queen's popularity", added Smith, and she remains a royal able to "bring star power to even the most mundane ribbon-cutting event".

Prince of Wales (73)

Prince William has previously topped popularity polls, but now finds himself narrowly in second place to his wife. His popularity was done no harm after he chose to take a break over Easter, "putting his public duties aside to care for his wife", and the future king remains markedly more popular than both his brother and his father, said The Telegraph.

It means William is "very much central to the success of the Carolean age", royal biographer Andrew Morton told Reuters. With the King already in his 70s, "an awful lot of the future of the monarchy rests on the shoulders of Prince William".

Princess Anne (71)

The King's sister remains highly popular. Regularly described as the "most hard-working royal", her "quietly respectful, no-nonsense, practical" approach seems to appeal to the British public, said Juliet Rieden at ABC.

While her positive favourability may be slightly lower than Kate and William's, Princess Anne remains the royal with the lowest negative rating – just 13%, compared to Kate's 15% and William's 21%. 

King Charles (63)

A year on from his coronation, Charles's popularity appears to have stabilised, while as the prince, it "waxed and waned" in his decades in the public eye, said The Telegraph.

He has only made sporadic appearances since his cancer diagnosis in February, but he appears to have "settled into his role as monarch" and that is reflected in a fairly favourable polling result.

Prince Edward (54)

King Charles's youngest brother, the Duke of Edinburgh, maintains a generally positive view amongst the public. He has returned to royal duties to support the monarch after his cancer diagnoses, said The Independent. He and his wife, Sophie, "are part of Charles's slimmed-down working monarchy, introduced after his mother passed away last year".

Queen Camilla (50)

Camilla has often been vilified for her part in the breakdown of Charles's marriage to Diana, but a "calculated and highly successful PR campaign" as well as "continuous diligence, humility, thick skin and determination" has seen her popularity gradually rise, said Tatler.

Still, the Queen Consort clearly splits opinion, but is marginally viewed more favourably with just 41% responding negatively.

Prince Harry (31)

Prince Harry was once one of the most popular royals, but a majority negative view suggests the public still view him as to "blame for the royal split", said the London Evening Standard. 

Though his popularity has marginally increased, he still remains with a split of 61% negative versus 31% positive.

Duchess of Sussex (26)

Prince Harry's wife Meghan Markle remains widely unpopular, with her ratings decreasing since last year. Her rating of 26% makes her the second least popular royal. 

Younger people, aged between 18 and 24, tend to be more positive about the Sussexes than older groups, but they are still  "divided in their opinion", said YouGov.

Prince Andrew (6)

Prince Andrew remains the most unpopular royal due to his association with convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, which has rocked the family over the past few years. Just 6% said they viewed the Duke of York favourably, while 86% said they had a negative opinion.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have arrived in Pakistan for a five-day visit aimed at strengthening ties between Britain and the South Asian country.

The royal couple arrived last night at the Nur Khan airbase, near capital Islamabad, where they were greeted by Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, says The Telegraph.

Details of the visit have been kept secret owing to security concerns, and more than 1,000 Pakistani police officers have been deployed to keep Prince William and Kate safe as they travel around the Commonwealth country.

Kensington Palace said security issues and political uncertainty meant that the tour was the couple’s “most complex” to date.

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In his first official engagement in Pakistan, the Prince met pupils at a government-run college in Islamabad and spoke about the importance of young people learning about mental health, reports the BBC.

One girl told the Royal that she and her classmates were “big fans of your mother”, to which he replied: “You were, really? Oh, that’s very sweet of you. I was a big fan of my mother too.”

The Duke and Duchess later met Prime Minister Imran Khan for lunch, during which they discussed the Pakistani leader’s former sporting career.

“William recalled how everyone laughed at a gathering in Richmond-upon-Thames in 1996 when the former Sussex and Worcestershire cricketer announced his political ambition to the then teenage Prince William and Diana,” according to the Daily Mail.

The Duke and Duchess will go on to visit Lahore in eastern Pakistan, as well as the north and west of the country.

They are the first British royals to officially visit the country since the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall toured the region in 2006.

The media is awash again with talk of a right royal rivalry after the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge took their family on a budget £73-a-head FlyBe plane to Balmoral after Harry and Meghan came under fire for talking four private jet trips in 11 days.

A Flybe spokeswoman said: “We were delighted to welcome the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and their family on board one of our flights again, this time when they flew from Norwich to Aberdeen on a Flybe flight operated by Eastern Airways.”

It is not unheard of for royals to travel on budget airlines but many in the media think the timing of the move is no coincidence, with William and Kate “deliberately slumming it” to “troll” the other royal couple.

The Mirror points out that Kate and William's “£73 flight” comes amid Harry and Meghan’s “private jet row,” and The Sun says the move sees “Wills” give Harry a “flying lesson”.

“You couldn’t make it up,” adds Libby Purves in the Daily Mail, “Ibiza-sleaze and popstar preening for one pair; for the other, a bleary early morning at Norwich airport.”

However, as Metro points out, royals have flown economy before, with the couple taking a FlyBe flight in 2011 from Edinburgh to Manchester for the wedding of William's cousin Zara Tindall, while Harry headed back from the marriage with Ryanair.

Critics had called Harry and Meghan hypocritical for flying by private jets, which emit seven times more carbon emissions than an economy flight.

Earlier this week Sir Elton John had entered the row about Prince Harry, Meghan and their son Archie taking his private jet to visit his home in Nice, in the south of France, saying: “We ensured their flight was carbon neutral, by making the appropriate contribution to Carbon Footprint.”

Three new photos of Prince George have been released to celebrate his sixth birthday - and reveal that the young royal is a dedicated football fan.

Two of the snaps show George, the third in line for the throne, in an England football shirt laughing in the garden of his home in Kensington Palace, while the third shows him wearing a green polo shirt and striped shorts on a recent family holiday. As The Daily Telegraph notes, “gone are some of the fustier outfits in which he has been pictured in the past on other landmark occasions”.

“Happy Birthday Prince George! The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are very pleased to share new photographs of Prince George to mark His Royal Highness’s sixth birthday,” the royal couple wrote on their Instagram account.

The Duchess, who recently succeeded the Queen as the figurehead of the Royal Photographic Society, took the shots of her son, reports Metro.

“The photographs not only reveal that our future king has become a football fan, but also suggest that he is a drain on the Tooth Fairy’s resources at present,” reports The Times, which notes that the Prince is missing one of his bottom teeth.

Metro adds that George “is the spitting image of his dad and granddad”, Prince William and Prince Charles.

The schoolboy was spotted playing football earlier this month with his siblings while his father played in a charity polo match. George also enjoys tennis and was recently visited by Roger Federer at the Berkshire home of his mother’s parents.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge share new pictures of all their children - George, four-year-old Princess Charlotte and one-year-old Prince Louis - on their birthdays.

Although details about George’s birthday party have not been released, The Sun reported earlier last week that the family are expected to spend their summer holiday on the Caribbean island of Mustique, where they also celebrated the Prince’s fifth birthday.

The Duchess of Cambridge has shared family photographs of the young royals larking around in her garden at the Chelsea Flower Show, which opens to the public tomorrow.

Kate Middleton teamed up with landscape architects Andree Davies and Adam White to design the Back to Nature Garden, which was devised with the aim of encouraging families to spend more time outdoors.

The Duke and Duchess’s children, Prince George, five, Princess Charlotte, four, and one-year-old Prince Louis helped gather moss, leaves and twigs to decorate the display.

In images taken by award-winning photographer Matt Porteous, the two older children sit with thir legs dangling over the side of a bridge

Prince William helps Prince Louis on a rope swing, while Princess Charlotte swings alone

George climbs up a waterfall as Louis runs around with a stick

“The garden’s centrepiece contains a high-platform tree house, clad in stag horn oak that draws inspiration from a bird or animal nest. It also features a swing seat, rustic den and a campfire as well as tree stumps, stepping stones and a hollow log for children to play on,” says Hello! magazine

The Duchess returned to the show today with a group of schoolchildren, climbing into the treehouse and roasting marshmallows.

“The Duchess of Cambridge is a strong advocate for the benefits that the outdoors has on physical and mental health, and the positive impact that nature and the environment can have on childhood development,” says Town & Country magazine.

Speaking to presenter Monty Don for a BBC interview, she said: “There’s an amazing fact I learnt recently that 90% of our adult brains are developed before the age of five. And really what a child experiences in those really early years directly affects how the brain develops and that’s why I think that it’s so important that all of us, whether we’re parents or carers or family members, really engage in quality time with children and babies from a really, really young age.”

Social media trolls who direct abuse at members of the royal family could face police action, according to new social media guidelines issued by palace officials.

The rules, unveiled by palace officials today, will apply to accounts run by Buckingham Palace, Clarence House and Kensington Palace on channels such as Twitter and Facebook.

In what the London Evening Standard calls a “rare intervention” by senior courtiers, commenters are reminded to show “courtesy, kindness and respect” to other users, in order to create a “safe environment”.

“The aim of our social media channels is to create an environment where our community can engage safely in debate and is free to make comments, questions and suggestions,” the palaces said.

The guidelines warn against posting spam, defamation, bigoted language and any material deemed “obscene, offensive, threatening, abusive, hateful [or] inflammatory”, warning that palace moderators will hide or delete content that breaches the rules, and reserve the right to block users who post it.

“We also reserve the right to send any comments we deem appropriate to law enforcement authorities for investigation as we feel necessary or is required by law,” they said.

The move “follows revelations last month of high levels of vitriol and abuse, especially aimed at the Duchesses of Cambridge and Sussex”, notes The Guardian.

The Duchess of Sussex, who is mixed race, has been “subjected to racist comments on top of the sexist and offensive words aimed at both her and the Duchess of Cambridge”, The Daily Telegraph reports.

Media speculation of a feud between the pair has had a knock-on effect on social media, where partisans of the two women frequently clash in an online war of words.

In fact, the majority of the abuse is linked to “arguments between rival fans”, says the Guardian, with palace social media staff spending thousands of hours deleting hateful exchanges.

Many Twitter users welcomed the move, although some expressed disappointment that such intervention had been necessary.

Others said that the roots of the problem lay beyond social media, blaming the press for fuelling trolls with irresponsible reports capitalising on rumours of a feud:

George Clooney has claimed Meghan Markle is being “pursued and vilified” by the media in the same way that Princess Diana was in the 1990s.

The Hollywood star, who is friends with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, said it was “frustrating” to see how the Royal wife and former fellow actor is being treated.

Speaking at a press event in California for his new Catch-22 TV miniseries, Clooney said: “She’s a woman who is seven months pregnant and she is being pursued and vilified and chased in the same way that Diana was, and it’s history repeating itself. And we’ve seen how that ends.”

As CNN notes, Prince Harry’s mother “had a notoriously difficult relationship with parts of the British media” and died in a car accident in 1997 while being pursued by photographers.

“Meghan has also faced intense interest from the unsparing UK press since her engagement to Prince Harry was announced in 2017,” says the news site.

Her estranged father, Thomas, and half-sister, Samantha, have taken part in several “tell all” interviews, even leaking details of a personal letter allegedly written by the Duchess.

A supposed rift with her sister-in-law, the Duchess of Cambridge, has also resulted in online abuse against both Royals.

But The Times’ Valentine Low insists that the comparisons between the treatment of Meghan and Diana are “utter fantasy”.

“There are no crowds of paparazzi waiting for her every time she leaves Kensington Palace. No one is spying on her in the gym. No one is listening in on her phone calls. Her private life is not being exposed in the tabloids on a weekly basis,” he writes.

Aside from a couple of incidents that overstepped the mark, it is “remarkable how little intrusion there has been”, Low continues.

Indeed, more than two decades on from Diana’s death, we are living in an era that “has arguably never seen royal privacy more respected by the press”, says Camilla Tominey, The Daily Telegraph’s associate editor.

She claims royal protection officers are now “so scrupulous about unauthorised images that they even make members of the public delete illicit mobile phone pictures and footage”.

An unnamed photographer told Tominey that new regulations introduced by the Independent Press Standards Organisation in the wake of the Leveson Inquiry “have had a massive effect on us, which is why you simply don’t see pap shots of the royals in the papers any more”.

Veteran royal reporter Robert Jobson added: “The only vilification of Meghan is coming from her own family and a few online lunatics.”

Kensington Palace staff are waging an escalating war against internet trolls who are posting vicious comments about Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle, according to reports.

The two women have faced sexist and racist abuse on social media, including a handful of violent threats, and rival fans have also turned on each other, reports Hello! magazine.

Neither of the duchesses have individual public social media accounts, but photographs of the Royals are posted on Kensington Palace’s Instagram and Twitter feeds, with nearly nine million followers combined.

A source told Hello! that while the majority of comments were positive, palace staff were spending “a lot of hours” every week moderating abusive messages.

“It follows a Kate vs. Meghan narrative and some of the worst stuff is between Kate fans and Meghan fans,” said the source. “Arguments about who looks more appropriate, for example, that turn into personal attacks on other users.”

Hello! royal correspondent Emily Nash reports that an increasing number of insulting messages are also being posted under photos of the two royals on the magazine’s own social media accounts.

“Kate has been called ‘boring’ and, when Meghan made a surprise appearance at the British Fashion Awards, our moderators had to disable comments on an Instagram post and delete more than 500, because the debate became so abusive,” Nash writes.

Meghan has been accused of faking her pregnancy to get attention, while rows between rival fans has seen one telling another to “drink bleach”.

Under a video of Prince Harry and Meghan, another troll wrote: “Soon it will be me who is next to Harry and Megssy will be gone.” The message ended with six kitchen knife emojis.

“A joke in poor taste perhaps, rather than a direct threat,” says The Times. “But other posts that accused the duchess of bleaching her skin to look whiter and made references to ‘the ghetto’ were harder to laugh off.”

Kensington Palace has appealed to Instagram and Twitter for help to deal with the insults, says the newspaper.

The Daily Express notes that the online war “comes amid ongoing reports of a rift between the royal wives”.

“Parents-to-be Meghan and Harry sparked speculation of a falling-out with the Cambridges when they revealed plans to move away from Kensington Palace,” the paper adds.

The Palace has made no comment on the rift rumours.

Kate Middleton has helped to design a garden for the Chelsea Flower Show, Kensington Palace has announced.

The Duchess of Cambridge’s horticultural creation, titled Back to Nature, is said to have been inspired by “magic” childhood memories of spending time in the “great outdoors”, and uses “wild planting and natural materials”.

Her collaboration with the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) and Kingston-based landscape architects Davies White marks the first time that the Royal has been involved in a display at the world’s most famous horticultural show, the London Evening Standard reports.

Award-winning garden designer Adam White explained that he and the Duchess “spoke about our childhood memories, being outdoors and exploring nature”, and that she had been “very open and has been hugely collaborative”.

“She is very hands-on, model making, emailing images, coming up with all the ideas that we want to capture. She would often bring a folder of cuttings with her full of ideas,” he continued.

According to well-being magazine Happiful, the Duchess hopes to “encourage families to rediscover nature, as well as the physical and mental health benefits it has to offer”.

A Palace spokesperson said: “The garden seeks to recapture for adults the sense of wonder and magic that they enjoyed as children, in addition to kindling excitement and a passion for nature in future generations.

“The garden will build on Her Royal Highness’s passion for the outdoors and the proven benefits that nature has on physical and mental health.”

RHS director Sue Biggs added: “We could not be more thrilled, or feel more honoured, that the Duchess of Cambridge has co-designed our RHS Garden at Chelsea Flower Show.”

Speculation is mounting about a rift between Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton, amid reports that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are moving from Kensington Palace to the Windsor Estate.

Prince Harry and his pregnant wife have been living alongside the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge at the Palace but are planning to up sticks and set up home at Frogmore Cottage, in the grounds of the Queen’s Berkshire home.

Reporting on rumours of mounting tensions between the two royal wives, the Daily Mail quotes a source as saying: “Kate and Meghan are very different people. They don’t really get on.”

The newpaper says that insiders “insist there has been no dramatic falling out”, but The Daily Telegraph’s Camilla Tominey claims there was an “incident” in the build-up to the royal wedding in May.

Tominey, who first broke the news of Harry’s relationship with Markle, says two separate sources “claim Kate was left in tears following a bridesmaids dress fitting for Princess Charlotte”.

An insider told the journalist: “Kate had only just given birth to Prince Louis and was feeling quite emotional.”

Royal sources “have been furiously seeking to dampen down stories of a rift at the heart of the ‘fab four’, as the young royals are known, trying to make the case that Meghan and Harry are moving to Frogmore Cottage, near Windsor, out of privacy and space concerns”, says The Daily Beast’s London-based royal blogger Tom Sykes.

According to Tominey, there was noticeable tension between the two women when they appeared together at the first ever Royal Foundation Forum in February.

And the dress-fitting incident reportedly occurred at around the time Markle was reported to have “upset” the Queen by asking to wear an emerald tiara at her wedding, rather than the one offered by the 92-year-old monarch, says the Daily Mail.

But as Lisa Ryan at The Cut says, “there’s no indication of any all-out war” between Harry and William’s spouses.

“Overall, it seems Kate and Meghan are friendly, but as a person who has relatives, I would not be surprised if they occasionally piss each other off,” Ryan concludes.

A relaxed-looking Prince George smiles outside Clarence House in a new photograph released by Kensington Palace to mark his fifth birthday.

The Royal Mint also issued a new £5 coin, featuring St George and the Dragon, as the future king celebrated his special day on Sunday.

The young Prince is believed to be on holiday with his parents, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, and two younger siblings, Charlotte, three, and three-month-old Louis, on the small private Caribbean island of Mustique.

According to royal blogger Tea Time With The Cambridges, the family were spotted arriving at Saint Lucia airport last Wednesday and then boarded a private plane to the island. With 100 luxury villas and a no-fly zone, it is one of the Cambridges’ preferred destinations.

George’s grandparents Michael and Carole Middleton, and his aunt and uncle Pippa and James Matthews, are said to have also joined them. “It certainly sounds like George will have a blast,” says The Sun.

“There have been whispers of a garden party planned for when the family gets back from holiday to celebrate the birthday with friends and family,” adds the Daily Express. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are expected to be invited, along with George’s classmates from Thomas’s Battersea school in south London.

Click on the gallery above for more pictures of the young prince.

Kensington Palace has released five photographs of the christening of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s third child, Prince Louis.

Fifth in line to the throne, the prince was baptised in the Chapel Royal at St James’s Palace last Monday. Four of the images released were taken by British photographer Matt Holyoak in the Morning Room and garden of Clarence House.

This morning a fifth photograph (above), by Jersey-based photographer Matt Porteous, was also released showing Prince Louis laughing with his mother.

So what do the photographs reveal about the royals and their special day?

In the photos, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis are joined by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Prince Charles and Camilla, Carole and Michael Middleton, Pippa and James Matthews, and James Middleton.

The Queen and Prince Philip were notably absent from the christening. The monarch, who has begun to scale back her responsibilities, had a busy week ahead of her, including the RAF centenary celebrations and tea with US President Donald Trump, notes CNN.

Nevertheless, the 92-year-old “poignantly retains a place” in the intimate family portraits, “watching over the next generation of her family”, says The Daily Telegraph.

The newspaper says an oil painting of the Queen by Michael Noakes appears to have been “raised several inches up the wall” from its previous position to ensure it is visible in the official picture.

The images mark the first time all five members of the young family have been officially photographed.

“The latest portrait conveys the gradual shift towards the next generation as the younger ranks are swelled by new births and happy marriages while the most senior members of the family take a back seat,” says the Telegraph.

The photographs also offer an insight into Clarence House, the official residence of Prince Charles and Camilla.

The Cambridges are sat on a 1773 Chippendale sofa, with a portrait of George Bernard Shaw by Augustus John also in the background. “For nearly 50 years, from 1953 to 2002, Clarence House was home to Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, and is still decorated to her taste,” says the Daily Express.

The family shots include a lot of smiles, particularly from Prince George who is grinning from ear to ear.

Holyoak said he was honoured to “witness at first hand such a happy event”.

He added: “Everyone was so relaxed and in such good spirits, it was an absolute pleasure.

“I only hope I have captured some of that joy in my photographs.”

Princess Charlotte’s fourth birthday has been marked with the release of a new series of photos taken by her mother.

The fourth in line to the throne was captured by the Duchess of Cambridge at Kensington Palace and their Norfolk retreat of Anmer Hall.

Charlotte has been in public eye since birth, after her mother “broke with tradition in 2015 by issuing the official photographs of her newborn daughter” reports the BBC.

Her last official public outing was in October when she served as flower girl for the wedding of Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle.

The then three-year-old princess “captivated the crowds”, both those in Windsor and those at home watching on their television sets around the world as one of the flower girls, says E News.

The toddler has had quite a bit of practice, having served as a bridesmaid for her aunt Pippa Middleton and James Matthews in May 2017, her uncle Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in May last year and her godmother Sophie Carter and Robert Snuggs in September.

Eugenie’s wedding was certainly not the first time Charlotte has stolen the show during official engagements, however.

Here are some of her most memorable moments in the public eye:

Prince Louis’s christening

Princess Charlotte showed off her cheeky side at her little brother’s christening in July this year.

The Duke and Duchess’s second child “made hearts melt” as she walked into the Royal Chapel at St James’ Palace holding her father’s hand, said the Daily Express.

“As she tottered up to the entrance, holding an order of service, she said to photographers: ‘You’re not coming,’” according to the newspaper.

She was also seen waving, before shaking hands with the Archbishop of Canterbury, who carried out the service.

Her tantrum at Hamburg Airport

Last July, Princess Charlotte, who had just turned two, appeared to throw a bit of a strop at a Hamburg Airport as the family prepared to board a helicopter.

Charlotte “erupted into a mini-tantrum”, before taking a tumble on the tarmac, says the Daily Mail. The family had been jetting about on a five-day royal tour that took in to Warsaw, Berlin, Heidelberg and their final stop, Hamburg, and it clearly all got a bit too much for the toddler.

Her outburst didn’t last long, though, after she was picked up and comforted by her mother, adds Time magazine.

The birth of her brother

“There was plenty of excitement surrounding the Lindo Wing of St Mary’s Hospital” upon news that Kate had gone into labour with her third child in May, Business Insider reports. Reporters and a huge crowd of well-wishers gathered outside in the hope of getting a glimpse of the new royal baby.

But when Prince William arrived with the newborn’s two siblings, it was Charlotte who commanded the limelight.

“She’s completely mastered her royal waving technique and is definitely living up to her princess title,” says the news site.

Twitter users also noted her confidence, saying that while older brother George appeared uncomfortable at all the attention, Charlotte seemed to revel in it.

The royal wedding

Charlotte drew further attention at the wedding of her uncle Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. The young bridesmaid “seemed to love the limelight and had crowds giggling when she poked out her tongue and later ruffled her dress”, the Daily Mirror reports.

“Wearing a stunning floral headpiece, the adorable tot could be seen peering through the window of the car as the bridal party travelled to St George’s Chapel,” the newspaper adds.

Trooping the Colour 2018

Princess Charlotte and Prince George made a memorable appearance on the Buckingham Palace balcony on the afternoon of last month’s Trooping the Colour ceremony - part of the Queen’s official birthday celebrations.

The two young royals appeared alongside Savannah and Isla Phillips, daughters of Peter and Autumn Phillips, and granddaughters of Princess Anne.

Despite the fact that it “all got a bit much for Princess Charlotte at one point, who leaned into her mum for a cuddle”, she waved happily at the crowd for most of the event - proving that “Charlotte isn’t just any ol’ 3-year-old”, concludes Good Housekeeping magazine.

Prince Louis, fifth in line to the throne, will be christened later today.

It will be the first royal engagement for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s youngest child, who was born on 23 April this year.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are expected to attend the 40-minute ceremony, as are the Duchess of Cambridge’s sister and brother, Pippa Matthews and James Middleton. Both sets of grandparents, Prince Charles and Camilla and Carole and Michael Middleton, will also be at the church.

However, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh will not be there.

So when will the royal baby be baptised?

The christening will take place in a private ceremony at 4pm today. This will make him around three months old. “The good news for his football-loving dad, Prince William, is that 9 July is one of the rest days in the World Cup,” notes the BBC.

Where will the christening be?

The Chapel Royal at St James’s Palace in London, where his older brother Prince George was christened.

“As Royal tradition dictates, Prince Louis will be baptised in the Lily Font bowl, christened with holy water from the River Jordan in the Middle East,” says the Daily Express.

“The Lily Font bowl was commissioned by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert in 1840 and is made of silver with botanical decorations. The Royal Family have used the sacred font in baptisms since its creation.”

Princess Charlotte was christened at the church of St Mary Magdalene in Sandringham in 2015, when holy water was apparently flown in from the River Jordan especially for the event.

Who will baptise him?

The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend Justin Welby, who recently conducted the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s wedding in Windsor.

What will Louis wear?

According to the Daily Express, he will wear the same cream lace gown worn by George and Charlotte. It is a replica of the gown made in 1841 for Queen Victoria’s eldest daughter, Victoria, says the newspaper. The original gown was taken out of use in 2008 when it became too fragile to wear.

Who are his godparents?

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have chosen six godparents for Prince Louis, one more than Princess Charlotte and one less than Prince George. The latest group to get the honour are the Duchess’s cousin Lucy Middleton and the couple’s friends Nicholas van Cutsem, Guy Pelly, Harry Aubrey-Fletcher, Lady Laura Meade and Hannah Carter.

A French magazine forced to pay £92,000 in damages for publishing topless photographs of Kate Middleton is trying to appeal the ruling by using provocative images of Meghan Markle.

Paris-based publication Closer was ordered to pay compensation to the Duchess of Cambridge last year after losing a long-running legal battle.

So what is it all about?

Why was Kate Middleton awarded the payout?

In 2012, France’s Closer magazine published photographs of the Duchess sunbathing topless. She was inside the grounds of a luxury holiday chateau during a private holiday with Prince William in the south of France, and the pictures were taken by paparazzi using long lenses.

Following five years of legal proceedings, a French court last year ruled that her privacy had been breached and awarded her €100,000 (£92,000) in compensation - a substantial amount but much less than the £1.5m asked for by the Royals.

Why is the magazine appealing the ruling?

Lawyers for Closer reportedly say that the ruling itself was consistent with the law but that the damages were “exaggerated for a simple matter of privacy”.

“Token sums of less than £100 are often awarded for breaches of privacy in France,” notes The Daily Telegraph.

The magazine’s legal team will argue in the Versailles Appeals Court that the amount should be drastically reduced.

What has Meghan Markle got to do with it?

Lawyers will argue that it is “hypocritical” to award such a large payout when other members of the Royal Family “are happy with sexy photos”, reports the Telegraph.

“Closer’s legal team are expected to produce in court footage of the Duchess of Sussex removing items of clothing before seductively posing in shorts in a video called Grilling Never Looked So Hot, to make the case that female members of the Royal Family have willingly posed for revealing images,” says the newspaper.

The footage was shot in 2013, before Markle had met Prince Harry, for an advert for Men’s Health magazine.

Kate Middleton has been named this year’s top royal style influencer, beating her sister-in-law, Meghan Markle.

The Duchess of Cambridge had the biggest impact on the country’s shopping habits, according to eBay's annual UK Retail Report.

“Her maternity style while pregnant with Prince Louis [ensured] she generated more online searches on eBay than any other royal over the past year,” says The Daily Telegraph.

Searches for tailored maternity coats increased threefold in November 2017 and searches for Jenny Packham more than doubled after the Duchess wore the designer’s red smock dress (pictured below) to present her third child to the world, outside the Lindo Wing in April.

“While Meghan was clearly the focus of the fashion pages this year, Kate’s distinctive style has long been a hit with shoppers on eBay since her wedding in 2011,” said the site’s UK vice president, Rob Hattrell.

“We always see an uptick in searches around landmark royal events and 2018 was a bumper year for small businesses on eBay, with both the birth of Prince Louis and Meghan and Harry's wedding driving purchases across the nation.”

Princess Charlotte (pictured below with her mother), who inspired a 60% increase in searches for flower crowns after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s wedding, was in third place.

Click on the gallery above for more images of Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle's best fashion choices.

Kensington Palace has released three official photographs from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding.

The portraits, taken by England-born photographer Alexi Lubomirski, show the couple alone on the East Terrace of Windsor Castle and with members of the wedding party in the castle’s Green Drawing Room.

“The Duke and Duchess of Sussex would like to thank everyone who took part in the celebrations of their wedding on Saturday,” a Palace spokesperson said.

“They feel so lucky to have been able to share their day with all those gathered in Windsor and also all those who watched the wedding on television across the UK, Commonwealth and around the world.”

So how do the pictures compare with the three official photos from the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding in 2011?

On first glance, they take a similar format. Both sets of snaps include one of the couple alone, one of the couple with their bridesmaids and pageboys, and one of the main wedding party.

It is the couple portraits that show the biggest differences. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding was a state occasion and, accordingly, their photo together is more formal. The royal pair are pictured standing in the Throne Room of Buckingham Palace.

By contrast, Prince Harry and Meghan are captured in black and white, lounging on the steps of Windsor Castle, laughing together.

Hugo Burnand, the photographer for the 2011 wedding, was best known for taking official photographs of Prince Charles and Camilla, while Lubomirski has shot celebrities including Beyonce, Gwyneth Paltrow and Jennifer Aniston, notes Harper’s Bazaar.

Prince Harry and Meghan’s family photo also feels “a bit more intimate than William and Kate’s family portrait, likely because Meghan’s mother was her only family member present”, says Town & Country. “This is likely also why Prince William and Duchess Kate are on the bride’s side of this portrait,” the magazine adds.

The royal baby is only two days old but he is already predicted to become a trendsetter like his mother and siblings.

The Duchess of Cambridge and her first two children, Prince George and Princess Charlotte, have the power to send designers’ sales sky-rocketing and crash their websites simply by wearing their clothes.

Baby number three, who is yet to be named, looks set to follow in their footsteps. The little prince appeared outside St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington on Monday, wearing a blanket by GH Hurt & Son, which has said it expects to be “extremely hectic” for the next few days.

Other clothes makers are also getting in on the action, creating collections inspired by the royals:

My 1st Years

The company was given the royal seal of approval two years ago, when Prince George sported a My 1st Years personalised blue gingham robe to meet then-president Barack Obama (only a prince can get away with meeting the leader of the free world in his pyjamas). The robe swiftly sold out and has been a favourite among parents ever since. In honour of Prince George’s little brother, the company has launched a limited edition royal-themed range, including robes, towels, pyjamas, high-top trainers and a rocking chair, all with the “regal touch of a crown”.

Boden

The Duchess of Cambridge wrapped up her baby bump in a bright red Boden coat to visit Great Ormond Street earlier this year. The clothes company, founded by Johnnie Boden in 1991, has since launched a limited-edition collection of baby clothes in celebration of the royal baby's birth. The clothes line, named A Very British Baby, includes a cashmere cardigan and bonnet that wouldn’t look out of place on Princess Charlotte and a sleepsuit with corgi embroidery and piping along its Peter Pan collar (below).

Rachel Riley

The luxury clothing brand welcomed the arrival of the new prince this week and directed customers to its range of clothing fit for a royal. Among its offerings are striped smocked sets, babysuits embroidered with crowns, frilly bonnets and bloomers, lace-up booties and a soldier motif cardigan. Rachel Riley, who studied pattern-cutting at a small haute couture atelier in Paris, is among Kate Middleton’s favourite children’s designers, and was behind these sailboat smocked dungarees worn by Prince George at his meet-and-greet with New Zealand babies in 2014 (below).

Joules

The high street shop is so popular in the Cambridge household that their dog Lupo is said to sleep on a Joules bed. Founded by Tom Joule, the company is celebrating the new arrival with “some right royal kit”, including babygros and jerseys featuring its iconic animal emblems (a bear, a fox and a rabbit) wearing crowns. The best of the Joules collection has to be its footless knitted legging tights designed for “little crawlers”, with a royal bear motif and the words “hip hip hooray” on the bottom.

GH Hurt & Son

Nottingham-based GH Hurt & Son has been supplying lace knitwear since 1912 and has been keeping royal newborns warm since Prince Charles was born. The Queen and Prince Philip wrapped their first born in a GH Hurt & Son blanket to present him to the world in November 1948. Princess Diana followed the tradition with Prince Harry and Prince William, and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have also followed suit. The family company said it was “delighted” that the fifth in line to the throne was wearing its Nottingham Lace knitted baby shawl on Monday.

Merrythought

It is not just clothing lines that are marking the new prince’s birth. Specialist needle workers at Britain's last remaining teddy bear factory have been putting the finishing touches on their own arrival: a collectable bear with a delicate blue silk bib to be embroidered with the prince’s name and date of birth and tied with a gold tassel and satin ribbon bow. Merrythought has already designed handmade teddy bears for the royal baby’s siblings. This one will have a hand-sewn smile and gold crown and rocking horse motif on his paw.

The Royal Family has welcomed the arrival of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s third child.

Showing off his new son outside St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, Prince William joked that he was expecting “thrice the worry now”, with three children under the age of five.

The baby Prince, born yesterday morning, “was wrapped up in a white shawl and bonnet has not been given a name yet”, says the Daily Express.

Catherine had been admitted to the hospital’s Lido Wing in the early stages of labour at around 6am.

A statement by Kensington Palace shortly after 1pm said: “Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cambridge was safely delivered of a son at 1101hrs. The Baby weighs 8lb 7oz.

“Prince William was present for the birth.”

Both mother and baby are doing well, the palace added.

His siblings, Prince George and Princess Charlotte, arrived earlier in the day to meet the newest member of their family.

The new baby boy is fifth in line to the throne, with Prince Harry dropping down a place in the order of succession.

The newborn was greeted on social media by everyone from Theresa May to the London Eye.

“My warmest congratulations to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge on the birth of their baby boy,” the Prime Minister wrote on Twitter. “I wish them great happiness for the future.”

Meanwhile, the London attraction announced that it would light up in red, white and blue to honour of the birth.

An unauthorised biography of Prince Charles depicts him as an overly pampered royal who struggles to overcome his unpopularity.

Written by investigative journalist Tom Bower, The Rebel Prince: The Power, Passion and Defiance of Prince Charles includes some incendiary claims about the heir to the throne.

“This book is the story of Prince Charles’s battle for rehabilitation after Diana’s death, and his refusal to obey the public’s expectations of a future king,” the author writes in his preface.

Bower, who has written unauthorised biographies of Tony Blair and Richard Branson, claims to have interviewed more than 120 people as part of his research.

Clarence House says it will not be commenting on any of the allegations made in the book.

The much-publicised biography is “tailor-made to fuel republican ire and royalist outrage while at the same time leaving House of Windsor watchers of any stripe salivating over a veritable state banquet of telling anecdote and revealing foibles,” Cahal Milmo writes for i news.

Below is a selection of some of the more colourful claims made about the Prince:

He’s a lavish spender, even by royal standards

Bower alleges that Prince Charles once travelled on the royal train from Highgrove House, his family residence in Gloucestershire, to Penrith in Cumbria so that he could go to a pub. The reported cost of the spur-of-the-moment jaunt? £18,916.

The 69-year-old royal is said to have complained in his journal about having to fly Club Class to Hong Kong in a chartered British Airways plane.

“It took me some time to realise … that this was not first class (!) although it puzzled me as to why the seat seemed so uncomfortable,” he reportedly wrote. “Such is the end of Empire, I sighed to myself.”

He likes his home comforts

When attending functions, the Prince reportedly brings along his own pre-mixed cocktails, which are carried by a police officer. On longer trips – like the time he visited a friend in North East England – he’s said to have taken luxury loo roll, a toilet seat, an orthopaedic mattress and two landscapes of the Scottish Highlands.

He cares about public opinion – a lot

The book paints a picture of a prince obsessed with how little the public thinks of him. It details one incident when Charles reportedly threw a dinner plate to the floor at a party when the issue came up.

Bower claims that the Prince is concerned that the public is more interested in William and Kate than in him. Bower also claims that the Prince frets over his future portrait on coins when he becomes Charles II, The Guardian reports.

He didn’t know what cling film was

After hosting a lunch at Clarence House one day, the Duchess of Cornwall is said to have told staff to leave the leftovers on the sideboard. Later on, Charles reportedly went on the hunt for some dinner.

“He walked into the dining room and shrieked,” the book reads. “Fearing the worst, Camilla dashed in after him. ‘What’s this?’ asked her husband, pointing at the food.

‘It’s cling film, darling,’ she replied.”

You can purchase the book from The Week Bookshop now

Politics and entertainment collided again at The Baftas last night, as guests wore black to protest against sexual harassment and a demonstration broke out on the red carpet.

The big winners also came with a political bent: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri - the story of a woman seeking justice for her murdered daughter - scooped most of the big prizes, including best film and best actress for Frances McDormand. The best actor was Gary Oldman, recognised for his portrayal of Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour.

The awards are seen as a bellwether for the Oscars, which will be handed out next month.

Attendees at last night’s ceremony showed their support for the #MeToo campaign by wearing black or Time's Up badges, demanding greater respect and equality in film following scandals involving some of the industry’s biggest names.

Taking their cue from the Golden Globes in January, some stars were accompanied by rights and equality campaigners. Angelina Jolie, for example, was joined by Cambodian-born US writer and producer Loung Ung.

Earlier in the day, an open letter to The Observer co-signed by 190 British and Irish actors including Carey Mulligan, Kate Winslet, Claire Foy, Noma Dumezweni, Emma Thompson, Jodie Whittaker, Sophie Okonedo, Emma Watson and Saoirse Ronan called for change.

“This movement is bigger than just a change in our industry alone,” it read. “This movement is intersectional, with conversations across race, class, community, ability and work environment, to talk about the imbalance of power.”

In a separate demonstration, feminist group Sisters Uncut staged a sit-in on the red carpet to protest against the Government’s record on domestic violence.

One person who remained apolitical, however, was the Duchess of Cambridge. She stepped out on the red carpet wearing a dark green dress.

Protocol prohibits members of the royal family from supporting political protests or movements, but there had been speculation the Duchess might break with tradition and endorse Time’s Up by wearing black.

The Daily Telegraph says the dress choice proved “mildly controversial, with a few criticising the Duchess of Cambridge for not wearing black in support of the #TimesUp movement - but, overall, most people have reacted to the royal's green Jenny Packham dress with relative calm”.

While the Duchess did not follow the masses, says The Daily Mirror, “the bespoke dress features a subtle black sash and she may have chosen green as a nod to Suffragette flag colours, which stands for hope”.

The ceremony was hosted by Joanna Lumley, the first woman to take charge of it in more than 15 years.

The big Bafta winners

Best filmThree Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Outstanding British filmThree Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Leading actressWinner: Frances McDormand - Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Leading actorGary Oldman - Darkest Hour

Supporting actressAllison Janney - I, Tonya

Supporting actorSam Rockwell - Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

DirectorThe Shape Of Water - Guillermo Del Toro

The journey from Camilla Shand to Queen Consort has been a long and tumultuous one for the wife of King Charles III.

Having married the then Prince Charles in 2005, Camilla Parker Bowles, as she was then known, chose not take the title of Princess of Wales given the huge public opposition to her following the death of Princess Diana.

Yet having once been vilified she has slowly transformed her standing with both the Royal Family and the British public.

It culminated earlier this year in a statement on the 70th anniversary of the Queen’s accession to the throne. In it, Elizabeth II made clear that when her eldest son takes the crown, it was “her sincere wish” that his wife, Camilla, “be known as Queen Consort, as she continues her own loyal service”.

The “candid message” set about “paving the way for Queen Camilla”, said The Observer at the time. “Charles is understood to have long harboured a firm desire his wife should carry the title of Queen Consort, and be thus crowned and anointed, when he becomes king.”

Yet “given the unprecedented length of the Queen’s reign, the title of Queen Consort will be unfamiliar to many, and might raise the question of why Prince Philip wasn’t similarly known as the King Consort”, said the i news site.

Why Queen Consort and not Queen Camilla?

The former Duchess of Cornwall has not become Queen Camilla in her own right “because the throne can only be inherited and cannot be taken by members who married into the royal family”, said The Independent.

She will instead be given the title Queen Consort, which will allow her to be anointed at Charles’s side at his coronation, just as the last Queen Consort, the Queen Mother, was when King George VI was crowned in 1937.

It completes a remarkable turnaround for Camilla, as few women had been “as publicly vilified” as she was, said BBC royal correspondent Sarah Campbell. “She was ‘the other woman’ in the marriage break-up of the century, endlessly compared to Diana, Princess of Wales,” said Campbell. “In choosing Charles, she upended her life. For years she was hounded by the press, her character and appearance relentlessly attacked. But she weathered the storm and gradually cemented her position as the most senior female member of the Royal Family.”

Camilla has slowly gained popularity amongst the public, with the latest YouGov poll placing her as the eighth most popular Royal, with the evolution of her title testament to that transformation.

At the time of Charles and Camilla’s wedding, she announced she would take the lesser title Princess Consort, which remained her official position until her status as Queen Consort-in-waiting was confirmed earlier this year.

What is the precedent?

The wives of ruling kings have traditionally become queen consorts – although the husbands of sovereign queens do not have the right to a royal title.

Following in the footsteps of Prince Albert, the husband of Queen Victoria, the Duke of Edinburgh was given the title of Prince Philip in 1957, five years after the Queen took the throne. Her mother, who was married to King George VI, was known as Queen Elizabeth and then, after his death, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.

Though women traditionally receive an equivalent title to the male Royal they marry, men are not honoured with an equivalent title to their wives. That’s why Prince Philip did not receive the title of King or King Consort when he married Queen Elizabeth II.

This is because there are more variations of Queen than there are of King.

“A Queen can be a Queen Consort (married to a King), a Queen Regnant (reigning in her own right), or a Queen Dowager (mother of the reigning monarch),” said the Express in 2019.

“Kings, however, only exist as Kings Regnant… Camilla will be a Queen Consort when Charles succeeds his mother. Philip, on the other hand, can’t be a King, since it’s his wife (the Queen Regnant) doing the reigning.”

What does the role of Queen Consort entail?

The Queen Consort’s primary role is to “provide companionship and moral and practical support” to the reigning monarch, Buckingham Palace said in a statement.

“While the monarch plays a constitutional role in approving bills before they become law,” reported The Independent, “the Queen Consort does not hold a formal position in the structure of government”, added BuzzFeed.

She also does not see official state papers or hold official audiences, although she is Queen Consort over 15 other Commonwealth countries where King Charles is head of state.

The Times of India has reported that Camilla is also set to inherit “the world’s most controversial diamond”, the Koh-i-Noor, which forms part of the Imperial State Crown, which was originally created in 1937 for the coronation of King George VI, and later went to Queen Elizabeth II.

The paper reported that the priceless diamond, which was originally found in India’s Golconda mines in the 14th century and came into British hands during the colonial era, “is the subject of a historic ownership dispute and is claimed by at least four countries, including India”.

The Daily Mail previously reported that the crown that has the Koh-i-Noor “has only been worn by female royals… because it is said to be unlucky for men to do so”.

So what about Kate?

Given the historical precedent, and more importantly the public standing enjoyed by William and Kate, it is unlikely that she will face public opposition when William, now Prince of Wales, ascends to the throne.

While there will be no formal announcement until his coronation, it is widely assumed that she will take the title of Queen Consort Catherine – or, informally, Queen Catherine.

And George, Charlotte and Louis?

The 1701 Act of Settlement laid out the line of succession to exclude Roman Catholics and prioritise male primogeniture, meaning royal sons took precedence over their female siblings, including first-born royal daughters.

This is why the Queen’s second eldest child, Princess Anne, is behind her younger brothers Prince Andrew and Edward in line to the throne.

Ahead of the birth of William and Kate’s first child, a public outcry over the antiquated law led to Parliament passing the Succession to the Crown Act 2013.

It states that for any royal births after 29 October 2011, the succession will be decided by birth order, regardless of sex. This means that William and Kate’s second child, Princess Charlotte, will remain third in line to the throne behind her brother, with their third child, Prince Louis, now fourth in line. Their uncle, Prince Harry, follows in fifth position, with his two children behind him.

Although the bill was rushed through Parliament before the birth of Prince George in 2013, it did not formally become law until two years later, as it had to be ratified by all countries in the Commonwealth.

As well as changes to the succession, the act also allowed for members of the Royal Family to marry a Roman Catholic and become King or Queen, and replaced the Royal Marriages Act 1772, meaning now only the first six in line to the throne need the Queen’s consent to marry. It did not, however, change the law to allow a Roman Catholic to become monarch.

What title can Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s children take?

Even before stepping down as Royals, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex had decided their son would be styled as Master Archie Mountbatten-Windsor rather than taking a title, in accordance with their wish that he grow up as a private citizen.

Now Charles is King, both Archie and his sister Lilibet “will be entitled to be styled as an HRH” by attaching the titles of Prince and Princess respectively to their names, said Town and Country.

A French court has ruled that topless photographs of Kate Middleton taken by paparazzi and published in a French celebrity magazine were an invasion of privacy.

The ruling, just a day after the announcement that the Duchess of Cambridge is pregnant with her third child, brings to an end a five-year legal case.

Earlier this year, six people, including three photographers, were tried after long-lens pictures of the couple on holiday in France in 2012 were published in Closer magazine and a local newspaper, La Provence.

Similar images later appeared in Italian, Swedish and Danish publications after several British papers turned down the chance to buy the photos. The Irish Daily Star also ran the images, but its editor resigned after a public outcry and accusations from a Palace spokesman that the publication of the images was "grotesque and totally unjustifiable".

Now the court has awarded the royal couple €100,000 (£91,000) in damages and interest and ordered both the editor and the owner of the glossy magazine to pay a fine of €45,000 (£41,000) each, the maximum in each case. Closer editor Laurence Piea and publisher Ernest Mauria could have been sent to prison for up to a year, but retained their freedom.

While the amount is one of the highest ever in a privacy case in France, "it is a fraction of the £1.4m the couple wanted over the grainy images", says the Daily Mail.

Neither of the royals attended the court sessions over the years although Prince William did present statements attacking the paparazzi and claiming the impact of the topless photographs was "all the more painful" given the link between harassment by the press and the death of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales.

The six defendants argued the couple regularly allow their private lives to be sold to millions of people around the world.

During May's hearing, The Guardian reported comments made by Closer's lawyer, Paul-Albert Iweins who attacked the "Anglo-Saxon reasoning behind punitive damages and compensation" and said the trial was hypocritical.

"The public and private lives of the royal couple are so closely linked as to be inseparable," Iweins said, adding it was of "public interest to know that future heirs to the throne have a solid relationship and are getting on well" and that the photographs cast the young couple in a positive light.

While yesterday's guilty verdict was certainly not a surprise, "what was interesting about this case was that the royal couple and their lawyers here were pushing for a much, much larger amount in damages", says the BBC's Hugh Schofield, "in effect, saying the royal couple is different".

"There was an attempt to turn this into a different kind of affair, one in which there would be almost punitive damages awarded against Closer magazine", says the Paris Correspondent.

As it is, while the payout is substantial, is it not the "precedent-setting kind of damages which would really act as a deterrent to Closer magazine and others like it in the future".

The Duchess of Cambridge has given birth to a boy, a little brother for Prince George and Princess Charlotte.

The new royal baby was born at 11.01am weighing 8lbs 7oz.

He is fifth in line to the throne and is Queen Elizabeth’s sixth great-grandchild.

Catherine and her new son are “both doing well” and both families are “delighted with the news”, according to a statement from Kensington Palace.

The Duchess was admitted to the Lindo Wing at St Mary's Hospital, Paddington, shortly before 6am, with Prince William by her side.

Here’s what we know so far:

Where was the baby born?

Kate Middleton returned to the Lindo Wing, the private maternity ward at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, where she had Prince George, now four, and Princess Charlotte, now two. Prince William and Prince Harry were also born there.

The maternity ward promises “world-class care”, with private en-suite rooms and state-of-the-art facilities.

One woman who gave birth there last year told Hello! Magazine that “an afternoon tea to celebrate the baby's birth, a post-delivery massage and glasses of bubbly are all part of the service”.

Prices for a standard room package start at £5,900 for the first 24 hours of a “normal” delivery, although mothers who have previously had a baby at the Lindo Wing, like Catherine, may be eligible for a 10% reduction.

Guy Thorpe-Beeston, surgeon gynaecologist to the Royal Household, and Alan Farthing, a consultant gynaecological surgeon, were present at the latest royal birth.

What will the royal baby be called?

Kate and William’s first two children were given traditional royal names, Charlotte Elizabeth Diana and George Alexander Louis, so it seems likely that they will take a similar approach with their third child. Current favourites among the bookmakers for a boy are Arthur, Albert, Philip, James and Henry.

Where will the royal baby be in line to the throne?

The new baby will be fifth in line to the throne. Prince Charles is currently at the front, followed by Prince William, Prince George and then Princess Charlotte. Prince Harry will be pushed down to sixth in line. Following changes to succession laws in 2011, which give sons and daughters of any future UK monarch an equal right to the throne, Princess Charlotte will remain fourth in line to the throne, despite having a baby brother.

Who will be the godparents of the royal baby?

There are a number of possible contenders for the new baby’s godparents “include one of the van Custem brothers – who are old family friends of Prince William”, says The Evening Standard.

However William van Cutsem is one of George’s godparents, “so the couple may ask one of his siblings - Hugh, Edward or Nicholas - or perhaps Hugh's wife Rose van Cutsem”, the paper adds.

Prince George has seven godparents that include Julia Samuel, a close friend of William’s mother Diana as well as the couple's former private secretary Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton and William's cousin Zara Tindall.

Meanwhile, no members of the royal family made it onto the list of Princess Charlotte’s godparents, with Kate and William instead opting for a member of Diana’s family instead.

Charlotte's five also included Kate's school friend Sophie Carter and Laura and Lady Jane Fellowes, William’s two cousins on his mother’s side.

There has been much speculation over whether Meghan Markle or Prince Harry will get the role.

But the Daily Express's well-placed royal expert James Brookes regards that as unlikely.

“I don’t think Meghan will feature this time around – not least because the Cambridges haven’t given Harry the role either,” he said.

“So it would a bit odd bypassing him for Meghan especially as, in the grand scheme of things, the couple haven’t known her for as long.”

Brookes added: “The thinking of many royal watchers is that as an uncle, and living at Kensington Palace, Harry would get to see George and Charlotte rather a lot anyway so perhaps William and Kate thought it best to give the godparent title to someone else.”