Prince George ‘played sheep in school nativity’

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He may be the third in line to the throne, but when it came to casting the school nativity Prince George received no special favours.

Prince William has revealed that the young royal played the distinctly low-key role of sheep in the festive pageant at Thomas’ school in Battersea, The Daily Telegraph reports.

“I went to my boy's nativity play. It was funny,” the Duke of Cambridge told schoolchildren at the BBC’s Salford headquarters on Wednesday. “He was a sheep.”

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The four-year-old prince began his first term at the £18,000-a-year school in September. At the time, headteacher Ben Thomas was at pains to emphasise that the royal - listed on the register as George Cambridge - would be treated no differently from his classmates.

Regardless of his humble role in the nativity, George appears to be looking forward to Christmas.

Last week, during a trip around a traditional Christmas market in Finland, the Duke of Cambridge handed over a Christmas list from his oldest child to a local Santa Claus. Eagle-eyed photographers snapped a close-up of the note, the first example of the prince’s handwriting, to see what was on George’s wishlist. In fact, the young royal only had one toy on his mind - a police car:

Prince George’s new school vulnerable to terror attacks, claim local residents

4 September

As Prince George prepares to start school this week, local residents have expressed concern about the security mechanisms in place ahead of his arrival.

One resident, doctor Sarah Burnett-Moore, filmed herself entering Thomas’s Battersea school unchallenged, after the wrought iron gate and a main entrance door were left open, reports The Daily Telegraph.

She told the paper that, given the imminent arrival of Prince George, the incident represents an “astonishing” absence of security - at an establishment the Daily Mail says is charging £17,604 a year.

“I could have walked in with an IED [bomb] and set it to go off on Thursday”, she said, adding that many of her neighbours share her concern that the prince’s presence at the school will make the area vulnerable to attacks.

The school was closed for refurbishment at the time Burnett-Moore was able to enter the premises, but builders regularly traipsed in and out of the building.

While Kensington Palace have not commented on the incident, royal insiders told the Telegraph that “a slick, well-rehearsed security operation will come into force” once Prince George attends the school, including hourly security checks of the building.

As George prepares for his first day at Thomas’s Battersea, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have confirmed that they are expecting their third child together.