Since Harry and Meghan left Britain for California, leaving behind official royal duties, relations between the couple and the rest of the royals have been rocky. But now the Sussexes have returned to the UK and begun mending fences, things have changed.
William is the heir to the throne and diligently takes on the responsibilities which come with that. But Harry, with his place in the public eye but outside of The Firm, has the freedom to speak and act more openly than his brother.
So, will Harry or William win the UK’s hearts and minds? Royal correspondent Richard Palmer and The i Paper columnist Anne McElvoy give their perspectives.
There was a time when Prince Harry was so popular no UK newspaper editor would dare criticise him, but these days it is Prince William who is virtually untouchable.
Harry and Meghan still have their fans. Yet turning around public animosity will be a big job. Their decision to quit official royal duties six years ago in favour of earning cash from commercial activities was interpreted as a rejection of Britain. Their subsequent attacks on the royal institution since have not helped either. But what really annoys their critics is the idea that they want all of the privileges of royalty without the responsibility.
They are unlikely to ever work for the monarchy again but, in spite of all of the drama of the past six years, it is not too late for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex to win back much of their popularity. Reputations can change over time in the national soap opera that is the Royal Family and there are opportunities as well as pitfalls on the path ahead.
Harry can surely look to the example set by his late mother Diana, Princess of Wales, who, like him, was a private individual after her divorce but was able to sustain much of her popularity.
Granted, their positions are not exactly the same. She did not seek to make money on the side – perhaps because she had no need to, after receiving a £17m lump sum and an annual £400,000 to run her private office in a divorce settlement that left her living at Kensington Palace.
Harry has no such luxury but is still not short of a bob or two. What is more important is that he can follow Diana in using his independence from the institution and state to speak out more freely than William and other family members about the big challenges facing Britain and the world.
Diana famously incurred the wrath of the British government by speaking out against landmines among other issues but ultimately she was on the right side of history. It won’t endear him to the Royal Household or other parts of the establishment but Harry can use the platform his birthright gave him to help hold Britain and other nations’ governments to account.
We have already started to see that with his speech in Kyiv in April in which he urged Vladimir Putin to end Russia’s war on Ukraine but also, crucially, demanded that the United States honour its international treaty obligations under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum to join the UK and other signatories in upholding the security of the east European country. By contrast, when William visited British troops in Poland near the Ukrainian border in 2023, he was restricted to blandishments about “keeping everyone safe out here and keeping an eye on what’s going on”.
It can be the same in the UK. Back in 2017 Harry went on a series of visits to support charities and other groups that were trying to keep youth centres open in the face of severe cuts to council budgets. In Leicester I remember his frustration as he explained to young people that, because of the convention that members of the Royal Family don’t get involved in party political disputes, he couldn’t say what he really thought about the cuts. Now, faced with the same problem, he could name and shame councils or central government.
Harry has spoken about how he lost a sense of purpose and identity when he left the Army after 10 years. He should have stayed in but told me he didn’t want to do the desk jobs, interspersed with more frontline roles, required to obtain further promotion. When he did move from being an Apache helicopter pilot to become a staff officer at London HQ, some of his colleagues complained they never knew where he was.
His decision to create the Invictus Games for injured troops remains his greatest achievement but there is perhaps more he could do yet to advocate for military families. Might he speak out more regularly, for example, to force the government to act more quickly to end the scandal of damp and mouldy accommodation for military families?
There is still one big block here. Diana complained about and undermined the monarchy but she also played the game with the media and the public. Harry needs to do the same now, make peace with the remaining sections of the media he is still at war with and return to be the fun-loving prince everyone used to admire, even if he did wear his heart on his sleeve and show his anger and frustration at times. Indeed, harnessing that emotion to the causes he cares about could be the key.
There is one more thing he and Meghan could do to help build bridges with the rest of the family: stop using their royal titles and be known as Harry and Meghan Sussex. He would still be the King’s son and the next king’s brother so what he said and did would still have an impact, but it would put clear blue water between him and the official royals.
If he can be seen to be doing the right thing for the right reasons – carrying the responsibilities of royalty without being allowed to enjoy its privileges – while William becomes ever more restricted in what he can and can’t say and do, then the turnaround could be achieved.