Irreconcilable? A father and son who might never meet again

The king will put his role as head of state above any feelings he has as a father in his dealings with Prince Harry after his latest confessional interview, sources have said.

Harry’s complaints in a BBC interview and a later statement this weekend have raised questions for the government and the royal family.

But the Duke of Sussex, 40, is expected to remain an outcast while he continues to challenge the refusal by the Home Office’s Royal and VIP Executive Committee (Ravec) to grant him and his family a right to armed police protection when in the UK. He has complained that his father refuses to speak to him or take his calls.

Royal sources have suggested it would have been constitutionally improper for the king to intervene while the case was before the courts. Charles, 76, is embarrassed that his son took legal action against His Majesty’s government and his reluctance to be seen with Harry is expected to continue until the matter is finally resolved or dropped.

Harry has asked home secretary Yvette Cooper to review the processes that led to him losing the right to lifetime protection while former politicians are given permanent security.

“In recent years my family and I have been subjected to well documented neo-Nazi and extremist threats, including from al-Qaida,” he said. “There are individuals in prison on UK soil because of such threats. And yet, since 2019 a proper risk assessment has not been conducted.”

His decision to move his family abroad led to Ravec’s decision to downgrade his armed security, while taxpayers continue to pay an estimated £10 million a year to protect eight former prime ministers.

Royal insiders have contrasted the monarch’s attitude towards his son compared with his approach towards Prince Andrew and Andrew’s ex-wife, Sarah, Duchess of York. The key, according to some family friends, is that Andrew and Fergie have remained fiercely loyal to the king.

Harry appears to have accepted he has little prospect of getting permission to go to the Supreme Court after the Court of Appeal ruled that although Ravec departed from its policy, it was understandable that it had created a bespoke case-by-case assessment because of his decision to live abroad.

If Cooper is unwilling to help him, he may be forced to drop his complaints, opening up the possibility that the king might at least be open to some form of reconciliation. But the king and his relatives worry whether they can trust Harry to ensure that private conversations do not end up in a future memoir or documentary.

A Buckingham Palace spokesman summed up the monarch’s weariness, saying: “All of these issues have been examined repeatedly and meticulously by the courts, with the same conclusion reached on each occasion.”