Another Lamb to the Slaughter

Dear readers this week I have found myself completely distraught by what I see as the Prince of Wales publicity campaign which victimized his youngest and most vulnerable son, Prince Harry. I have been appalled to read the praise of Prince Charles responding to his son with the "courage of a wise and loving dad" by the News of the World(1) who splashed the story across it's front pages. What I find to be even more appalling is the way the other papers jumped on the bandwagon to add their tributes for "behaving perfectly" (The Mirror), politicians such as Tony Blair(2) who said Prince Charles acted in a "very responsible" and "a very sensitive way", and even the chief executive of Addaction, Peter Martin, commended Prince Charles for tending to the matter 'promptly and properly'(3). Really?

Who gave Press Complaints Commission (PCC), headed by Guy Black, the power to decide this was "an exceptional matter of public interest"? What drove 'everyone in authority' to allow this interest, as Torin Douglas of the BBC reported, to override "the need to protect Prince Harry's privacy(4)"? Where was Prince Charles not only during this decision making process, but when his sixteen-year-old son was left to his own devices. When was it decided that a private incident from last summer be exposed five months after its resolution? How did Prince Charles allow this to happen? Why was Harry exposed? That's the question that is foremost on my mind. Let's start at the beginning and walk through this one question at a time.

Who? My first guess was Mark Bolland, the man honored in 2001 as "PR Professional of the Year" by PR Week magazine for his having not only "overseen a massive sea change in the relationship between Charles and the press" but for "moving the subject of any potential marriage to Camilla Parker Bowles on to less negative ground". The Telegraph reported that, "The Prince was believed to have allowed Mr. Bolland to leak stories suggesting that Princes William and Harry accepted Mrs. Parker Bowles.(5)" The Scotsman reported at the time, "And Hugo Vickers, who writes on Royal issues, says... "It seems they are prepared to say anything to boost Charles, whatever the cost to anyone else.(6)"

This is the same Mr. Bolland who lodged a complaint against The Mirror newspaper for reporting on Prince Harry's sports injury back in November 1998. According to the BBC, Piers Morgan, editor in question, denied "the prince's claim that the article was "intrusive and trivial" and accused him of trying to "bully and censor the press(7)". Prince Charles' office issued a statement regarding the issue that included, "We are therefore making a formal complaint about this matter to the Press Complaints Commission which, with newspaper editors, has done a great deal over the years to protect the privacy of Prince William and Prince Harry, and will ask them to deal with it." The same Mr. Bolland who left the PCC stewardship to his partner, Guy Black. Per an article in Tuesday's Independent,(8) Mr. Black, Mr. Bolland, Ross Kemp, a childhood friend of Mr. Black, and Mr. Kemp's girlfriend, Rebekah Wade, Editor of the News of the World, are friendly and have vacationed together. The News of the World is the paper that broke this story and the story that became known as "Sophiegate".

What drove this behavior? I suspect Mr. Bolland's quest to improve Charles' image. To quote The Sun, "Reading about Harry's drug problems could alert parents to the perils faced by their OWN teenage kids, Prince Charles decided. And he agreed that running the story was in the "public interest"(9). 

Where was Prince Charles? According to the 'authorized' story by an FOC (Friend of Charles) he was "often away on business in London" so Prince Harry found himself "at home alone at Highgrove" where he "was encouraged to have friends round to keep him company." Which family friends could he have invited without experiencing this dreadful result? Definitely not Charles paramour, Camilla Parker-Bowles because who will be there to take care of his needs then? Her son, Tom Parker Bowles, perhaps? Oh dear, he's a cocaine user who we're told was banned from visiting William for a bit after that admission. Also, in the February issue of Fable he penned a cooking article in which he said a particular cooker "looks more suitable for cooking up crack than canap�s" so the ban may have to be reinstituted. What about Mrs. Parker-Bowles sister's, Annabel, son, Ben Elliot? No good, he was once described by The Daily Mail as a, "key player in the smart social set that has given Prince Charles cause for concern because of its influence over Prince William". Plus this August he was demanding "an apology and substantial damages yesterday from two tabloid newspapers that printed pictures purportedly showing him and Jade Jagger frolicking naked on a public beach in Ibiza(11)" so obviously he was a little too busy. How about his cousin, Emma Parker Bowles? Wait, that's no good either because Emma was admitted to a drug and alcohol addiction clinic which has to mean she was more into drugs than Tom or that she just wanted to stop taking drugs in a controlled situation in order to avoid a large weight gain. How about Nicholas Knatchbull, another of Charles' godchildren and the future Earl Mountbatten of Burma and William's mentor at Eton? Unfortunately, he's been questioned by the police over possession of illegal substances and spent a bit of time in a drugs clinic himself. There's always Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, daughter of Charles' very dear friends Patti and Charles. She might have had time since her fall from the "It" girl status she once claimed. Wrong again, she lost her status do to her admission of a cocaine habit and her subsequent stint in rehab. I'm quite sure it was the same one Emma went to. Gee it would appear that Charles' friends have no more clue about parenting than he does. Thank heavens he has his son, William, to "consult" with on these things.

According to Penny Junor, author of Charles: Victim or Villain?, was quoted in The Herald(14) as saying, "It is quite well known that Harry drank a lot and has been drinking for some time underage and causes a fuss. It gets quite out of order." This was seconded by an article in the Sunday People(13) that stated, "Harry was definitely smoking cigarettes from the age of 11 or 12." This FOC also stated that even on family vacations the Princes were "left to entertain themselves in some style." This appears to be a problem of more than two months duration. This appears to be a problem that requires more than a few hours touring a rehab to repair and I believe that this total humiliation is the exact opposite of what is required to overcome it.

When was it decided that this unfortunate incident ought to be dragged out of the past and heralded in the future? Could it have been on a weekend retreat with the four Musketeers, Bolland, Black, Kemp and Wade? Could it have been part of another grand scheme of Mr. Bolland's? Perhaps he plans to rob the fanfare of the Queen's Golden Jubilee year from the Queen and shift it over to Charles? It seems possible especially after what I read today. It was an article calling for the Queen to step down during her Jubilee year and was written by a man who claims to be a schoolmate of Charles' wanting to let the world know that Charles is ready to be King. Though it could have nothing to do with this episode, the timing seems too perfect.

How could Charles allow this to happen? Does he forget his own drinking nightmare when at 14 he was photographed while on a school field trip ordering and drinking a glass of cherry brandy? In his authorized biography, "The Prince of Wales" by Jonathan Dimbleby, Charles' recollection of his return to school is this; "I wish he had beaten me…slightly sore backside for a day or two…but instead I was demoted." Mr. Dimbleby goes on to say, "Humiliated by the press, horrified by the sacking (of his protection officer), and wounded by the headmaster, the Prince was profoundly shaken: "I thought it was the end of the world."(10) The sting he described so vividly approximately 30 years later he would willing put on his son in the name of public interest? He would sacrifice his son to secure a position as the 'Prince of Parenting'?

Why was Harry exposed? We've been reading articles lately that Buckingham Palace is not happy with the way in which the staff at St. James Palace uses the royal family at the expense of making the Prince of Wales look good. The examples have been of Prince Edward and his wife, Sophie. They say they are being used as the scapegoats in a scheme to improve Charles' image. They are adults and can take care of themselves, but Harry is a young man and Charles is his father. How could a father allow such a thing to be done to his son?

Has everyone forgotten that Harry lost his mother four years ago. A mother who I noted in the article Parenting an Heir and a Spare, was devoted to her children. "Diana's negative feelings about her childhood drove her to focus completely on giving her son's a stable upbringing. No detail of their life escaped her notice." In a This is London(15) article and elderly woman out walking her dog around Highgrove very sternly told reporters, "Listen, he was a little boy who lost his mummy when he was just 12. Who are we to judge him?" These are the most sage words anyone has uttered about the incident.

For here is an innocent boy robbed of his mother, betrayed by his father, compared to his brother, humiliated at the hands of some very unsavory characters, and left alone to figure it all out for himself. The way he must be feeling reminds me of the way his mother, Diana, described feeling on her wedding day when on the way down the aisle she spotted Camilla Parker-Bowles - like a lamb to the slaughter. It seems to me that given the evidence, her youngest son has been equally devastated. Harry, we all want you happy. Don't let these inhumane; self-serving people destroy your sense of self.

1 http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/news.html
2 http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/page.cfm?objectid=11537280&method=full
3 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1759000/1759328.stm
4 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1759000/1759745.stm
5 http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/11/02/nchaz02.xml
6 http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1492502001&rware=MWWWLUAHOYKV&CQ_CUR_DOCUMENT=3
7 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_218000/218012.stm
8 http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=114471
9 http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2002020401,00.html
10 The Prince of Wales: A Biography by Jonathan Dimbleby. Copyright 1994. William Morrow and Company, Inc., New York. Page 69
11 http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2001%2F08%2F07%2Fnjade07.xml
12 http://www.people.co.uk/
13 http://www.people.co.uk/
14 http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/archive/14-1-19102-1-11-15.html
15 http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/html/news/top_direct_london.html
16 http://www.pcc.org.uk/10YearBook/1998.html
 

Above are some links for your use in further investigating the awful truths that surround this ugly sacrifice of an innocent child. I wish that Harry would take a case to the PCC himself based on a case they list on their website16 as an accomplishment for 1998: A crucial privacy adjudication came with a complaint from Coronation Street actor Stephen Billington. The Commission ruled it unacceptable for newspapers to use an apparent public interest defence - such as, in this case, exposing a blackmailer - to print intrusive material about an individual, and upheld his complaint. Remember it was Mr. Black who decided this story was an exceptional matter of public interest.

Here are some other boasts of the PCC with respect to the rights of children: