Prince Harry and his wife Meghan’s bombshell allegations about the royal family in a TV interview were sad and disappointing but will not harm the monarchy in the long term.
That was the consensus among some of Victoria’s staunchest royal supporters following the tell-all interview with Oprah Winfrey, in which the prince said an unnamed relative had been concerned about how dark their baby Archie’s skin would be.
Constitutional monarchist Jason Ronald at home with a portrait of the Queen.Credit:Chris Hopkins
Meghan told Winfrey she had contemplated suicide and was refused mental health help, and Harry accused his family of failing to support Meghan amid racist media coverage in Britain.
Jason Ronald, national chairman of the Royal Over-Seas League, said the interview was “all a bit sad” but, like Princess Diana’s revelations to journalist Martin Bashir in 1995, it would not change anything.
Mr Ronald, a cattle farmer at Tallarook, north of Melbourne, who has met the Queen three times, said the interview would not affect the strength of the monarchy. Prince Harry had denied it was the Queen who made the racial remarks about Archie, “and there’s never been a bad word said against her”, Mr Ronald said.
He said the monarchy “continues on strongly in her capable hands” and in Prince Charles, Prince William and Prince George “there are some good people to follow”.
“Long may it continue.”
Bryan Stertern-Gill, a spokesman for the Australians for Constitutional Monarchy and for the Victorian chapter of the International Monarchist League, said the interview was “a great shame in view of the great age of the Queen, and Prince Philip’s medical condition, and their lifetime of service to the Commonwealth”.
