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This episode commenced with a single photograph, arguably the most significant ever captured of a individual from the royal household.

There stood the Earl of Inverness, with his arm around a female youth, while an associate grinned suggestively in the background.

Absent that image, captured at a gathering in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the allegations of a adolescent who stated she was transported across the ocean and forced to have brief intimate contact with a prince of the royal bloodline?

A curious, telling move by someone who had publicly asserted to have no been aware of her, asserted he could no have had intimate contact with her, and yet handed over millions of monarchical resources to resolve a long-delayed lawsuit.

A Long Period of Controversy

Considering this, discussions of the royals acting firmly to distance themselves from Andrew are inaccurate. This controversy has persisted for the better part of 15 years since that photograph, and a further snapshot of Andrew ambling amiably with a notorious individual emerged.

• Arrogance: For what duration did his siblings, perhaps even his relatives, know that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Dubious Friendships: They must have realized, if his staff and the police were fulfilling their roles, that he had some extremely unsavory companions given he publicly welcomed them to royal residences.
• Fiscal Irresponsibility: If the family did not know about his personal conduct, they certainly knew about his extravagance with taxpayer funds.

Travel were printed in royal annual reports: private aircraft flights from the estate to a country club and back again in time for midday meal, private flights instead of scheduled services, all for the comfort of "the travel enthusiast".

A Life of Privilege

Additionally the presumption which required subservience when he walked into a room or the supreme awareness about his designations used on his letterheads in letters to his associates.

He managed to escape consequences while his parent, who strangely indulged him, was still living. The sovereign did at least strip him of official roles and honorary colonelcies in the aftermath of his ill-fated and, it is now clear, deceptive public statement six years ago.

Current Situation

Just in the last two weeks that events sped up, following the publication of biographical works giving more grim information of his actions and that of his connections.

Further disclosures have again highlighted Andrew's belief that he could get away with lying about his interaction with a notorious figure.

People (and the media) were far ahead of the royal family. There was no one of any consequence to defend him, a consequence of all those years of hubris.

Monarchical Concerns

The more intelligent royals understood that. The one imperative is to transfer the institution, if not as before at least whole and untarnished.

For generations the last 190 years trying to reverse the reputation of past sovereigns, showing they are useful, responsible and reactive to their subjects.

He was placing all that in jeopardy in an era when respect and secrecy is no longer adequate.

Consequences

Finally, the famously uncertain sovereign was prodded further. There was no alternative. The institution had relinquished authority of the account.

Presently the removal of designations and the continued and lifetime social disgrace that will hurt Andrew the most.

• Demotion: Lowered to just a commoner
• Prior Instance: The first royal to forfeit his honorifics in modern times
• Naval Career: Especially painful given his duty in the conflict

He remains a counsellor of state, on paper able to act for the king, and he is still in the succession to the monarchy, but not any of these will ever happen.

Future Prospects

Can persons he encounters still defer to him? Might they still slip up and call him Your Highness? Might they say Andrew,

Naturally, he is not retiring to an ordinary town, but to the monarchy's extensive property at a monarchical property.

In that place, he will be supplied by the monarch with one of the estate properties and given some sort of personal stipend.

It is not his prior accommodation, where he paid a token payment for more than 20 years, and Norfolk is a bit remote, but even so it may not be far enough.

Pending Matters

Matters remain unresolved. There are still files in the possession of US Congress to be disclosed.

• Parliamentary Interest: Could legislators request additional information
• Fiscal Review: Or examine the improper use of state resources
• Criminal Investigation: There may even be a criminal probe into his behavior

Maybe for the time being the institutional damage to the crown is contained. The message from the royal household was evidently that the revocation of designations was what the sovereign, and particularly other senior family members, sought.

A Shift in Position

An end to pretence that Andrew was making the choice himself. And, significantly, the concise statement showed plainly that the royals were siding with the victim's narrative of events.

Additionally, for the premiere occasion they finally showed concern for the victims: "The measures are judged required, notwithstanding the truth that he persists in refuting the accusations against him."

In the end it is entitlement, selfishness and inactivity that will kill the crown. In his stupidity, personal excess and corruption, Andrew seems never to have learned that reality.