A Reunion for Harry and The King?

0:28Insurance isn't one size fits all. Will Prince Harry meet the king? Meghan's Netflix show gets more scathing reviews and Queen Camilla wants to hit a groper with her shoe. I'm Jack Royston, Newsweek's Chief Royal Correspondent and this is Newsweek's Royal Report. Hello listeners and welcome to the show. It is a question that no doubt we have all asked before a hundred times but Prince Harry's planning a new visit to England for the Well Child Awards, sparking the inevitable debate about whether he will meet his father. Now, obviously, it's particularly important because Harry has seen Charles just once since the King was diagnosed with cancer in January 2024.

1:11And even then, that was for under an hour before Charles disappeared off to Sandringham to recover. Not only that, but Harry's spokesperson said on a visit to London in May that year that he had not been able to meet Charles because of the monarch's other priorities, and he added that he hoped to see his father soon, but that didn't happen. So just let me go back over those timings again. So Charles was diagnosed actually with cancer in January 2024. He announced it publicly in February. Harry appeared to just jump on the next plane to Britain and got all the way over here and got about half an hour, 45 minutes with his father, came back to London, you know, flew straight home, came back to London a couple of months later in the May for a court case, if I recall correctly.

1:55and Charles didn't see him. And so Harry made it clear that he had wanted that meeting and seemed to kind of almost take a bit of a swipe at Charles, saying the king had other priorities. They haven't met again since. We know Harry wants it. The king has not facilitated it, despite multiple trips to Britain. So that really is what's at the core of the question surrounding Harry's attendance at the Wellchild Awards, which we all saw coming and we knew he was going to. It's a fantastic event, actually, but this will be hanging over it. So there's already been an article in the Daily Mirror, it's a UK tabloid, which sparked a lot of debate, basically saying they're going to meet.

2:38And there's also been already a follow-up article in the Mirror suggesting that they're not going to meet. So, I mean, I think it was a fairly speculative piece, to be totally honest with you, with probably an overwritten headline. It's not the first, and it won't be the last. but it got all the debate shows talking i did a tv debate on good morning britain about it um you know i think it needs that story needs to be taken with a pinch of salt which doesn't necessarily mean they're not going to meet and it won't happen um but i think it's just all still up in the air you know i'm not convinced that they themselves necessarily know for certain whether they're going to get it together um but first though just a few key details so harry is in London for the Well Child Awards, like I said.

3:21It's on September the 8th. It's usually in a kind of posh London hotel and the charity works for children and young people living with serious illnesses or complex medical needs. And so the awards are basically about honouring those kids, but also their parents and guardians who work tirelessly to kind of help them live as close to a normal life as possible. It's genuinely a really good cause. And in the past, it's actually seen Harry brought to tears. In fact, you know, it was at the Well Child Awards that Harry kind of broke down during the middle of a speech leading to this in 2019. And William saw the video footage and it led to, you know, the big final breakup argument between them.

4:04So, you know, there's a lot of kind of emotional weight coming from all kinds of different directions here. It's going to be probably quite an emotional visit for Harry. And we are told he's going to spend time with the winners and their families at reception before the ceremony. And then at the ceremony, he's going to present an award for inspirational child aged four to six. He'll also give a speech. And Harry is great with children. He, you know, he genuinely is. So he will be in his element, I think, particularly at that kind of reception for families beforehand. So he's given he's given a statement, you know, which was released by Well Child in their press release.

4:39And it read, I am always privileged to attend the Well Child Awards and meet the incredible children, families and professionals who inspire us all with their strength and spirit. For 20 years, these awards have highlighted the courage of young people living with complex health needs and shone a light on the devoted caregivers, family and professionals who support them every step of the way. Their stories remind us of the power of compassion, connection and community. So that's the main event. And it also coincides with the anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II's passing away. she died on September the 8th 2022.

5:14Now I don't personally think there's going to be any particular offence taken by the fact that it's on the same date. Sometimes people talk about upstaging and that sort of thing. I doubt very much that that's going to be the atmosphere and in the last couple of years there hasn't been a kind of formal event on September the 8th and in fact actually quite the opposite but it does present a problem because the last two years the king has marked the anniversary of his mother's death up in Scotland, where he's gone to church at Crathy Kirk, and he's predominantly mourned privately. It actually mirrors the same way that the queen marked the anniversary of her own father's death, her recession day.

5:56Because, of course, you've got to remember, in the royal family, the anniversary of your parents' death is also the anniversary of the moment you became monarch. And so the The Queen always used to spend it up at Sandringham, which is where her father died. So Charles would be up in Scotland, which is where the Queen died. She died at Balmoral. So doing so creates also a moment of privacy and an opportunity for some kind of solitude and quiet reflection, I think. Now, in any normal family, you might just say, well, why doesn't Harry just jump on a plane, head up to Scotland and see Charles there?

6:32But doubtless, it's a little more complicated in the royal family. and that would require him to circumnavigate potentially around Charles's aides, one of whom he's written some very disparaging things about in his book Spare. And that's always been a problem for Harry is that there's so much aggression towards these key gatekeepers of his inter-family connections. In order to speak to his relatives, Charles doesn't even have a mobile phone. In order to speak to Charles, he's got to go through staff and Harry hates the staff and social staff no doubt hate him back. No love lost on either side.

7:08Now, I've said it before on this podcast because it always looked like this was the most likely opportunity for Harry to come to Britain and see his father. We were always waiting for when is the next moment going to be. That provides a litmus test for where Harry and Charles' relationship is. And it was always most likely, in my opinion, to be the Well Child Awards because Harry does go every year. It's in September. It's also, for what it's worth, it's near his birthday, which is mid-September. On this occasion, it's about a week and a half or so before Donald Trump's US state visit. So there might be a little busyness there around pre-planning, but if Charles is still in Scotland, then he shouldn't be too busy, basically.

7:53Now, we kind of know how Harry sees things because he said he wants reconciliation. He said this in an interview with the BBC back in May, And he also blundered into a new swipe at his father in that self-same interview, which kind of perfectly encapsulates the two sides to Harris Gary's character in one neat package. So he said he wanted to rebuild Bridges, but he also accused Charles of standing in the way of him getting his Metropolitan Police bodyguards reinstated. So in essence, he's still angry and he really struggles to let go of the past. He doesn't really, I think, understand his father's motivations properly, despite having moved, I think, a lot closer to Charles on certain subjects over the years.

8:34I'm thinking there mainly about his appearance for the New York Times Deal Book Summit last year. And he said not reading the papers is better for your mental health. And, you know, he said he had times when he read them loads. He said times when he hardly read them at all. and the latter is definitely better, which is exactly what Charles has been trying to tell him for years. So, you know, he's moved closer to Charles on a number of issues and he does still want reconciliation, but there is always this looming threat that, you know, restraint will collapse and he'll just pile in on his father again.

9:07So what about the king? Well, I'm not quite so sure, to be honest. There's been this whole idea kicking around for a while now that Charles' door is always open, but he couldn't see Harry for protocol reasons while Harry was in the process of suing the UK government over that aforementioned decision to strip him of his police bodyguards. So that lawsuit ended earlier this year in May, and it was actually that was the interview that Harry gave where he kind of said he wanted reconciliation. It was at the point that he definitively finally lost that lawsuit. He filed two initial lawsuits at the High Court, lost them both, went to the Court of Appeal and lost that too.

9:50It was at that moment that he kind of gave the swipe at Charles while also saying he wanted reconciliation. So now that court case is definitively over. That removes this barrier that we've been told exists or has existed to Harry and Charles seeing each other. So if those briefings that have appeared in the UK press are true, then you would expect this to be the moment that Charles does sit down with Harry and does, you know, even if he doesn't talk things through, at least get together with him and, you know, thereby we have a moment where peace threatens to break out. But of course, it may not be anywhere near as simple as that.

10:28Now, this episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states. I don't dismiss the briefings that appear in the UK media out of hand, but I do like to see them as one piece in a jigsaw puzzle. And I think it's very important, in my opinion, to look at all the other pieces too and just, you know, to just look at it all dispassionately without kind of trying to disappear too far down one path at the exclusion of the others.

11:13So what are those other pieces in the jigsaw puzzle? Well, looking completely dispassionately at this claim, in some ways it kind of doesn't make a whole load of sense to me because Harry's lawyers filed pre-action correspondence, i.e. they wrote to the Home Office threatening to sue. in around September 2021. There had been a particular visit to Britain that Harry went on in kind of June, July that year for the unveiling of a statue in his mother's memory where he'd also gone actually to the Well Child Awards, in fact, and he'd been followed by some paparazzi afterwards and he kicked off about it and felt that if he'd had his police protection, it wouldn't have been a problem.

11:48So he got his lawyers to send a letter to the Home Office that September. He then submitted his claim form for that lawsuit the following February in 2022. So this was months before Queen Elizabeth II died. She was still alive at the time. None of that stopped the Queen and separately Charles and Camilla meeting with Meghan and Harry in May that year. They had a kind of stopover in Britain on their way to the Invictus Games in the Netherlands, and they sat down with Harry. Both the Queen did by herself, and Charles and Camilla did by themselves. and it also didn't stop Harry attending the Queen's funeral.

12:27I mean that's perhaps not a huge surprise. It would have seemed really callous to prevent a man from mourning his grandmother but it also didn't stop a more informal walkabout that him, Meghan, William and Kate did at Windsor Castle in the days after the Queen died which was not necessary. I mean nobody would have really been surprised if that hadn't happened. It also didn't stop Harry being invited to attend the coronation in 2023. So if anything has changed the mood music in this situation, then, you know, one candidate is the release of Spare, which certainly precipitated Charles's decision to evict Harry and Meghan from Frogmore Cottage.

13:06So that does seem like a moment when there's definitive evidence of a pivot from Charles, you know, a change in attitude from Charles. He had, you know, he had had the option to evict them before and he evicted them days after spare came out. But I also think Charles getting diagnosed with cancer is another massive, massive factor here. And it feels a little bit like Charles finds Harry exhausting because of his tendency to blow up often over, you know, I don't want to say small things because obviously they're not small to Harry, but I do also kind of understand that Charles might feel that he's just constantly in danger of sticking his foot in it by mistake of, you know, trailing on a landmine and Harry blows up and then all of a sudden it becomes this really emotionally difficult situation.

13:52And, you know, perhaps whether it's big or whether it's small, I suppose the bigger point is that maybe Charles just doesn't see it coming. So one example is, you know, in the hours before the queen died. so we knew she was going, even in the media, we knew she was going. And Charles rang Harry to speak to him to ask him not to bring Meghan up to Balmoral. And rather than give my account of it, I'll just read what Harry wrote about it in spare. And he wrote, Then came another call from Parr. He said I was welcome at Balmoral, but he didn't want her. He started to lay out his reason, which was nonsensical and disrespectful, and I wasn't having it.

14:27Don't ever speak about my wife that way. He stammered, apologetic, saying he simply didn't want a lot of people around. No other wives were coming. Kate wasn't coming, he said. Therefore, Meg shouldn't. Then that's all you needed to say. So the fact that he said Charles stammered and Charles was apologetic tells you that Charles, I think, has blundered into a situation where he's inflamed Harry's anger in a way that he didn't expect and has then taken, you know, caught off guard. He's kind of, you know, on the back foot. And, you know, Charles knew, no doubt, that his mother was dying. And I'm sure he had a whole load of calls he needed to make.

15:07I'm sure this wasn't the only call he was making. He had a round of calls to all kinds of different people to coordinate all these kind of things. As the about to become the king for the first time. He actually wasn't yet. He was about to become the king and was going to be the new head of the monarchy. And it was coming. It was imminent. And, yeah, like, you know, who knows whether Charles decided Meghan couldn't come or whether he was simply the person who had to deliver the news to Harry. And maybe he phrased it insensitively, but like, hey, his mum was dying. Like, what are you going to do?

15:36He was about to say goodbye to his mother. And like, that's terrible for anyone. But for Charles, it means he's going to be king. And that just must be incredibly stressful. And yeah, like he put his foot in it. But is it the right thing to blow up at him? And the way that Harry describes it in spare is that even, you know, months later, I suppose, that it hit shelves. I don't know how quickly he turned it around because obviously it wasn't a huge amount of time. But even having had at the very least some time to stew it over, Harry still doesn't appear to be aware of the fact that that might actually have been a really difficult experience for Charles.

16:16So I think for Charles, these various moments when Harry's been a hothead, he'll have those in the back of his mind. And honestly, you know, I do genuinely believe in this situation there are wrongs on both sides. But the guy has cancer and I kind of can up to a point understand the instinct to want to spare himself the grief, like, you know, the bellyache of having to deal with a child who he finds exhausting. That said, Harry is still his son. And, you know, my own personal view is that he should make time for Harry, particularly because we're told his health has actually been holding together reasonably well within the parameters that obviously we are not expecting him to pop up and announce he's in remission anytime soon.

16:55You know, he has a managed condition, i.e., you know, it ain't going away anytime soon, but the treatment has also been effective at containing it. And, you know, if he is capable of doing international tours, which must themselves also be exhausting, then he should be able to manage having some time for his son. Most people I speak to do actually want to see reconciliation. Like even in Britain, where Harry and Meghan, we make no bones about it. They are very, very unpopular in Britain. But I do think most people want to see healing and they want to see repair and they want to see reconciliation.

17:28You know, there is a contingent of hardcore people who want to see punishment and who want to see Harry pay. And, you know, in some ways, they come here from a very similar perspective to Harry. You know, Harry wants accountability and so do they. Like, well, that's what they're seeking. They're seeing the same thing Harry is and they just don't realise it. but most people in Britain do actually want to see reconciliation and they want to see healing and so you know it doesn't mean Charles has to forgive Harry and it certainly doesn't mean he has to forget but it's about just trying to maintain to keep something to keep connection and to keep family like family has to mean something family meant a huge amount to the queen and you know with Harry clearly he still holds a lot of anger like in some ways the same applies to him that he's not going to forget I'm sure either and he's probably not going to completely forgive, I'm sure he still blames Charles for a lot of things.

18:18And actually, I think Harry's determination that there must be some kind of resolution or justice or compensation or accountability, as he, you know, that's the word he uses, has been a major barrier to peace in the past. After all, you know, Harry wants his family to move closer to how he sees things and maybe apologise and acknowledge his side of the story, but he really hasn't done very much to acknowledge theirs. You know, he hasn't budged an inch on the allegation that Meghan was bullying the staff. he's even gone you know he's gone as far I mentioned earlier you know he spoke to Dealbook and he said that his mental health is better when he doesn't read the papers but he said all of that without acknowledging that this was the exact advice that Charles had been giving him all along and the exact advice that Harry later told the world was total you know he described it as total neglect during his mental health documentary with Oprah so even in the moment when he kind of does row back on his past, you know, intransigence and stubbornness, he still doesn't actually acknowledge that his father was right.

19:20So Harry really, in many ways, hasn't budged an inch. Even when he's kind of budging an inch, he still is not acknowledging the fact that he's budging. So he wants them to move close to him, but he's not moving close to them. So I think, you know, it's safe to say that at the very least, neither side is perfect and neither side is going to back down. But I think there have been times when Harry has been treated badly, you know, not least of all times he was stopped from wearing his military uniform despite his service on the front line, which I actually think poses a potential threat to the monarchy as an institution, because it does make it seem like it's an elaborate game of dress up.

19:56But there has also been many times when he's treated other people badly, and particularly his willingness to bombard his family during times of grief and mourning, not only for Queen Elizabeth II, but also for Prince Philip. So I think that really played very badly with the American people, for example. But the greatest chance of success for both sides is to just stop trying to resolve things and just move on. Just talk about other things. Just don't talk about all that controversial stuff. Talk about how Archie and Lilibet are doing. Talk about the king's health and how he's coping. Talk about news from the wider family.

20:33Harry can talk about how his various projects are going. You can talk about the fact he's learning to surf. Harry could ask for example how Princess Anne's health is doing she obviously had an unfortunate encounter with a horse last year and was kicked in the head just ask about people's welfare, just ask, catch up just do the catching up keep it surface, keep it uncontroversial don't expect it to be a massive moment just try to make it a moment that goes well that's the most important thing Try to make sure the meeting goes ahead. Make sure the meeting goes well. You know, that's his biggest priority.

21:13If he wants reconciliation, he must just ensure that the whole meeting passes without any exhausting arguments. And if some Charles accidentally or on purpose, who knows, says something that riles Harry up, Harry just has to exercise some restraint and let it wash over him. because what he wants is he wants the relationship back. And right now the power is effectively in Charles' hands. Charles can decide whether to make time for his son or not. And that must be kind of a strange feeling for Harry because for a long time the power was in Harry's hands. He was the one with the book coming out. He was the one with the Oprah interview.

21:49He was the one with the Netflix show and the arm full of royal bombshells. But now he's had to stop firing those bombshells because it was destroying his reputation and his father is the one who just has to decide whether he can face the prospect of seeing Harry. And that means Harry just has to make sure things go well. He needs to be on his best behaviour, not even particularly because that's the morally right thing to do, although I think it probably is, to be honest. But just because that's how you rebuild a damaged relationship. And he says that's what he wants. So if you have something you want, you simply have to act in a way that obtains the thing you want, that gets you your objectives.

22:29From Charles's point of view, though, there is a real reason to give Harry the time and make a concerted effort. And that is because actually it would make the monarchy look good. The whole point of the royals is to lead by example and to show people hope and inspiration. And, you know, to show people that it is possible to do the right thing. And, you know, there are loads of families with beef and drama and rifts. and what advice would Charles give to any other British family or American family even in the midst of a messy argument? There is no way in a million years he'd ever tell a parent not to see their own child.

23:06At the very least, that child would basically have to be banged up in prison for a truly unforgivable sin before it would even warrant a discussion about cutting them off completely. And even then, there are a shed load of crimes where you would still expect the parents to visit and to maintain contact. Not least of all because it's about accepting your responsibility as a parent to continue to shape or help shape or try to shape, even if you're unsuccessful, a person you brought into the world. You know, Charles and Diana brought Harry into the world, and he doesn't have Diana anymore. Charles is the only person he's got.

23:46And Charles, having done that, does actually have a responsibility to parent Harry, even though Harry's an adult. I'm not convinced that that responsibility completely evaporates in adulthood. Obviously, it's super different. Once somebody's an adult, they've left home, they've got their own life, especially they've found their own family, because your 20s are difficult and your 30s, you are in charge in a much greater respect. So it's a massively diminished responsibility by the time a child is Harry's age, but it doesn't evaporate completely. I don't personally think you can just completely wash your hands of them.

24:28But of course, make your own minds up. And on that note, I'm going to take a quick break. But before I do, remember to rate and review The Royal Report on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you get your favourite shows. And when I'm back, season two of With Love, Meghan is out and her Rotten Tomatoes score is even lower than Season 1. Every day as a small business owner feels like solving a puzzle. One moment you're cruising along and the next, there's a shipping snag that has you scrambling. But here's a surprise you will like. With Progressive, small business owners save 13 % on their commercial auto insurance when they pay in full.

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25:21Hello and welcome back to the show. Megan has released the second season of her cooking show with Love Megan, and the reviews are once again toe-curlingly bad. In fact, season two has just 20 % on Rotten Tomatoes for the critics' score, So that's the amalgamation of all of the review articles and the kind of scores out of 10 that it got. And that compares to 38 % for season one. And on the audience score, the kind of popcorn meter they call it, season one got 33 % and now season two is on 27%. So it's done even worse than the first one. Now, I have kind of a bit of a theory about why. But first of all, let's just talk a little bit about what it actually shows.

26:05So my thoughts on the season itself are kind of conflicted because there were points when I kind of quite liked it, but it is still a little bit weird. So episode one, again, it's back to Daniel Martin, her makeup artist who kicked off season one as well. And I thought the rapport with them, between them, actually seemed a little more natural and relaxed this time. In the first one, Daniel Martin seemed to kind of be a little nervous maybe and not quite know why he was there. Perhaps he was a little camera shy, he was a little uncomfortable in the kitchen, his chopping wasn't great, which they actually referenced in this one.