What’s next for Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor?

0:00How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup? Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway, and in each episode of my new podcast, Stuff Matters, I take an object, crack it open, and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow. Coming up on the Sky News Daily, he's the man born a royal prince plagued by scandal which ultimately led to him losing his title. But what's next for Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor?

0:40How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup? Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway, and in each episode of my new podcast, Stuff Matters, I take an object, crack it open, and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow.

1:12Hi, welcome back to the Sky News Daily. I'm Gareth Barlow. Now, normally on Fridays, We take a person or event that's leading the news, take our time in telling you all you need to know. Today, though, is a little different. We're going to be looking at what's happening next to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, as he's now going to be known. He's had the last remaining symbol of the royal role he was born into removed from him. That's the title of prince. He's also lost his Grace and Favour's royal home, Royal Lodge, on the Windsor estate. So what's next for the man and what's next for the royal family?

1:43Our royal correspondent, Rhiannon Mills, has more. Let's get on to the here and now in a little bit. Let's look back. Because Andrew's style of life, Rhiannon, wasn't always wrapped up in scandal. He was a bit of a golden boy, a war hero at one point. Yeah, and I think you have to remember that the papers loved him. He was seen as this kind of glamorous, handsome prince. He, of course, served in the military, went off to the Falklands, then came back with a rose between his teeth. The pictures were just what the tabloid papers wanted. He then, of course, met Sarah Ferguson. And that was another exciting fairy tale wedding at a time that you also had all the excitement around Charles and Diana as well.

2:26He was seen as a real star, I suppose, in the media. And on top of that, of course, he was always widely regarded as Queen Elizabeth's favourite son. Now, speaking to people who know the family well, they'll say that maybe that was slightly overdone. In some ways, actually, he was the son that needed her the most. And that is why it was seen that they spent so much time together and maybe it was seen that he was the favourite. And then things started to change. Then the Randy Andy headlines started to come out. The image maybe started shifting a little bit. Yeah, and I think it was all part of that problem of what do you do when you're not the heir and what do you do with that role that you've got?

3:10Of course, Prince Andrew was very keen to be involved in the world of business, loved travelling the world as a UK trade envoy. But it was around that time, of course, that we first found out about his links to the convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. and then of course since then there's been questions really about whether he was using that kind of publicly funded role to privately fund his own lifestyle and anyone who's tried to look into that has found it very very difficult because the freedom of information requests that have gone into various government departments the doors have been closed or documents have been lost so it's been quite difficult to kind of get a full picture of what he did when he was in that role.

3:52And around that time, big allegations of big payments from global individuals, let's put it that way, and questions of money going backwards and forwards. And even now today, that kind of perpetuates as to how he continues to be able to afford life, let's be honest. That's right. But also, if I think back to when I first started this job as royal correspondent, so what, 11 years ago, one of the first stories that I had to do was regarding allegations that had come out from Virginia Dufresne. I remember having to fly off to Davos where he was kind of being wined and dined and representing the UK government in terms of that big business forum.

4:29But while that was all going on, he was still having a very full public working life as a member of the royal family. And so around that time, there didn't necessarily seem to be what you could say a problem around Prince Andrew. He was still very much being seen as an important working royal. but the Epstein stuff kept rumbling on and that is why he did that Newsnight interview was to try and get rid of that distraction to try and shut it all down and we now know that that completely backfired and just started off this this cascade of different actions being taken by the royal family in terms of him being seen to be reprimanded for that.

5:09What do we know about when Epstein entered Andrew's life and what do we know about the the reality of their relationship? So what we mainly know is from from what we've been told by Virginia Giuffre over the years what's come out in terms of depositions the run-up to the civil case that she lodged against him and of course most recently in the book that was released after she took her own life back in April and speaking to those close to Andrew actually around the time he did the Newsnight interview I was told it was a close relationship, one that Prince Andrew felt that he benefited from, which is why in the Newsnight interview, he didn't apologise for being close to Jeffrey Epstein.

5:51But also, of course, within Virginia Dufresne's book, we've been given more details about where she says that he was seen, I think he was on four different occasions, involved in different parties. Of course, Prince Andrew vehemently denies any of the allegations against him. But what has been abundantly clear, and this continues to be a problem, is that people really want to know what he saw. He may deny doing anything wrong, but he was in Epstein's company. He did invite Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, Harvey Weinstein to a party at Windsor Castle. They were close. So there is an assumption that he knows more than he's basically shared publicly so far.

6:34If we go back to 2019, there was that just awful interview on Newsnight, from his perspective, certainly. That evening, before that interview went out, I was sent the transcript. I was shocked that they allowed him to talk for 50 minutes, I think it was. But also a couple of things that came out of that, which continued to haunt him in the years that followed. One, he never apologised for being friends with Jeffrey Epstein. He also didn't offer any kind of sign of support or apology for Epstein's wider circle of victims. And that evening, I remember asking his close advisor before the interview went out, and they clearly didn't think there was a problem with the interview.

7:19I remember asking her, why didn't he apologize for being friends with Epstein? And she said, well, he doesn't feel that he needs to apologize for that. And that is what has continued to haunt him as we've seen the years go by and as we've got to this point. Look, you and I spoke just the other day about what was going to be the movement on this. What we saw last night was really monumental from the king. And again, we were saying the other day, this story has just run and run and run since Prince Andrew. well, Andrew, as we now call him, decided to give up the use of his titles. The public had said that wasn't enough.

8:01Politicians were saying that wasn't enough. And therefore the king ultimately had to act, put the institution first, and basically in front of any kind of family relationships. There is this view of him that he is an arrogant man. Many would stand by that very strongly. what do you think his personal emotions will be like at the moment? When you talk to those who know Prince Andrew, who know the rest of the family they will say that he's always been a man who hasn't necessarily needed the affirmation of his relatives he hasn't been a man who's needed that emotional support or pat on the back some of course would describe that as arrogance but this does feel particularly painful and especially I think for his daughters princesses Beatrice and Eugenie and you do get the sense that from the wider family there is a belief that those two girls need to be looked after in terms of the media scrutiny but more widely they have not done anything wrong and it's been a really difficult period for them not just the last few weeks, but gosh, for the last 10 years or so.

9:19So I suspect that the family will be rallying around them. So Beatrice and Eugenie retain their princess titles. They are certainly within that party of four of their parents and themselves, very much the innocent parties in this. The other person that had relationships and interactions with Epstein was Sarah Ferguson. What happens to her now? Because she was living in Royal Lodge alongside her ex-husband, who she remained pretty close with. Yeah, really close. What happens to her? So all we're hearing at the moment is that she will make her own private arrangements. In terms of Sarah Ferguson, though, this has all been really damaging as well.

9:58Around a month ago, that email came out where she appeared to be apologising to Jeffrey Epstein. She all along said it was because she was being blackmailed. But as a result of that, All of her charities dropped her as patron. And so for her as well, this has been catastrophic. And as really what's kind of cemented in my head is although Jeffrey Epstein is no longer with us, he continues to haunt those individuals that he was linked to. And you see that loud and clear with Andrew and Sarah Ferguson. So Andrew is getting out the boxes, the packing tape and packing up his life, although I should imagine he's probably watching somebody else do it for him.

10:38He's then heading to Sandringham. What do we know about where he's going to live on the estate? Because this is important, isn't it? This is not a crown estate. This is privately owned by the king. In many respects, he's kind of going into domestic exile. It's private properties there. So in terms of us being able to scrutinise, what rents you're paying and all that sort of stuff, that kind of goes away for the family. And also, yes, we often focus on Sandringham House, and that's the property where they all spend Christmas Day. We see them walking to church on Christmas Day. But there are other houses on the Sandringham estate that the family are able to use.

11:13Certainly Queen Elizabeth II used to kind of privately go and spend time at other properties rather than go to the big house. Andrew, we don't know where he's being moved to. But look, Norfolk is a place that they are deeply respectful of the royal family, are very respectful of their privacy. But we wait to see exactly how they're feeling about Andrew living permanently in their midst. So we expect to see no more Andrew in public life. We expect to probably never hear from him again, but we probably expect to hear his name again because one would assume that more accusations, more laser like focus, more reflection on his past will continue it.

11:55He might go away physically, but the question marks surely won't. Prince Andrew is still being looked at by various bodies. So, for example, the Met Police investigation is still ongoing in terms of claims that he asked a close protection officer to dig up dirt on Virginia Giuffre. Congress over in the States, they would like to speak to him because of his links to Jeffrey Epstein. The Public Accounts Committee in the last couple of days have wanted to look closer at the Crown Estate issue as well. So there are a whole raft of areas where things could move in terms of Andrew himself. And that is why the royal family cannot entirely shut this one down.

12:36We don't know when there'll be movement from different areas. And that's where it risks overshadowing, again, royal family engagements. Final thought then for the royal family as an entity, as a concept, as a part of public life. a hammer blow but not a death knell? I think there's a few things in that. The statement of course it's absolutely seismic. We only call him Andrew now. All those titles, honours, gone. The home, gone. But there is also an element in there which I think some people have overlooked and from following this story is significant. The fact that the end of that statement very clearly said that their majesties stand with the victims of abuse.

13:23That's never been said before when it comes to this story around Andrew Epstein and Virginia Dufresne. And that's often felt weird to me because of the work that Queen Camilla and the Duchess of Edinburgh have done around sexual violence. So I think there's probably been pressure within the royal family itself to make sure that their position was made clear that although Andrew denies the allegations against him they stand with victims of sexual abuse also the fact that they're talking about the fact that action needed to be taken because there'd been a lapse of judgment I've certainly never heard it said as loud and clear as that that that is the reason that something had to be done but at the heart of it you have a king who he's been brought up to be mindful about the reputation of the monarchy.

14:10But you also have a man there who wants to show that he is empathetic and he is socially engaged. And the noise around Andrew has been so loud. But I think what we've seen now is that the king has listened and his actions really have been monumental. Thank you, Rhiannon. Well, after today's podcast, I spoke to the family of Virginia Jufre, the woman who accused Prince Andrew of having sex with her when she was underage. They shared their thoughts on the recent events. The king is setting a roadmap. He's setting a precedent to the rest of the world to say, I do stand with survivors. I am going to hold even my brother to account.

14:51But it's still, it's not enough in the sense that he's still walking around a free man. I mean, let's not be naive that he's not going to be living on the side of the road here. He's, you You know, he's still in a very, let's say, cush spot where he should be. He should be investigated. Let's put it that way. And I think that our government is safeguarding these documents. They have it locked away in this little Pandora's box of people that are implicated. And we need to fully investigate them because Prince Andrew is just one of many that need to be investigated thoroughly. And so I think the king should put pressure on our government.

15:29He should put pressure on President Trump. He should tell President Trump verbatim, President Trump, put your big boy pants on and let's get these Epstein files released so that we can go after these monsters properly. That's all for us for today. You can follow the latest about Andrew and the royal family on SkyNews.com. We'll be back again on Monday.

15:59How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup? Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway, and in each episode of my new podcast, Stuff Matters, I take an object, crack it open, and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow.