01x06 - The Top Job

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This year, the Royal house of Windsor celebrates 100 years on the British throne.

They are now the most famous Royal family in the world and have prospered while other great dynasties have fallen.

They've seen their relatives overthrown, m*rder*d and exiled, overcome family feuds, fire and betrayal.

And they have always followed one crucial rule -- survive, whatever it takes, whatever the cost.

The Windsors learned the dark art of survival in the days of w*r, a century ago.

They've never forgotten.

Now, Channel 4 can uncover their secrets with the help of family insiders, Royal experts and some of the most closely guarded papers in the world.

We've combed through letters, diaries, government memos, confidential Royal reports, and for the first time, cameras have been allowed into the Queen's personal family archives at Windsor.

What we found rips aside the mask of royal pomp to reveal the human frailties and the secrets of the family that built Britain's most powerful dynasty.

The present Queen is the fourth monarch in the Winsor dynasty.

Five years ago, she celebrated her Diamond Jubilee.

We are now celebrating the life and service of a very special person over the last 60 years.

The 86-year-old was at the top of the global celebrity A-list.

The house of Windsor was at the peak of its popularity.

The Queen is now in her 91st year, the longest reigning British monarch.

Every time she catches a cold, the world holds its breath.

When the Queen dies, there will be an outpouring of lamentation such as we have never seen before.

The British people will be genuinely saddened by the departure of somebody who has been a fixture for so long in their lives.

But we'll also be mourning the prospect of mortality.

It will be there writ large in brilliant letters for all to see.

The man who holds the future of the Windsors in his hands is her eldest son and heir.

Prince Charles grew up in her shadow.

He has rebelled against his mother, insisting on a vision of monarchy which is radically different from hers.

You are the man! He is the most outspoken Prince of Wales in the history of the Windsors.

As King, he could make or break the dynasty.

'The pictures the whole world has waited for.

A first look at Britain's month-old Royal Prince, Charles of Edinburgh.

Prince Charles was born on 14th November 1948.

His grandparents were King George VI and Queen Elizabeth.

For the next four years, they were in charge of his upbringing.

In 1949, Princess Elizabeth joined her husband, Philip, who was stationed with the Royal Navy in Malta.

She missed her son's second Christmas which he spent at Sandringham with his grandparents.

Queen Elizabeth wrote to her daughter telling her how much Charles was missing her.

"Somehow, Charles thought you were coming.

"His face lit up and he said, "Mummy," in a voice of bliss.

"I am sure he misses you and Philip.

" When she came back, she didn't immediately rush to see her son.

In fact, I think she went to the races before coming to see him.

His mother's cool approach to her children meant her son had to wait his turn.

1953, the Queen's Coronation year.

Prince Charles' young mother was catapulted into the top job by the premature death of her father.

Prince Charles was just four years old.

From now on, he would, if anything, see even less of her.

Widowed at only 51, and now called the Queen Mother, Charles' grandmother was nowhere near retirement.

She was determined to maintain her place at the centre of power.

A letter held in the Queen's private collection at Windsor reveals how she wrote to her daughter's private secretary.

She was anxious to remain a councillor of state, entitled to stand in for the monarch.

"Naturally, I would like this as it would give "me an interest, and having been one, "it seems so dull to be relegated to the no-earthly-use class.

" The Queen Mother had moulded one future King, now, she would mould another.

The Queen Mother provided the kind of backbone that her late husband Bertie had lacked.

And, I think she felt that Charles was similar -- that he was kind, that he required affection and she felt that she could exercise over Charles the kind of influence that she had exercised over Bertie.

'London airport, the giant BOAC Stratocruiser "Canopus" is ready for a royal mission to fly Her Majesty the Queen to the most distant corners of her Commonwealth.

Five months after her coronation, the Queen went on a six-month tour.

Charles would be left with his grandmother again.

After the long separation, the Queen Mother said goodbye to her grandchildren.

They were to travel with their nanny and nurse on the Royal yacht Britannia to be reunited with their parents in North Africa.

This event took place in Tobruk, North Africa.

The Queen Mother had written in advance to her daughter, encouraging her to connect with her young son.

"You may find Charles much older in a very endearing way.

"He is intensely affectionate and loves you and Philip most tenderly.

" "I am sure that he will always be a very loving "and enjoyable child to you both.

" Reporter: The special train arrives exactly on time bringing the Queen Mother back to London.

Eager eyes search each carriage and then with a cry, "There's Granny!" the children wave their welcome.

The Queen Mother was huggability personified.

She was tremendously affectionate and welcoming and warm and cuddly.

Whereas, the Queen was a very distant mother.

Later, Prince Charles said, that, as a young boy, he and his grandmother established a special bond.

His closest family relationship.

Not only did Charles have a remote relationship with his mother, he also had an alpha male father.

The Queen Mother was wary of Prince Philip.

She thought he bullied his son and failed to appreciate how sensitive he was.

To toughen up the boy, his father wanted to send him to Gordonstoun, his old school in Scotland.

'Gordonstoun is anxious to develop character as well as intellect, to provide for the tough boy.

It must strengthen the delicate, not only in his own interest, but for the service he can render.

The Queen Mother wanted him to go to Eton and that would have kept him near the family and, of course, it was much less brutal than Gordonstoun.

The Queen Mother intervened forcefully.

"However good Gordonstoun is, "it is miles and miles away and he might as well be at school abroad.

"He would be terribly cut-off and lonely up in the far north.

" The Queen Mother's intervention failed.

Prince Philip won the day.

Prince Charles went to Gordonstoun.

He hated it.

Whenever he could, he escaped from school to stay with his grandmother.

He begged her to persuade his parents to take him away from his Scottish prison.

She refused.

But she said she would help him find the strength to deal with his troubles.

At 18, Charles went to Cambridge University.

It was the late '60s, students around the world were protesting against the establishment and state repression.

This atmosphere certainly coloured his worldview in certain respects.

But, he was also, I would say, a cultural Canute.

He disapproved of long hair and bare feet and he looked the part of the rather '30s undergraduate.

But, I think that that mixture continued in his life.

In 1969, Charles was officially launched as Prince of Wales at his investiture.

To help them get through his ordeal, his grandmother wrote him a boosting letter.

"My darling Charles, I can't tell you what charming and "heart-warming things I'm always hearing about you.

"Everyone loves you and is proud of you.

"And I absolutely know "that you'll be able to do wonderful things for this country.

"Not only in leadership, but by being your own kind-hearted, loving "and intelligent and funny self.

" Charles had to give his first TV interview.

Despite his youth and inexperience, in his hesitant performance, the Prince revealed a hint of inner steel.

Service is something that you give yourself to people.

If, you know, particularly if they want you, and sometimes if they don't want you.

If you feel that you can do something even if they think that you You know, you're not doing something very useful.

And you think you're right there, then you can be of service.

Charles had shown that he had a mind of his own.

He was a man who was going to do it his way.

This would put him on a collision course with his mother.

In 1971, after finishing university, Prince Charles dutifully joined the Navy.

Pretty quickly, he realised he wasn't cut out for a naval career.

The question which has bothered him ever since was already preying heavily on his mind.

My great problem in life is that I do not really know what my role in life is.

At the moment I do not have one, but somehow I must find one.

The Queen and her courtiers expected the Prince of Wales to nod and smile politely through public engagements.

Charles, as he later explained in a private conversation with three newspaper editors, was determined to defy these expectations.

I've had to fight every inch of my life to escape royal protocol.

I've had to fight to go to university, I've had to fight to have any sort of role as Prince of Wales.

I am determined not to be confined to cutting ribbons.

In 1974, a young Jon Snow was working on a project for homeless and vulnerable teenagers.

I was in the office one day and the phone rang and a very pukka voice said, "Hello, is that Jon Snow?" I said, "Yes.

" "Squadron Leader David Checketts here "and I'm the Prince of Wales's Private Secretary.

" I said, "I'm the Pope!" "No, no, no, I really am.

" And then he said, "The Prince of Wales would very much like you to come and see him.

" So I cycled down to Buckingham Palace the following week and Prince Charles said, "Look, I've got an awfully long time before my mother dies "and I'm really thinking about how to use my life productively.

" So I said, "Look, if you were ever prepared to put your name to "a project that was really going to make a difference to people "who had really serious social problems, "you would make a fantastic impact.

" Then he said, "Sort of Prince Charles's Trust, perhaps?" Prince Charles was thinking hard about how to help the poor.

Britain was facing a social and economic crisis with unrest, poverty and record levels of youth unemployment.

I came across memos that he'd written as a young man that gave some insight into his character and evolving interests.

And the most interesting of these was written in 1978.

And he starts by saying I want to consider ways in which I can escape from the ceaseless round of official engagements and meet people in less artificial circumstances.

I felt that it was important to take risks with people who perhaps other charities or other groups would never perhaps take a risk with.

There we were in Buckingham Palace and talking homelessness, drug addiction, dealing.

Of course, the Royal Family was conventionally involved with things like the Scouting movement and the rest of it, but there was nothing like this.

This was a shock to the system.

- So, you know exactly how to look after rabbits, do you? - Yes.

- And what do you feed it on, lettuce? - Apples.

- Is it getting fatter and fatter and fatter? - Yeah.

- Has it produced any babies yet? - That's a boy.

- That's a boy? My mum's trying to get a girl.

Hi, rabbit.

At the same time, the Palace was busily planning a public appeal to mark the Queen's upcoming Silver Jubilee.

Her scheme aimed to encourage young people to help others.

In the summer of 1974, Martin Charteris, the Queen's Private Secretary, subtly warned Charles to get his tanks off his mother's lawn with his plans for a rival Prince's Trust.

I think the message is to go steady on the trust the Prince has in mind until the dust settles.

He warned against a potential conflict of interest.

Charles didn't give up.

Privately, he worked away on plans to set up his own project.

In 1976, the year before the Jubilee, the big royal story was the breakdown of the marriage of the Queen's sister, Princess Margaret, to Lord Snowdon, a huge scandal.

That summer, Charles made what would become one of the most significant moves of his life.

He launched The Prince's Trust.

It barely merited a mention.

Buckingham Palace was intent on making sure the Queen's Silver Jubilee was a success.

The Prince's Trust was an unwelcome distraction.

Prince Charles complained about the level of pushback he got.

The Queen and Prince Philip have very strong ideas about how you do monarchy and Prince Charles comes along and starts doing things very differently.

His father in particular actively opposed him.

One suspects that from the moment that Prince Charles was old enough to have ideas of his own that he began to get quite impatient of having to listen to his father saying how his father thought that he should do it, because this is the way that father-son relationships often work.

In defiance of both his parents, Charles stuck to his beliefs.

He developed a wide range of interests, ranging from organic biscuits to inner cities.

I believe the Prince's Trust should strive to tackle the racial minority problem, to dampen down a potentially disastrous situation.

The new leader of the Conservative Party showed that she was going to make immigration an election issue.

If we went on as we are, then by the end of the century there would be four million people from the new Commonwealth or Pakistan here.

Now, that's an awful lot and I think it means that people are really rather afraid that this country might be rather swamped.

Later the same year, the Prince of Wales expressed a radically different position, - saying he'd like - To have more visits to immigrant areas in order to help these people to feel that they are not ignored or neglected.

The idea of the heir to the throne showing support for immigrants was highly sensitive.

A member of Charles's own staff felt the need to reassure Buckingham Palace that they Would move cautiously and only with advice on this one.

Two years after Margaret Thatcher's election victory, there were race riots in several cities across England.

Here he was, seeing all these problems, not really understanding them, and what he wanted to do was to go out and talk to these people and find out and help them.

You are the man.

You are the man! He was actually saying, "This may be political, "I don't give a stuff if it is, "it's social and I know I can do something about it.

"And as far as I'm concerned, "if that gets me into trouble, I don't care.

" Prince Charles would insist on pursuing his vision of monarchy, even if that meant challenging his mother.

By 1984, the Prince of Wales had done his duty.

He'd married a suitable girl, Diana Spencer, and produced an heir and a spare.

- Future helicopter pilot.

- Yes.

- Without a doubt.

But it wasn't enough.

A glamorous, younger wife and two attractive children didn't help Charles when it came to making himself heard.

He didn't ease up on his activism when William and Harry were born.

But then, I'm afraid, that told us a lot about the relationship he was having with his wife at the time.

You don't appear to hit it off exactly eye to eye on the slopes.

What is the secret of this? You two read the papers.

I don't think I can help it.

I suspect most husbands and wives find that they often have arguments.

- But we don't.

- No, no, no.

- But occasionally we do, because, I mean - No, we don't.

I-I You know, I - I go on longer sometimes.

- Yes, but I'm faster.

There we are.

He found fulfilment through his official life in much the same way as Diana was to find fulfilment through her engagements.

Certain things have to be said.

If you were to skirt around issues all the time, how do we ever get anywhere in life? And I just feel that sometimes I can throw a rock into the pot and watch the ripples.

The problem was that when Charles created ripples, Diana caused a tsunami.

Charles realised rapidly that she was doing this to upstage him, and he resented it, having always himself in the past occupied the limelight.

Once again, he turned to his grandmother for support over his marital difficulties.

He also turned to the woman Diana thought was the cause of their problem, Camilla Parker Bowles, whom Charles had loved to since he was 24.

Like the Queen Mother, she gave him unconditional love.

Unlike Diana, she was happy to remain in the shadows, not stealing the limelight.

Camilla saw life as Charles's mistress as a bit of fun, something that would never be made public and would probably continue for as long as she was sexually active.

I don't think there was ever any ambition on her part to advance herself to become the wife of the Prince of Wales.

The Queen Mother is relatively broad-minded.

She didn't mind Prince Charles having an affair with Camilla Parker Bowles, provided that this did not become a scandal.

And this was what worried her because she had seen what happened in the abdication crisis where a private matter had blown up into something that had practically wrecked the monarchy.

The Queen Mother allowed the couple to use her Scottish home, Birkhall, as a bolthole.

With Camilla's support, Charles pursued his diverse interests, ranging from homeopathy to dry stone walling.

Most of the public viewed him as a crank who talked to his plants and cheated on his wife.

One group not put off by lurid stories about the Prince's private life and eccentric views were Islamic scholars based in Oxford.

They were looking for patron or an Islamic centre, which would be built at the heart of the agent city.

Charles was the obvious candidate, with his well-known interest in different religions.

He is a man of great personal faith and he has a very strong sense of the spiritual.

I think Islam for him is very interesting and a very, very fulfilling aspect of understanding the world around him.

Prince Charles became the first royal actively to support another religion.

This was radical stuff for the man destined to be the head of the Church of England.

His support was even bolder in the climate of rising Islamophobia, the perception in the minds of some people that Islam was about burqas and book burning.

Prince Charles was convinced he could make a difference by delivering a speech about Islam.

These two worlds, the Islamic and the Western, are at something of a crossroads in their relations.

We must not let them stand apart.

Halfway through the lecture, it was obvious that something historic was happening there, and the way he had jam-packed Sheldonian Theatre in his hands.

We must not be tempted to believe that extremism is in some way the hallmark and essence of the Muslim.

Extremism is no more the monopoly of Islam than it is the monopoly of other religions, including Christianity.

The Prince was speaking nearly a decade before the horrors of 9/11 and 7/7.

The speech was largely ignored in Britain, but in the Muslim world, he enjoyed hero status.

His speech left quite an impact on all Muslims, that here is someone, Prince of Wales, future king of the United Kingdom, addressing us Muslim as equals.

A month after his speech, Charles was filmed for this TV documentary, arriving in Saudi Arabia.

It showed the King paying him the great honour of leaving his palace at three in the morning to welcome the British royal.

The first half an hour of their discussion was the king speaking about the speech.

That degree of gratitude for what had been said was exceptional.

Prince Charles has nurtured his relationship with the Arab royals for over 25 years.

But he has been criticised for turning a blind eye to human rights abuses, the treatment of women and other controversial aspects of the Saudi regime.

The slightly sinister side of it is that these royal families pour a lot of money into his charities, not to his personal pocket, but to his charities.

And there is a sense that he might be too beholden to them.

Prince Charles showed foresight in reaching out to Muslims, but he was a prophet without much honour in his own land.

His approval ratings remained stubbornly low throughout the '90s.

The Princess of Wales's death could have been a catastrophe for him.

But he benefited from huge public sympathy for his bereaved sons.

Very soon after Diana's death, Charles made it clear that Mrs Parker Bowles was, in his words, non-negotiable.

Two years later, the couple's relationship became official.

The Prince of Wales and Camilla Parker Bowles seen together in public quite clearly.

No secret about their relationship now.

Having stability in his private life would give the Prince the confidence to push even harder in making his opinions known.

The mood at Buckingham Palace was less upbeat.

To understand what was going on in 1999, you've got to remember that the palace had come through an extended period of great difficulty.

And then the Prince of Wales's determination to carry on doing rings on his terms, which had been very hard to reconcile with those very traditional, conventional attitudes that still exist to this day inside Buckingham Palace.

These tensions came to a head in 1999, at the time of a controversial Chinese state visit.

There were protests against China's human rights record and its occupation of Tibet.

The monarchy was expected to put on a show.

We were trying to foster good trading relations with China.

And in order to do that, all parts of the state system have to work smoothly.

And the royal family, as ever, had a big part to play.

They were really rolling out the red carpet.

As part of the traditional protocol, the Chinese would host a state dinner at their embassy.

The Queen was the guest of honour.

There absolutely was an expectation that Charles would be there, and the way that the royals arrive at these banquets, the Queen is the last to arrive, so Charles would have been sort of the second to last to get there.

When the car came and it was the Queen getting out, then obviously we realised we had a big story here because the Prince of Wales wasn't there.

There was no explanation for it.

The Palace didn't brief on it.

I think they were caught unawares.

By not attending on this occasion, he was not only letting down the monarchy, he was embarrassing his mother.

Those who work for the Prince of Wales didn't have an explanation beyond that he had an unbreakable social arrangement elsewhere.

That unbreakable social arrangement turned out to be a small dinner party hosted by the Prince and Camilla Parker Bowles.

Having a significant figure like the Prince of Wales, heir in line, signalling his disapproval of what is going on in Beijing was damaging in the extreme.

Buckingham Palace's response was one of anger, so angry in fact that some of their senior officials briefed journalists about what they described as a petulant and selfish prince.

Charles's behaviour was particularly galling to his father.

I should think this is a source of considerable frustration and dismay to Prince Philip, who's led an intensely disciplined life, with which he's kept his mouth largely shut, under intolerable stresses and strains, and he's been this absolutely rock-like support.

Prince Charles was now not only in conflict with his parents but also with the government.

The Labour government was spitting tacks, fuming about it.

They saw this as a huge breach of the Prince's duty to the state.

Prince Charles had intended to snub the Chinese.

He wanted to signal his support for the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of Tibet.

In 1996, he'd paid a private visit to Britain, which irritated the Chinese, but he was welcomed by the Queen Mother at her home.

The meeting was captured in these never before seen autographs.

Charles's grandmother's bond with the Tibetan leader chimed with his interest in Buddhism and the plight of the Tibetans.

It was another legacy from the woman he called Quite simply the most magical grandmother you could possibly have.

For me, she meant everything.

And I had dreaded, dreaded this moment.

In his grief at the Queen Mother's death on the 30th of March, 2002, there was hope that her passing would signal a radical change in her grandson's personal life.

And the prospect of him as king arouses strong feelings on both sides.

The death of the Queen Mother was a devastating blow for Prince Charles.

Above all, she saw the funny side of life and we laughed till we cried.

Oh, how I shall miss those laughs.

But her death was also an opportunity for him.

Marrying Camilla was something that was much easier for him to do after his grandmother had d*ed.

Within three years of his grandmother's death, Charles and Camilla had moved into Clarence House and got engaged, with Camilla flashing a ring which had belonged to the Queen Mother.

After their wedding in Windsor, they spent their honeymoon at the Queen Mother's Scottish home.

The Windsors' phobia about divorce was finally lifted.

The curse of the former King, Edward VIII, who had abdicated to marry a divorced woman, Wallis Simpson -- the man the family called Uncle David.

The thing that hung over Prince Charles all his young life was the spectre of his uncle David .

.

and he was constantly warned against being like that.

Charles has succeeded where his predecessor had failed miserably.

He has married the woman he loves despite them both being divorced and he hasn't had to give up the throne.

Camilla has already got the one thing Wallis Simpson always wanted and never received -- the title "Her Royal Highness".

I think Queen Camilla was always on the cards.

You'll never find it acknowledged, you'll find clever wording like, "there are no plans" or "it is not envisaged.

" I bet you a dollar a doughnut Her Majesty Queen Camilla will be crowned.

Being with Camilla hasn't stopped Charles obsessively lobbying ministers about his various hobbyhorses .

.

as was revealed when the government finally had to hand over the Prince's "Black Spider" memos.

Such was the extent of Prince Charles' meddling in government, sending these letters, endless letters that he scribbled in his own hand, that the government went to extraordinary lengths to protect him against his own folly by amending the Freedom of Information Act to exempt him in the future.

Prince Charles need look no further than Edward VIII for a bad end for a monarch who interfered and spoke out.

Apart from wanted to marry a divorced woman, he's remembered as a royal who meddled in politics.

His Majesty's visit to South Wales is not only a promise of new life but a gesture of sympathy, with men and women who for years have born bravely the misery and sufferings of unemployment.

He famously said, "Something must be done.

" The public loved it.

But, to the establishment, his remarks were further evidence of Edward's unsuitability to reign.

His intervention was, "A constitutionally dangerous proceeding "that would thr*aten, if continued, to entangle the throne in politics.

" Poverty and social problems still trouble Britain today.

In the riots during the summer of 2011, the Conservative government blasted the culprits as "feral youth".

After two riots in a generation, Tottenham was set to become a complete no-go zone.

It was horrendous.

And of course, amidst all of that, the phone rang and it was the Prince of Wales.

He sounded very concerned and his question was, "What can I do?" I said, "You can come.

" And he didn't just come back once.

He's been back six times.

- Hi, Camilla.

- Hello.

- How are you? Welcome to Tottenham.

Today, the Prince's Trust has no less than six projects in Tottenham.

I still think half the problem is that people join gangs because it's a cry for help.

In fact, they're looking for a framework and a sense of belonging and meaning.

All we've been doing is tinkering with the symptoms for a long time and not getting to the root causes.

As Prince of Wales, Charles has gone way beyond his brief, according to his critics.

Some of us are nervous because Prince Charles does controversy and, in the end, it doesn't matter whether the cause is right or wrong, if the monarchy is to survive and prosper, not only must it not be political, it mustn't be controversial.

I have had it from sources very close to the Prince of Wales that Prince Charles is completely clear about what the difference is between being Prince of Wales and being monarch.

You know, it's hard-wired in his DNA.

But there are many who think that, based on his track record, the leopard simply won't be able to change his spots.

The quality that makes a monarchy successful -- because a monarchy in many ways is a ridiculous idea in the 20th-century, never mind the 21st -- to make it work you have got to have a terrific degree of discipline and, of course, the one quality Prince Charles visibly does not have is any degree of discipline.

For over 60 years, the Queen has been faithful to the promise she made on her first tour of South Africa when she was just 21.

I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and to the service of our great imperial family, to which we all belong.

She is not a great reformer -- let's put it like that.

Her thinking is based on tradition, and she is comfortable and confident in what she inherited and sees in her lifetime -- no need for further change.

She has her eye on history, too.

She wants people to think that she has been the best monarch the country has ever had.

I think there's a very good chance that she will be judged that way, but in order to achieve that goal, conserve that which you have, try and make it better if you possibly can, and don't do anything brand-new.

The Diamond Jubilee marked the beginning of the transition.

Charles' team are discreetly planning for the time when the long wait is finally over.

The eternal wait is very much what has been going on.

I mean, he is the oldest Prince of Wales in history.

The Diamond Jubilee was the first glimpse we had of Charles' vision for the future monarchy.

I remember watching that scene on the balcony and thinking, "My goodness, this is a moment to remember.

" Of course the Duke of Edinburgh was in hospital with a bladder infection, but it was Charles' vision, that "magnificent seven".

Charles wants a slimmed down, value for money monarchy, with no embarrassing hangers-on.

This version of the Royal Family would exclude his own siblings' children.

Princess Anne has accepted it, the Wessexes have also accepted it with good grace.

The sticking point seems to have been with the Duke of York.

Prince Andrew's antics over the years have led to nicknames including "Randy Andy" and "Air Miles Andy".

He has been a liability to the Royal Family, from his ill-advised friendships with convicted paedophiles, to business deals with Kazakhstanis, to his relationship with his ex-wife, which is one of the things that I'm told really riles Charles.

It all contributes together into something that is just not very palatable.

Andrew was furious.

He feared his daughters, the princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, were going to be sidelined.

He wrote to the Queen, insisting his girls must keep their royal status.

The Queen personally sided with Andrew in this w*r of words, but I think the Queen is not going to go against Prince Charles.

Eventually, Andrew had to admit defeat.

He took the unusual step of issuing a personal statement and conceded via Twitter that his daughters are: "Modern, working young women who happen to be members "of the Royal Family.

" You could argue that Charles isn't being mean to his brothers and sisters by trying to elbow them out.

This is Charles wanting to secure the longevity and future of the House of Windsor.

Charles is following the example of the founder of the House of Windsor.

Anti-German feeling during the First World w*r was directed at the Royal Family.

George V made all his German relations living in Britain give up their German Royal titles and adopt British names.

He changed his own name from a German one to the solidly British "Windsor".

He slimmed down the monarchy and made its core members work hard to show they provided value for money.

There's a streak of ruthlessness in George V, but he's also being pragmatic and he thought that, if he didn't make these changes, the British monarchy might go down.

George V's reforms saved the monarchy and established the popularity it enjoys today.

The monarchy is going to come under a lot of pressure in the decades ahead and Charles' willingness to intervene could, if he doesn't overstep the mark, take the monarchy into a new style, a new generation.

From the beginning, the House of Windsor has been shrewd in adapting to changing times.

Never ahead, but never too far behind.

They've been cunning in weathering crises and they've been lucky.

The monarchy appeals to atavistic feelings in the public and I think for that reason it perhaps will survive.

The pressure to undermine this great edifice is not very great at the moment and, in our isolated and exposed position in the world, we probably want to cling to nurse for fear of getting something worse.

In an uncertain world, the Windsors are going to need all the guile and wisdom they've accumulated over the last hundred years to navigate the uncharted waters which lie ahead.

It would be very rash for those around the throne to take the continuation of the monarchy for granted.

Support for the monarchy is much more fragile in a very swiftly changing 21st-century environment.

I don't think the Royal Family these days would have to do much wrong for suddenly the monarchy to find itself in a lot of trouble.