Declassified files: Prince Charles wanted to visit Northern Ireland and the Republic

The heir to the throne’s views were recorded in a meeting between his deputy private secretary Stephen Lamport and senior Stormont officials, including the head of the civil service David Fell.

The February 17 1994 meeting with the Prince of Wales’s representative was “to discuss possible visits by the Prince to Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland” as well as a briefing for the prince on Northern Ireland.

Mr Lamport said that a slot had been set aside in Prince Charles’ diary to visit Northern Ireland in July. “He [the Prince] would if possible like the visit to cover the same areas of interest that would be included in a visit to a provincial city in Great Britain, such as young people, the unemployed, inner city issues and industry.

“He would like to feel that he was doing something useful for the people, not things that were entirely symbolic and lacking in substance.”

The NIO permanent secretary said it was “enormously important that the Prince should visit Northern Ireland” but that “a visit of no more than a day and a half would be best for security reasons, arriving in the afternoon, and with no publicity until the second morning”.

The note also recorded: “Mr Lamport said that the Prince hoped to visit the Republic of Ireland in the autumn, after [underlined] a visit to Northern Ireland.

“It was agreed that it was important that the visits should be in this order ... HM Ambassador in Dublin was enthusiastic about the possibility of a visit.”

The prince did visit the Republic in 1995.

In discussion about the upcoming briefing on Northern Ireland, there was a note to say that security policy should be included but it should be “not too heavy” and there was also a request that “demographic trends should be covered”.