There is still a path home to the UK for Prince Harry, but soon it will be too late

Prince Harry, it seems, was denied permission to have a wreath laid on his behalf at the Cenotaph on Whitehall.

This will have upset him, but he should not be surprised, and should avoid thinking of himself as a victim : he no longer represents the Queen.

For this reason, I feel free to write about him in a way that I would not think of, if he were still a senior royal. But, I am writing as a well-wisher.

There is a path homewards for Prince Harry, but he needs to be courageous and honest with himself, and take it soon.

He and Meghan seem to have persuaded themselves that they were being sidelined in the Royal Family. But, they had enormous status, and they always would have had that status.

As grandson of the Queen, later son of the King, later brother of the King, even later, perhaps, uncle of the King, and always son of Diana, Prince Harry would always have been a senior royal, and his wife alongside him. He would always have placed a wreath at the Cenotaph in person, Meghan would always have been on the rota to stand on the balcony.

Who knows where it went wrong : petulance, impatience, exhaustion, over-reaction, miscommunication. But, it needs to be put right quickly, before it is too late.

There are signs that over-exposure to Californian luxury is already eating away at British goodwill towards Harry and Meghan, and not just British.

Many Canadians feel ‘played’ by the Sussexes stay in British Columbia, only for them to later move south. As they get older their current lifestyle will allow some to paint them as selfish. Furthermore, celebrity in the US may blind them to respect ebbing away elsewhere, and it is elsewhere that matters, is it not? Nothing but a downward spiral lies ahead on the current trajectory.

We need Prince Harry and Meghan to come home now, and return to their duties. All could be well, if they do.

The PR people could spin it if this is the kind of world we must live in. It could be said that after the devastation of Covid-19 Prince Harry feels that it is his duty to return home and help rebuild the UK. It could be said that Harry and Meghan were exhausted and stressed, and they are now refreshed and refocused.

This would dovetail with their genuine interest in mental health matters.

All this assumes, of course, that they can get out of any contracts that they may have already signed in Hollywood.

If they do not have the courage and insight to come back soon there could be a repetition of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor’s sad exile in the Bois de Boulogne, but this time documented in horrendous detail by a sometimes ruthless modern media.

John Gemmell, Wem, Shropshire

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