How do you think QEII would have handled the situation with AMW if she was still alive and reigning? (title edited my MNHQ at request of the OP)

[SecondSpare]

Been reminiscing quite a bit recently about the late Queen. I have been wondering if she would have taken the same actions that King Charles III has taken in relation to the former Prince Andrew, who is now known as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor.

Do you think she would have acted as decisively in stripping AMW of his royal status and stripping him of his titles? I think it would have been absolutely gut-wrenching for her to do, particularly given the widely-held notion that Andrew was her favourite child.

We know what she would have done - because we know what she did. Nothing.

She’d have done nothing except enable and protect him, like she did all her life. She was a disgusting woman who seems to get a pass because she got old, spent 70 years as Queen and too many people believe the bullshit that this made her a wonderful person. She very clearly wasn’t.

A lot of truth in this

Only because so much has emerged that she would have had to have taken action. It would have been reluctantly done and I believe she’d have been annoyed at having to do it. She did help pay his victim off instead of letting him take full responsibility for his actions, which I believe tells us a lot about her character and her relationship with Andrew.

Why do you think that when it is well known that she stumped up the hush money that was paid to make the scandal go away?

Her motto was 'Never complain, never explain' - really, deeply arrogant when you look at it closely.

’Never complain, never explain’ neatly sums up the royals’ disdain towards the public and the truth, doesn’t it?
Effectively they can pretty much get away with anything as Norman Baker’s book ‘And what do you do?’ brilliantly exposes. I read it some years ago and am now listening to the audiobook. Well worth reading.
Their influence over British politics is one element of the breathtaking arrogance they have.

And we the public, and our representatives in parliament, have let the Royals police themselves for some unknown reason! It’s astounding really! Imho, they need to be scrutinised by a a properly independent body made up of citizens from all walks of life. It shouldn’t just be the Sir Michael Peat’s of this world conducting internal enquiries the results of which are either whitewashes or unavailable to the public.

We have put trust in the monarchy to automatically do the right thing when marking their own homework! And just like an unwritten constitution; this only works when people have good intentions. Not when they are hell bent on acquiring a vast fortune for themselves, or on covering up their own, or a member of their family’s, serious wrongdoings.

She’d have done fuck all. Same as she did when she was alive. She paid off his victims and waited for it to all go away. She was complicit.

Agree with this.

That lets the Royal family off rather nicely doesn't it? Poor things, if only they had access to the best intelligence on the planet, they might have known!

Epstein was convicted of sexual abuse and procuring a child a whole 12 years before Ghislaine.
Absolute rubbish they would not have known something was amiss with who Andrew was fraternising with. In fact QE2 expressed concern about AMW's role as TE and his friendship with JE many many years before. She just didn't do anything about it.

Here you are. From 2011. Her concern
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/mar/10/prince-andrew-queen-envoy-scandal#:~:text=Prince%20Andrew%20reportedly%20met%20the,the%20UK's%20international%20trade%20envoy.

So let's put to bed once and for all... the ridiculous notion that the royal family had no idea until Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted

I think it is possible to see this as one of the ageless hells - having a child who behaves monstrously but is impossible to control through the usual leverage.

Andrew was evidently her blind spot. But also it is hard to know what might have worked in controlling him.

It looks to me like Andrew has some kind of genuine psychological disorder compounded by an unforgivable indulgence by his caregivers in his formative years. This might explain his extreme behaviour.

He was also sexually abused as a young g boy according to Andrew Lownie’s book ‘Entitled’ ie taken to an older woman when still a young boy. Something of an aristocratic tradition but none the less potentially hugely damaging for a child.

Her massive mistake was giving him the trade envoy role - presumably as a tragic hope that he would rise to the occasion and become a responsible adult. She must have been doggedly turning a blind eye - she was certainly informed about his behaviour but every lackey was also trying to hang on to their cushy royal job.

She clearly loved him but was also responsible for how he turned out. What could she do given that he probabl lied about everything. She could have him drugged and locked up? Honestly it does seem like the only way such a sexually and financially compulsive and amoral character might be constrained.

Nothing worked short of what they have finally done, too late of course.

I think the wider family have always known but his behaviour is like one of those really badly behaved dogs who knock you over, hurt you, crap on your property, bite you etc and the owner loves them too much to see how badly they are behaving - if they did they would have to act decisively and effectively.

Rob Reiner & his wife were frightened by their son but maybe loved him too much to act effectively. Maybe they kept trying and failing.

AMW is also symbolic of all the privilege and entitlement of the family.

I think that they need to change quickly to survive. They could for start :

Open your wills.
Stop destroying the historical record.
Be transparent.
Establish a royal register of interests.
Pay real tax.
Pay death duties.
Open your finances to parliamentary scrutiny particularly the duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster.
Stop the grace and favour deals for non working royals.
Clarify the terms of the Crown Estate and make them favour the nation not a family.

Make it clear that the law applies to them too.

Do the right thing now.

That is a very interesting about the late Queen holding talks with Andrew

The article is dated March 2011 but it doesn’t state when exactly the talks were held.

It’s interesting because in February 2011, QE2 awarded Andrew the honour of the Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order (GCVO), which is the highest possible rank in that order and a personal gift from the monarch for service to the Crown. This was shortly after images of Andrew with Epstein were published in the media.

So I’d like to know if that award came before or after the talks or was possibly part of some deal?

I would imagine it was part of some deal. How stupid was QE2 over her son.

And to think Andrew lobbied MPs to strengthen ties with Azerbaijan, a despotic regime that uses torture against any protesters, Andrew was a frequent visitor there. And Epstein using an RAF base to land his private jet .
It's unbelievable all this was in 2011 and here we are in 2025 before he really is stripped of everything.

She clearly loved him but was also responsible for how he turned out. What could she do given that he probabl lied about everything. She could have him drugged and locked up? Honestly it does seem like the only way such a sexually and financially compulsive and amoral character might be constrained.

Accounts by people who had the misfortune to have to work for him said that when he was pulled up on his behaviour he would say that he was only answerable to The Queen. And she would always take his side. So she had the ultimate responsibility for him and could have controlled him by for one thing, telling him that if he didn't fall into line she would cut him off/ not protect him etc. She clearly didn't. Maybe because she thought she could sweep it all under the carpet as the Royals always have done ( because they have a massive cleanup operation surrounding them). Rob Reiners son was a drug addict. Andrew is a monster of the RF's own making. Yes, he probably has some kind of psychiatric disorder and is of low intelligence but they have all the money they will ever need, advisors, educational experts, medical professionals at their beck and call. But instead of getting him help, they hid it all away and palmed him off on us as a 'working Royal/ trade envoy.

Isn't some Azerbajani Oligarch tied up in his house that he sold for over the odds that then fell into disrepair and was bulldozed? The one gifted to him and SF when they married? It is such a clear money laundering operation for despotic regimes. Yet nothing is done. No investigation, nothing.

That doesn't say she has concerns about his trade envoy role. It says she was concerned that the headlines would overshadow W & K's wedding. Given he got the Order of the Garter soon afterwards, Id imagine the conversation went along the lines of 'There there my little treasure. Those nasty plebs are going on again. It might make us look bad when we want them to concentrate on Willy's wedding. I'll give you a big new bauble to wear if you quit'. She couldn't have given less of a shit about anything else. 2011 was also when the papace issued denials about the Guiffre allegations, despite Andrew having convicted sex offenders and young girls as guests in BP for a decade before. Only Charles apparently was against him taking the role, but he was ignored by TLQ. All this 'Andrew was her son/ she was a mother too" business. She was Charles' mother too. She ignored his concerns and has left him with a steaming pile of shit to deal with.

when does AMW move up to his nice house at Sandringham ?

Yes I’m no particular fan of Charles but I’ve read that only he felt disquiet about Andrew being awarded the trade envoy role.

I agree about the Queen leaving Charles with a horrible mess to deal with but he didn’t exactly rush to sort it out either! As usual, they only act when under outside pressure (the heckler).

Even now, they are still protecting Andrew. Some reports are saying that he will only be moving out of Windsor in October. And he doesn’t seem to be facing any further sanctions?

Yes! Unbelievable that it has all dragged on so long!

MPs first lodged a complaint relating to Prince Andrew in Parliament in 2001, when 65 MPs signed an Early Day Motion calling for a register of royal interests regarding his role as a trade and investment envoy. That was the earliest example of an official body of people trying to do something about him and getting knocked back.

I read somewhere that certain aides wrote to QE2 expressing huge disquiet about Andrew's role as TE particularly with regard to David Rowland. This is a financier and owner of a private bank in Luxembourg, Tory donor, shady. He was bankrolling Andrew to the tune of millions, and in return Andrew used his position to help Rowland obtain licences in the ME

Anyway, courtiers wrote to QE2 and received a very curt reply. And it went no further.

Rowland was front row at Eugenie's wedding.

Totally agree with this. The royal family is corrupt and operates a mafia-like omertà code of secrecy.

Wow. That is extraordinary!

No one would find this level of corruption and cover up acceptable in any other public body such as a County Council or a government department! Why on earth are we so passive and accepting of it within the institution of the monarchy? And why are our own MPs so easily cowed?

It leads you to wonder whether there is a strong Establishment “club” at the very centre of power all doing one another reciprocal favours.

How else have we got in to the position where the wealth and influence of the RF has grown so strong that it appears no one can effectively oppose or criticise them, or hold them to account, in a supposedly democratic country?

This is one of my main arguments for an elected head of state who would have to be accountable and who wouldn’t necessarily have immense private wealth behind them reinforcing their position.

No one would find this level of corruption and cover up acceptable in any other public body such as a County Council or a government department!

Yes. And Andrew was continually lobbying MP's on behalf of Rowland. Whilst trousering millions from him.