Paul Burrell, Diana's butler before her death

[MarchionessVonSausage]

I'm just reading "The Royal Insider" by Paul Burrell. It's quite amusing, lots of tidbits about his time as a footman to QE2, less about his time with Diana and Charles although maybe that comes later. I think his 1st book was more about Diana.

Does anyone remember back when he was charged with stealing Diana's belongings after she died, but the trial fell apart when the Queen said she knew that he'd taken some items "for safe-keeping". I've heard all sorts of stories about this, it seems loads of people think he's a liar and a thief. I've seen him interviewed and he comes across as very charming, not that this means he's not a liar!

Just wondering if anyone remembers it, I'm Australian and it wasn't widely reported here. What was the thinking at the time? Did he have much public support?

There’s no way for PB to come out of monetising her memory and his access to her as her servant looking anything other than odious and greedy

I agree completely, @Foraor, but he came up against an equally greedy and odious bunch with the royal family and I did have to smile over them twisting and turning to keep him out of that witness box

Some might even say they met their match, but as I've said on other threads the ghastly smirk that's constantly on his face may well have a lot to do with knowing they can't affford to touch him

It would also be intelligent!

Paul Burrell mostly worked with Diana as butler when she was separated from Charles and in her 30s although I think he was a footman at Highgrove from the late 1980s. I don't think he worked for Diana when she was young and newly married. There wasn't a huge age gap between Diana and Burrell - 2-3 years maybe.

I always thought that Burrell was used as a bit of a distraction over the shenanigans surrounding Diana's Will where the executors (her mother and sister) refused to follow Diana's wishes regarding the distribution of her assets, in particular, the bequests to her godchildren. I wondered whether the "items the butler took" were related to the disputed items? The executors did win a deed of variation in the end so the godchildren got none of the money left to them in Diana's will but were allowed to choose a single item to remember Diana. However, if Burrell was tried criminally then all the details would be aired in court. I always suspected this is why the Queen stepped in.

I do agree he is probably all that but at the same time the RF pays peanuts and is not at all loyal to their staff (see countless examples of people sacked and losing their housing at the drop of a hat) so in a secular age why would they command loyalty to the grave?

If Burrell and his like got pensioned off with a flat and an allowance, which wouldn't be unreasonable for the closest servant to the wife of future king etc, then I doubt we'd ever have heard from him

the RF pays peanuts and is not at all loyal to their staff (see countless examples of people sacked and losing their housing at the drop of a hat) so in a secular age why would they command loyalty to the grave?

A very fair point, @NormalAuntFanny, though I doubt the RF have ever really come to terms with a world where loyalty is earned rather than commanded

It's widely said that, for them, there's royalty and then there's "everyone else", and unfortunately the second group are merely there to be used and discarded at will

As I understand it (happy to be corrected by others who know more) royal household staff are paid according to civil service payment grades.

I have assumed that once you reach higher levels (such as personal secretaries/assistants) there is some negotiation, as there will be fewer people with these skills available (but I don't actually know this).

Re housing: there are many jobs in different walks of life where housing is part of the remuneration, and obviously if you lose that job you will lose the housing as well.

No, not at all! They're in fact very poorly paid -- remember that news story, at some point since Charles took the throne, about a housekeeping job at Windsor Castle which was advertised for considerably less than minimum wage, and caused public outrage, so was subsequently readvertised for just above minimum wage? The official line was that it was an 'error', I believe.

https://gpa.net/blogs/emea-1/uk-royal-household-advertises-sub-minimum-wage-housekeeping-job

But surely the Queen would not interfere with the CPS?

managed to conduct her affairs and divorce largely under the radar.

I think that the Palace PR machine always protects the principles, and throws the press a lot of bones about the people (women) who marry in.

The men seem to get a pass - the rugby bloke, PA husbands etc.

However, the way Sophie, Catherine, Meghan and indeed, Camilla have been treated over the years is appalling.

The RF family (very shamefully) hide behind them.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2002/nov/04/constitution.monarchy1

The public interest immunity (PII) system allows the prosecution to apply to the judge for a ruling that disclosure of certain information would be harmful to the public interest and should not be made public.

But as it's usually only used in matters of national safety or to the protect the identity of a witness who might be endangered, it's anyone's guess why this was considered appropriate, and why the trial was halted before PB could be cross-examined, potentially about his time working as QEII's personal footman before he worked for Charles and Diana and later for Diana alone.

Thanks @Foraor

That's really not good.

I would suspect it was a replacement post and the advert was sent out without updating to current standards. That isn't acceptable and is something HR should be checking. Realistically, it's also not something KC3 is likely to have been involved with.

A quick online search suggests that civil service housekeeping jobs would be paid at AA/AO band if not outsourced (which royal household ones are unlikely to be). That band starts at £23k.

He was on tv last night. Probably ch 5. On a programme about Hatfield House. He is a slippery toad. Still going on about his alledged close relationship with Queen Elizabeth. He's such a hanger on still.

https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-5516185/How-Prince-Charles-tried-stop-court-case-Paul-Burrell.html

Read this! Burrell is scum! And thanks to him I apparently now know Diana took cocaine!

Archive link Charles Burrell court

Many thanks @bluegreygreen🙏

Very good, & fairly damning doc on Kanga, re: Royals, I can no longer find online? Can anyone else?

Has it by any chance gone the way of Fergie visits Hull where she visits a Council Estate and wants to know whats in Poor peoples cupboards and generally fat shaming economically deprived people and as a friend of ours from Hull says not only were the family thinking who the heck is she but stronger language but also lets have a look in your bank account and here we are today where we really do need to look at her transactions and transgressions and we are not talking about her slimming plan Hustle she was upselling but that the footage has been buried on youtube by an updated with a more PC version with a more current revisit . Oh I wish that old bit of telly hadn’t been wiped from Youtube sounds like Kanga doc has been disappeared then. It has an interesting clip where Nigel Dempster discusses how all the journos knew about Kanga and what the arrangement was back in the day .

Started reading the article about the Burrell case. I’d forgotten it was so many items, and a lot of highly personal stuff. You may give the odd trinket , if you were decluttering, to your work colleague, but not letters etc. Maybe he was storing them on behalf of Diana for her protection, but they weren’t his to keep.

Me too I have been reading the article linked on Burrell and reading the comments section I love the Comment I wish his wife would write a Book 😂 I don’t think any of them were covered in Glory.
I think about Diana Being in the end close to Fayed and what he was up to you can’t tell me the Secret Services didn’t know about the Police reports that were made to go away . Diana really was surrounded by some shameful specimens

OP this is the best kind of Did the Butler do it? I do think having her school reports and old body wash cartons were against the agreement for safekeeping of getting into the wrong hands . I think they were in the wrong creepy hands and it has Anthony Perkin in Psycho vibes and now that comment he made about Diana’s hair blowing from the fan and him being the one to dress her corpse is being reframed for me. I think it was verging on obsession and hoarding her intimate possessions that lets face it were the only private part of Diana her then children were to inherit and how extremely precious that is because they had to share her in grief so publicly and The Public took such ownership of her.
I feel so sad for children born into this Circus to lose their mother so young even the Butler was part of the Circus he could of felt a duty to what I truly believe Diana cared for most which was her boys 😪