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The saga started with a isolated photograph, perhaps the most significant ever taken of a individual from the royal household.

Present was the Earl of Inverness, arm-in-arm a teenage girl, while a companion grinned suggestively in the backdrop.

Lacking that snapshot, shot at a gathering in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the assertions of a teenager who stated she was moved across the sea and compelled to have cursory relations with a member of the monarchy?

A curious, telling action by someone who had overtly stated to have no been aware of her, claimed he could never have had intimate contact with her, and yet provided a substantial sum of family funds to resolve a drawn-out legal case.

A Long Period of Controversy

In this context, discussions of the monarchy acting swiftly to cut Andrew off are wide of the mark. This scandal has continued for the majority of 15 years since that picture, and another snapshot of Andrew strolling congenially with a notorious individual surfaced.

• Arrogance: To what extent did his family members, possibly even his relatives, know that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Dubious Friendships: They must have understood, if his employees and the authorities were performing their duties, that he had some highly questionable friends given he unabashedly hosted them to palaces.
• Fiscal Irresponsibility: If the family did not know about his sexual proclivities, they certainly knew about his overspending with public money.

Trips were listed in official documents: private aircraft travel from the palace to a country club and back again in time for midday meal, private flights instead of scheduled services, all for the convenience of "the travel enthusiast".

World of Deference

Furthermore the presumption which required deference when he walked into a area or the supreme awareness about his honorifics used on his letterheads in letters to his friends.

He managed to escape consequences while his mother, who inexplicably indulged him, was still living. The sovereign did at least remove him of royal responsibilities and honorary colonelcies in the aftermath of his disastrous and, as revealed, mendacious public statement six years ago.

Current Situation

Merely in the last 14 days that events accelerated, following the release of books giving more disturbing information of his actions and that of his companions.

More information have again revealed Andrew's belief that he could avoid lying about his interaction with a disgraced individual.

The public (and the media) were far more perceptive of the monarchy. There was not a single person of any significance to support him, a result of all those years of presumption.

Institutional Fears

The more astute monarchical figures realized that. The key objective is to transfer the crown, if not as heretofore at least whole and unblemished.

For generations the last 190 years trying to reverse the reputation of earlier rulers, showing they are valuable, responsible and reactive to their subjects.

Andrew was putting all that in jeopardy in an age when submission and privacy is no longer sufficient.

The Fallout

Eventually, the famously indecisive king was prodded further. There was no alternative. The royal household had surrendered command of the account.

Currently the removal of titles and the persistent and permanent social disgrace that will hurt Andrew most deeply.

• Reduction: Reduced to just a private citizen
• Past Example: The primary monarch to surrender his honorifics in recent history
• Military Service: Notably hurtful given his duty in the conflict

He is still a royal advisor, in principle able to stand in for the monarch, and he is still in the lineage to the crown, but not any of these will actually come to pass.

Coming Developments

Will people he comes across still acknowledge him? Could they still forget themselves and call him Prince? Might they say Mr,

Naturally, he is not withdrawing to suburbia, but to the royal family's vast estate at a royal residence.

In that place, he will be provided by the monarch with one of the grace and favour houses and given some sort of financial support.

This is not his former home, where he paid a minimal lease for more than 20 years, and Norfolk is a bit distant, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Pending Matters

This is not over. There are still files in the custody of overseas authorities to be made public.

• Political Pressure: Will lawmakers demand more
• Financial Investigation: Or scrutinize the misuse of state resources
• Judicial Potential: There may even be a criminal probe into his actions

Maybe for the time being the reputational impact to the institution is limited. The narrative from the royal household was clearly that the removal of honorifics was what the monarch, and particularly other senior monarchical figures, desired.

A Shift in Position

No more illusion that Andrew was acting willingly. And, remarkably, the concise announcement showed evidently that the royals were aligning with the accuser's narrative of incidents.

Even more, for the premiere occasion they ultimately showed concern for the affected individuals: "These actions are deemed necessary, despite the truth that he maintains his innocence of the claims against him."

Finally it is entitlement, selfishness and indolence that will kill the monarchy. In his foolishness, personal excess and corruption, Andrew appears never to have grasped that reality.