Prince Harry has released an extraordinary witness statement as part of a court battle over alleged phone hacking by the publisher of the Sun and News of the World, owned by Rupert Murdoch. Here are some of its key claims:
Queen Elizabeth II, Harry’s grandmother, agreed to take on Murdoch
“I remember speaking to my brother and saying something along the lines of ‘enough of this, I want to get permission to push for a resolution to our phone-hacking claims and a formal apology from Murdoch before any of his people are allowed anywhere near the wedding [to Meghan in 2018]’ or words to that effect.
“I felt very angry about his newspapers’ appalling treatment of my wife and frustrated that nothing had been resolved on the phone-hacking front during the previous 12 months, and I thought (naively perhaps) that this might prove the perfect opportunity to air our grievances and force a resolution to our phone-hacking claims that had, up to that point, been denied to us on account of the secret agreement that had been reached between the institution and senior executives at NGN [News Group Newspapers] … and, of course, to force an apology from Murdoch.
“William was very understanding and supportive and agreed that we needed to do it. He therefore suggested that I seek permission from ‘granny’.
“I spoke to her shortly afterwards and said something along the lines of ‘are you happy for me to push this forward, do I have your permission?’ and she said ‘yes’ …
“Unfortunately, despite … best efforts, both Robert Thomson and Rebekah Brooks [of News Corporation and News UK] continued to ignore our requests but then, shortly before the wedding, we were informed by Gerrard Tyrrell that nothing could be done as NGN were not in a position to apologise to Her Majesty the Queen and the rest of the royal family at that stage on account of the fact that, if they did so, they would have to admit that not only was the News of the World involved in phone hacking but also the Sun and that was something that they couldn’t afford to do until the end of the litigation because it would seriously undermine their settlement strategy across all the other claims.”
… but his father, now King Charles, intervened
“With hindsight, I now understand why staff at Clarence House [representing Charles and Camilla] were being so unhelpful and were seemingly blocking our every move, as they had a specific long-term strategy to keep the media (including NGN) onside in order to smooth the way for my stepmother (and father) to be accepted by the British public as queen consort (and king respectively) when the time came, and anything that might upset the applecart in this regard (including the suggestion of resolution of our phone hacking claims) was to be avoided at all costs.
“This was all because of the secret agreement which had been reached between NGN and the institution that there would be no actions until the end of the litigation. Indeed, when I did actually issue my hacking claims against both MGN and NGN in October 2019, I was summoned to Buckingham Palace and specifically told to drop the legal actions because they have an ‘effect on all the family’. This was a direct request (or rather demand) from my father, Edward Young [private secretary to the queen] and my father’s private secretary, Clive Alderton.”
The life of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, could have been saved
“This sort of unlawful activity including phone tapping/hacking made her [Diana] distrust her protection officers as she thought they were leaking private information about her, which I believe is one of the reasons she insisted on not having any protection after the divorce (as I am told by the institution).
“If she’d had police protection with her in August 1997, she’d probably still be alive today. People who abuse their power like this need to face the consequences of their actions, otherwise it says that we can all behave like this.”
Prince William received a secret payoff from Murdoch’s business
“Judging by Ms [Maxine] Mossman’s [a lawyer representing Murdoch’s News Group Newspapers] witness statement, my brother appeared to know an awful lot more than I did on the subject of phone hacking although he did not tell me if that was the case.
“However, NGN still settled his claim for a huge sum of money in 2020 without subjecting him to a similar strike-out application, without any of the public being told, and seemingly with some favourable deal in return for him going ‘quietly’ so to speak.
“This goes to prove the existence of this secret agreement between the institution and senior executives at NGN – if it wasn’t in place then why on earth did William wait until 2019 to bring his claim in circumstances where our two private secretaries brought and settled claims back in 2012, and where he knew far more about the matter back then than I did, and also why didn’t NGN test its limitation argument against him?”
Phone hacking meant Harry was perceived as ‘an idiot’ and was at risk of attacks
“It even got to the stage where the tabloids would routinely publish articles about me that were plainly wrong but interspersed with snippets of truth, which I now believe were most likely gleaned from voicemail interception and/or unlawful information gathering.
“This created an alternative and distorted version of me and my private life to the general public – people that I had to serve and interact with as part of my role in the royal family – to the point where any one of the thousands of people that I met or was introduced to on any given day could easily have said ‘you know what, you’re an idiot. I’ve read all the stories about you and now I hate you and am going to stab you’.”
Harry’s relationships were affected
“Whenever I have been in a relationship, I have always tried to be the best partner that I possibly could but every woman has her limit. Unfortunately, they are not just in a relationship with me but with the entire tabloid press as a third party.
“At no point did I have a girlfriend or a relationship with anyone without the tabloids getting involved and ultimately ruining it, or trying to ruin it, using whatever unlawful means at their disposal.”
The tabloids hoped he would have a public breakdown
“Having seen me grow up from a baby (being born into this ‘contractual relationship’ without any choice) and scrutinised my every move, the tabloids have known the challenges and mental health struggles that I have had to deal with throughout my childhood and adult life, in large part created by them, and for them to then play on that and use it to their own advantage, while weaponising mental health, I think is truly appalling.
“Despite them all knowing about what I was dealing with throughout the years, they kept on doubling down their efforts rather than letting up. That is grotesque and sadistic – and no doubt they were hoping for a total and very public breakdown.”
The British people are being ‘brainwashed’ by the tabloid press
“The fact they’re all ganging up to protect each other, like they first did after the Leveson inquiry, is the most disturbing and dangerous part of it all. It is clear to me that the tabloid press are the mothership of online trolling. Trolls react and mobilise to stories they create, not the other way around, though plenty of headlines are knowingly created from troll accounts while giving the impression that this is what the UK public think and feel.
“This is brainwashing at the highest level. People die as a result of trolling, and people will continue to take their own lives when they can’t see any other way out. How much more blood will stain their typing fingers before someone can put a stop to this madness?”
There are ‘criminals masquerading as journalists’
“When I think about the fact that senior executives at NGN not only knew about and condoned phone hacking as a practice at both News of the World and the Sun, but also actively sought to cover it up by the deliberate concealment and destruction of evidence on an industrial scale, my immediate thoughts are that this makes them criminals, not journalists, and the fourth estate is too important and rightly powerful to have criminals masquerading as journalists running the show.
“They have lied under oath, perjured themselves in the process and have
proven they’re above the law. Everyone seems to be scared of them, especially politicians.”
No one is policing an increasingly emboldened press
“This isn’t just about phone hacking, this about accountability of power. Power that informs but is being used to brainwash people. They have created a stalemate society, where they can enrage the public over the most mundane and petty things, to distract from the critical issues for our country and communities.
“In short, the people and the newspaper organisations who hack people’s voicemails … have never been brought to justice, and are now more emboldened because of it.
“They believe they can do anything they want and get away with it, while making huge sums of money from it. If they’re supposedly policing society, then who is policing them?”
But James Murdoch, son of Rupert, is a ‘kindred spirit’
“He [James Murdoch] made a real effort to try and come and talk to me [at a Google event] despite my security detail trying to keep me away from him – presumably they thought I’d get into a heated argument with him or worse.
“I got the distinct impression that, having broken away from the cult that is the Murdoch dynasty, he was starting to show signs that he wanted to do things differently and to make amends for the past.
“Given that he had broken away from his family’s history, and I was about to do the same with mine, I felt that we were kindred spirits of sorts.
“My wife and I subsequently had a Zoom call with him and his wife when I was on the Aspen Commission for Digital Information. I also remember congratulating him for going in a different direction to his father …”
