Thursday 30 June 2022 12:06 AM Meghan 'bullying' inquiry buried: Findings of Palace probe into claims will ... trends now
Buckingham Palace has effectively buried a report into allegations of bullying by the Duchess of Sussex.
Royal aides yesterday admitted for the first time that the findings will never be made public.
A source said last night: ‘People suspected it would be buried, and now it seems that it has.’ The Daily Mail understands that even those who took part in the inquiry haven’t been told what the outcome is.
Palace officials would confirm only that their investigation had concluded and ‘recommendations on our policy and procedures’ had been taken forward.
Royal aides announced in March last year that they were launching an inquiry into claims that Meghan’s ‘belittling’ behaviour while a working member of the Royal Family drove two female personal assistants out of the household and ‘undermined the confidence’ of a third.
Controversial: Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, during last year’s interview with Oprah Winfrey
Staff were said to have been left in tears and feeling ‘traumatised’ – with some likening their condition to having post-traumatic stress.
The Royal Household employed a third-party law firm, paid for by the family privately, to probe the claims in a move that some predicted could increase tensions between Harry and Meghan and ‘the institution’.
The allegations have always been strongly denied by the duchess, whose lawyers described them at the time as a ‘calculated smear campaign’. They did not respond to requests for comment yesterday.
Last year a palace spokesman made clear that the specifics of the allegations – which were brought to the attention of senior household staff at the time by Harry and Meghan’s concerned press secretary, Jason Knauf – would not be probed.
But they said they would investigate how the ‘historic allegations of bullying’ were handled by officials and whether any changes to their HR policies and procedures should be instigated as a result.
A spokesman confirmed that ‘if’ those findings were to be made public, they would be included in this year’s Sovereign Grant report – the official annual review into the Queen’s public finances and the running of her household.
But announcing the report yesterday, her Master of the Privy Purse, Sir Michael Stevens, said of the investigation: ‘There is nothing on this in the report. As we said last year, this work was undertaken privately and had no Sovereign Grant money spent on it.
Buckingham Palace has effectively buried a report into allegations of bullying by the Duchess of Sussex (seen with Harry at Kensington Palace)
‘The review has been completed and recommendations on our (HR) policy and procedures have been taken forward. But we will not be commenting further.’
The Mail understands that although the review was concluded several months ago, the tiny handful of former royal staff invited to take part only recently discovered it had been wound up.
And they will not be told what its findings are, or what changes to HR procedures have been made as a result.
‘Considering those who participated did so at great personal and reputational risk to themselves, the fact that they haven’t even been told what the findings are is unfathomable,’ said one source with knowledge of the process.
‘I am sure they will be deeply distressed, but perhaps not entirely surprised given how things have been handled. The household seems to be terrified of upsetting or provoking Harry and Meghan.’
The issue was raised during a briefing about the Sovereign Grant which showed:
The Queen’s annual expenditure increased by 17 per cent to £102.4 million during 2021/22, forcing officials to dip into savings; The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are now ‘financially independent’, with royal sources saying this was of ‘great
