Late Thursday UK time, the “Firm” did what it should have done last week:

The original statement lacked accountability, a sincere apology and allowed the main subject too much agency over its tone and content. And it led to further leaks which further inflamed public discontent.

As a result, there was a needless week-long period of public anger and outrage, damaging the brand.

There needed to be someone in charge with a steady hand–someone who could foresee the inevitable public dissatisfaction and take the extreme action required.

Unfortunately, they waited a week to see if it would blow over.

That seldom works.

One can only laugh and express curiosity at the stranger aspects of the British legal system and the extreme deference shown to the royals.

According to The Times, who obtained a copy of the leasehold agreement for Prince Andrew’s home, he pays “one peppercorn (if demanded) for perpetual access to his 30 room mansion:

Meanwhile, moves are afoot to have Parliament weigh in and permanently strip Andrew of his royal titles. As I suspected, while last week’s official statement was an attempt to end the matter, that’s not going to work. It did not go far enough.

This story isn’t over.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/oct/19/mps-urged-to-confront-royal-family-over-prince-andrews-epstein-links

PR professionals and issues management experts take note: the “Firm” had a chance to draw a line and limit this crisis. Today’s statement blew that chance.

No apology, no contrition, no regret.

A missed opportunity. Now, this issue will fester through weeks of speculation about the future of the monarchy.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/oct/17/prince-andrew-to-give-up-royal-titles

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Another excellent Marina Hyde column today — this time addressing the Royal Family’s very, very bad week and reminding everyone of that time-worn truism in journalism: Don’t write, say or email anything you don’t want to see on the front page of a newspaper/website.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/sep/23/royal-victim-duchess-fergie-sarah-ferguson-jeffrey-epstein

Some things have a tendency to blow over, particularly when there is so much happening politically in the world. Other issues live on, fed with a constant drip, drip, drip of that journalistic fertilizer: new details that keep stories alive. Hyde suspects the latter in this case:

I’ve often wondered if the royal’s woes are caused by some intrinsic, institutional flaw or whether this is simply caused by the public’s every-growing demands for transparency catching-up with a brittle, aging institutional structure.

Could be a bit of both.

Likely more rough seas ahead for “The Firm” and the busy people charged with maintaining and burnishing the brand.

The Observer’s Andrew Rawnsley rightly reminds us that the US President’s recent state visit to the UK is really a sell-out of Canada. Here’s a snippet from Rawnsley’s 13 September 2025 column:

You can read the entire article here: https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/operation-ingratiate-takes-morerisks-with-starmers-embattled-reputation