GLOVER: If Prince Harry easily attacks the elected government, King should banish him

Prince Harry has said or written many outrageous and bizarre things about his family, the monarchy and the press in recent years.

But as misguided as his previous outpourings may have been, none of them rival in offense his claims about the government and the press in testimonies in his case against the publisher of the Daily Mirror.

I’ll leave it to others to write about the merits of the case, though his evidence of phone hacks has so far been very sparse. I’m interested in Harry’s remarkable comments about the government.

Because what he wrote about being at a “rock bottom” amounts to an unprecedented attack by a senior member of the royal family (Harry is fifth in line to the throne). Never in the history of our constitutional monarchy has there been such a regal attack against elected politicians. It’s regrettable – and dangerous.

On the one hand, his maunderings can easily be dismissed because they are so obviously wrong. But since they come from someone in his position, they will certainly be taken seriously. Depressingly, some will agree with him.

Here’s what he said: ‘Our country is judged globally by the state of our press and our government – both of which I believe are at an all-time low. Democracy fails when your press doesn’t scrutinize and hold the government accountable, and instead chooses to sleep with them so they can ensure the status quo.”

Where do you start with such nonsense? He is wrong on so many points.

Harry may have failed to notice that this government is constantly being pilloried by leftist newspapers such as the Guardian and Daily Mirror (whose publisher he is suing!) and by the BBC. Center-right newspapers also often have a hard time.

The idea that Rishi Sunak and ministers are not being monitored and held accountable is ludicrous. They are put under the microscope every hour of the day and night. Where is the evidence that the government and the press are in bed together?

A year ago, many newspapers helped to drive Boris Johnson out of number 10. Even the Daily Telegraph, the publication he had worked for most of his adult life, turned against him. Not so cosy.

In fact, you could probably make a better case than weak-eyed Harry if you said that the media in this country is sometimes too quick to berate politicians in power, and, of course, too oppositional. But that’s what we journalists tend to do.

Prince Harry’s argument is ridiculous. One wonders if he still knows the country he no longer lives in, and if he ever really knew it at all.

As for the idea that the press and government are working together to “ensure the status quo,” that is absurd. What, pray, is the status quo that Harry apparently dislikes? The royal family, of which Harry still remains a member, is the pinnacle of the status quo.

But here’s the highly privileged Harry, falsely accusing the press as a whole of failing to hold the “rock bottom” government to account, doing his utmost to restrain newspapers – so they won’t be free to advertise wealthy and powerful people like him on account. It’s mind-boggling.

This spoiled and entitled man can say whatever he wants, however selfish. I don’t even mind his ignorant attacks on the press, as the Fourth State can fend for itself and has survived more formidable foes than Harry.

What I do object to is his attack on the government – not because I like this crew very much or appreciate their ability, but because they are our elected representatives and should not be publicly berated by an unelected and foolish senior member of the government. the Royal family.

Our constitutional arrangements are a delicate organism, the product of past divisions and compromises. We tolerate – some of us may respect – an unelected head of state and a royal family with all the trimmings, firmly aware that they are separate from politics.

It has worked well enough over the past 200 years because, with a few exceptions, we have had monarchs who have understood the limits of their powers and respected the right of elected politicians to rule, albeit with the benefit of royal advice.

Of course, no one understood better how important it is to protect this precious relationship between the Crown and Parliament than our late Queen, Elizabeth II. How Harry’s crude political insults would have grieved her.

He’s like an unguided rocket, eyeing enemies here and there, expelling lots of smoke and making a lot of noise, before finally crashing to Earth in an inevitable explosion – and then mysteriously taking off again, searching for a new target.

In short, he is potentially deadly. If he describes the government as a “rock bottom” today, next month or next year he will unearth another unkind adjective that goes against our constitutional traditions. Perhaps – equally ill-judged – he will be tempted to embrace Sir Keir Starmer.

Or he can direct his anger once again against the royal institution that raised him and gave him the significance he will one day have in this world. His father, the king, has not been immune to his criticism in the past and will not be in the future.

Harry is a divisive figure. He pits people against each other on issues ranging from the press to the royal family to racism and now, his latest specter, the Tory government.

We can assume that this tumultuous character doesn’t suddenly learn how to behave. That’s never going to happen, with him 6,000 miles away in California, and Meghan by his side. Their future income depends on stirring up controversy.

Harry is the king’s biggest problem. And it’s not, as Charles should know and his mother certainly realized, primarily a family problem, although it is in part. Harry is especially dangerous because he is constitutionally liable.

The king loves his wandering younger son, despite the disrespect he has shown him. I’m sure he hopes Harry will return to the herd one day. But think of the damage he could do before that happens. And of course he may never come back.

If they were still close and talking, a way could still be found to persuade Harry to stop stirring. But he’s estranged from his father, and the rift inevitably widens with every clumsy public intervention.

There’s only one way. It may be difficult for the king as a father, but it should be easy for him as monarch and head of state. Prince Harry needs to be told that if he wants to remain a member of the royal family, he will have to behave as is expected of members of the royal family.

If he cannot accept this ultimatum – and I cannot imagine he could – Prince Harry must become a private citizen, in which role his facile declamations will soon be barely noticed, and will no longer harm the country that he ever served.