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bitchy | Prince William & Kate are ‘savvy enough to know that times are changing’

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It’s so funny to watch Kensington Palace try to go another keen blitz, where they’re briefing to their favorite outlets all about Prince William and Kate’s big, major, significant plans to be keen. There is never any pot of gold at the end of this keen rainbow, but I do enjoy watching KP staff try. If anything, William and Kate are doing less now that they have the Wales titles, and yet they need more staff and more hype to tread water and be completely unimaginative. Well, Victoria Ward at the Telegraph was tasked with writing yet another “no really, William and Kate are on the forefront of changing the monarchy” piece. The fact that the Caribbean Flop Tour is cited as the start of all of this “change” is amazing, as is the fact that the Telegraph used some of the worst photos from last year’s disastrous tour (so I’ll do the same!). Some highlights:

Will & Kate will not do traditional royal events: Rather than the traditional “away days” that for decades have involved members of the Royal family sweeping into towns and villages across the UK, greeting crowds and unveiling plaques before leaving, they instead launched a fundraising drive during a visit to Scarborough to galvanise long-term support for young residents’ mental health. It was a pilot project but one that has since been repeated in towns and cities across the UK and will continue to be rolled out.

Will & Kate have been working on these changes for years! Yet this was no knee jerk, last-minute change in tack; William and Catherine had been working up to this change in approach for years. Both laser-focused and determined to use their roles to instigate change, they recognise that today, we live in a different world to that of their predecessors. Their attitude is no comment on the approach taken by William’s grandmother, the late Queen, who successfully navigated 70 years on the throne by saying very little, acknowledging that she simply had to be seen. They understand, aides say, that times have changed. The public wants more from its figureheads-from the Royal family – and they believe they have more to give. They want to be more relatable. They want to use their time to create something more tangible, something that will actually change society for the better.

William is not like his father!! Of course, William’s approach is not wholly unique. His father spent decades as Prince of Wales campaigning on issues such as the environment, and continues to strive for change as King. But whereas Charles has often been criticised for his approach, his son and heir is savvy enough to know that times are changing.

The Caribbean Flop Tour haunts them: We only need to look back to the couple’s ill-fated Caribbean tour of March 2022 to see the origins of this approach. As William reacted to criticism that the tour, with its colonial overtones, was “tone deaf” and “out of touch”, he acknowledged that the royal world was shifting on its axis. With several Commonwealth realms demanding independence and slavery reparations, he made it clear he believed his family’s fabled “never complain, never explain” mantra was outdated. Aides said then that he had thought deeply about what kind of King he wanted to be when the time came, what needed to change and how certain protocols must evolve. That tour, he admitted, “brought into even sharper focus” questions about the past and the future and they are questions that William has mulled over ever since. He is keen to have his own voice.

The Kensington Palace CEO: Since the death of Queen Elizabeth II last September, his new model has been slowly unveiled. The Prince and Princess are recruiting a new chief executive that will answer directly to them, rather than their private secretaries. The message was clear. Kensington Palace was, if not reinventing the wheel, then certainly shaking things up.

No abrupt changes: The shift in tone is being introduced slowly and carefully. The couple cautioned their staff against abrupt change. They are determined to be perceived as authentic voices within the small number of key spaces in which they work; the early years, the environment, mental health and homelessness. These themes are the focus of long-term projects that will last years, if not decades, each rooted in their Royal Foundation. The Prince and Princess are absolutely hell bent on doing this their own way. And they have never felt more ambitious.

[From The Telegraph]

Kensington Palace sources insist that if everyone could go back in time, the Duchess of Sussex would have put William and Kate on the cover of the British Vogue “Forces for Change” issue she guest-edited. We are told that William and Kate came up with the word “change” themselves, that it is wholly their own initiative to say “change” endlessly, and that they needed a year and a half to mull over questions of whether the British commonwealth was ready for the British royals to stop with their colonialist and racist nonsense. William has insisted to sources that he must be referred to as handsome, single, and a change-making heartthrob who has his own voice and is keen to be a global statesman. Seriously though, I love how stupid this is.

Photos courtesy of Instar.

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