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Files on Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor's appointment as UK trade envoy have been released. Shelagh Fogarty is joined by LBC's Aggie Chambre who discusses what we know so far on the situation. The former Duke of York faces accusations of sharing sensitive information with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein while acting as a special representative for trade and investment. The late Queen was ‘very keen’ to have him as a UK trade envoy and she pushed for her second son to take on a “prominent role in the promotion of national interests,” former chief executive of British Trade International Sir David Wright said. Andrew was appointed with no vetting, as Queen Elizabeth II thought he would be a “natural fit” to be successor to her cousin the Duke of Kent in the role. Andrew was arrested in February on suspicion of misconduct in public office and later released under investigation. The former prince has vehemently denied any wrongdoing. Listen to the full show on the all-new LBC App: https://app.af.lbc.co.uk/btnc/thenewlbcapp #LBC #ShelaghFogarty #AggieChambre #Royals #UKNews #UK #UKPolitics #News #Politics #Queen #Andrew #RoyalFamily LBC is the home of live debate around news and current affairs in the UK. Join in the conversation and listen at https://www.lbc.co.uk/ Sign up to LBC’s weekly newsletter here: https://l-bc.co/signup
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0:00
This is a story that is interesting in and of itself, you know, the elements around then Prince Andrew getting this job at all
0:08
the manner in which he got this job at all, and then separate to it is the police investigation that Sir Chris Bryant alluded to
0:15
into allegations against Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, as he's now known, allegations of misconduct in public office
0:23
Worth saying that Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor denies any wrongdoing. He left the role in 2011, just to bring you up to speed on that
0:32
He took on the role in 2001. So he was in it for a decade. And what the documents provided so far tell us
0:38
and by the way, Sir Chris Bryant indicating that unless he finds more documents
0:44
he thinks this is it when it comes to the documentation that exists around both the employment
0:50
in inverted commas, employment of Andrew in this role and any documentation connected to it back and forth in this role
0:59
The limits of it are what he presented to Parliament today. But what the documents do show is that the late Queen Elizabeth
1:07
did express a wish for Andrew, her second son, to be made trade envoy
1:15
No evidence that Andrew was vetted before he was hired as a trade envoy
1:21
or any evidence that vetting was even considered. Now, again, Chris Bryant's response to that was, you know
1:29
rather sort of mundane in a way, in that he said, in the truest sense of the word mundane
1:35
in that he said it wasn't unusual because members of the royal family aren't vetted
1:40
for the roles that they carry out and that this particular type of role wouldn't be given now
1:46
to a member of the royal family any longer, according to Sir Chris Bryant. but I think there are questions around that actually
1:54
is anybody expecting to ask the question that Sir Chris Bryant asked
2:00
is anybody expecting the king to be vetted before he goes on a state visit
2:04
no but this isn't a state visit the job that he had for a decade wasn't a state visit
2:10
and he had a great deal of he appears Andrew to have had a great deal of say
2:16
over where he went and the kinds of places he went to, he seemed to have a, he expressed a wish to go to places that were more developed
2:24
than underdeveloped. His association with Geoffrey Epstein, who, as you know, was sentenced
2:30
to 18 months in prison in 2008. So during that time, he was trade envoy, prompted a lot of
2:35
criticism as well. And we heard from Wendy Chamberlain, the Liberal Democrat chief whip
2:40
asking the bulk of the questions to Sir Chris Bryant in that exchange in the House of Commons
2:44
she'll join me after 3.30 but Aghi Chombre is here in the studio with me now LBC's deputy political
2:51
editor it it's easy for this to get confusing isn't it because there are two very different
2:55
strands being looked at here there's the looking at how the government itself operated around that
3:01
appointment and then there's the entirely separate investigation into allegations of misconduct in
3:07
public office. Indeed that's right so today's story is purely about how the government operated
3:13
in appointing Andrew Mountbatten to that position of trade envoy And that why we had these 11 documents published by the government and then we had this statement that still ongoing from Sir Chris Bryant and effectively the Liberal Democrats put down a motion for a humble address which was voted on by MPs that
3:33
forced the release of these documents which is similar but again distinct to the humble address
3:38
put down on Peter Mandelson exactly and that was brought up actually in the debate in the
3:45
Commons, but simply because Sir Chris Bryant, the Trade Minister, was asked when the Lord
3:51
Mandelson files were going to be released, to which he said he didn't know and he was trying basically not to know because he wanted to keep these two situations separate. So
4:00
what we have discovered today is we've got these 11 documents and there were questions
4:05
about how indeed the former Prince Andrew had got his position as trade envoy. And it
4:12
transpires reading these documents that the late Queen was actually very keen for Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor
4:18
to take on a prominent role in the promotion of national interest, to quote a senior official who
4:24
told then Foreign Secretary Robin Cook back in 2000. It was the monarch's wish for him to take
4:30
on this job. And there was a wide-ranging discussion with the Queen before proposing a suitable role
4:38
and this was one that was decided. And there's some extraordinary bits, Sheila
4:42
in these disclosures, in these documents. Like, for example, that there was a suggestion
4:48
from the then head of protocol division, a woman called Catherine Colvin
4:52
who said Captain Blair particularly asked that the Duke of York should not be offered golfing functions abroad
4:59
This was a private activity and if he took his clubs with him, he would not play in any public sense
5:05
The other bit I just wanted to highlight as well was when they were talking..
5:10
Sorry, can I ask you a question? Yes. The head of protocol would be royal household or government
5:15
So that's someone in the royal household who's talking on behalf of the personal private secretary, Captain Blair
5:22
So they're having these wide-ranging discussions. But then we've also got Sir David, who is Sir David Wright
5:32
who's the then chief executive of the British Trade International. He had suggested it was the monarch's wish for Andrew to take on the job
5:39
And he said that he didn't envisage that the Duke of York would want to be burdened with the regularities of meetings of the board or the burden of paper which goes along with the board membership
5:53
We would nonetheless ensure that he was kept in touch with board developments and issues
5:57
So there's sort of an extraordinary thing saying, you know, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, then Prince Andrew, should get this role, but he doesn't want to be weighed down with the regularity of meetings, no
6:08
I mean, what emerges there, and I'm sure you've got more examples, but what emerges there, and it did when Sir Chris Bryant said it's not practice for the royal family to be vetted, is that they move in a different slipstream to the rest of us, don't they
6:23
Indeed, I mean it was interesting listening to Sir Chris Bryant's explanation really on
6:29
why he wasn't vetted and as you say it basically seemed to be, well look it's standard for
6:34
us not to vet the royal family and you're not possibly suggesting that we would vet the
6:38
king are you And that very much seemed to be Sir Chris Bryant tone But these documents seem to show there were sort of efforts to stop Andrew who you remember then Prince Andrew
6:52
who had earned nicknames like Air Miles Andy and Playboy Prince, things like that
6:58
They were sort of trying to stop him globetrotting and going around the world
7:02
and maybe having pictures of him playing golf. I mean, we've talked before much more recently
7:07
about how there was a story in the papers about how he was asked to stop. Was it horse riding around because they didn't want pictures of him being seen horse ride
7:16
In his new place in Sandringham. In his new place in Sandringham. Exactly that
7:20
And also in these letters, just one more thing to pull out, Sheila, that he, Andrew, tended to prefer the more sophisticated countries
7:29
and prefers ballet rather than the theatre and was particularly good on high-tech matters, trade and youth
7:36
including primary schools, outward-bound cultural events, but preference of ballet rather than theatre
7:42
You see, even if I may say, and I'm not casting aspersions on Andrew here
7:46
but if somebody is going to have a direct role with young people, outward bound
7:52
young people in their activities, you or I would have to be vetted to do that, rightly
7:58
Yes. And there are questions to be asked about that kind of thing. Oh, there are absolutely questions to be asked
8:02
Of course there are questions to be asked. And I know you're not suggesting there aren't, I'm just kind of... Musing, yes
8:06
Yes, yes. Yeah. Yeah, but I think that's why the Liberal Democrats put down this motion
8:12
That's why the Liberal Democrats had these questions. And, you know, Sir Chris Bryant was essentially saying in the House too
8:18
that we've got these 11 documents, and sort of implied it was pretty tricky to find those 11 documents
8:24
because they were paper-based. And you can see when you're looking at the documents, they're all sort of scanned
8:28
lots of them with handwritten notes all over them. And when asked, will more documents come out
8:34
Because it doesn't sound like these are the only documents from that time. So Chris Bryant sort of said this will probably be the end, suspect this will be the
8:42
end. But it sounded more like that's because, you know, they were dealing with the complexity of
8:47
paper-based systems in multiple different departments. He did say if there was more to
8:51
publish, he would come back with more. But he suspected this would be the last tranche of
8:56
documents. But I think there are big questions about why Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor wasn't
9:02
vetted and you know the the answer given to us by the trade minister this morning this afternoon
9:08
rather was that it's standard not to vet members of the royal family and the question of i mean i
9:15
get that in those days it would have been more paperwork than necessarily constant all digital
9:19
um but you were on whatsapp but yeah but you exactly not on whatsapp but you would have thought
9:24
that i mean there was a question wasn't there about um diplomatic telegrams that i don't think
9:31
was quite answered while we were listening it may have been answered when we stopped listening but you would have thought the diplomatic telegrams and exchanges between the royal household and the
9:41
government would be very protected um pieces of paper and by that i don't mean hidden i mean just
9:49
protected as in continuing to exist protected and therefore easily accessible indeed you might
9:55
you might indeed think that i mean but that's assuming things work isn't it assuming that
9:59
things work And you know just to put this in they are distinct situations they are very very different But just a reminder of how many documents we were expecting um for uh peter mandelson disclosure and that you know the biggest the
10:16
biggest dump of documents in many many many years compared to 11 documents uh released in this
10:22
that's right and of course we've already had uh a big drop of documents for peter mandelson
10:27
but i suppose that is kind of putting it down to it was a different time we are looking back what
10:32
20, 26 years or so. And the fact that they pointed to the fact that it is a paper based system, but
10:39
you know, perhaps they will continue looking, perhaps they will find more. It's interesting to
10:42
see Chris Bryant doing his job there because he was when he was shadow justice minister, he called
10:47
for Andrew to lose his job, didn't he? I'm calling him Andrew so that we don't have to keep doing
10:52
Mountbatten, Windsor and Prince, not because he's my mate. Calling for Andrew to lose his job
10:57
accusing him in the Commons, you'll remember, of being a very close friend of Colonel Gaddafi's son
11:01
Saif Gaddafi, again, in the run of his work. Yeah, I mean, it's, I wonder whether there are
11:10
only 11 documents. Well, there could be two reasons. One, some of them are being investigated
11:17
by the police, which is a different matter. And therefore, Chris Bryant can't much about them
11:21
or get his hands on them. And the other could be that, you know, with what you said there about
11:26
we don't envisage the prince being burdened with board meetings and that it was a bit of a
11:32
jolly fake job yes i mean i mean to the point on largely nominal to the point on the police i
11:40
suppose if the police had documents that were going to be published at a later date then sir
11:43
chris prion might have said that rather than he didn't expect any other documents to be
11:48
published um so i think we do have to assume that this is really it this is all we're going to get
11:53
but no, you're right to bring up that language again because it is extraordinary to sort of suggest
11:59
that he didn't envisage the Duke of York would want to be burdened with the regularities of meeting
12:03
or the burden of paper which goes along with the board membership so if he didn't want to be burdened with the burden of paper
12:09
which goes along with the board membership then maybe there really wasn't that much paper I know their distinct points, Sheila
12:16
but I'll just as well say that of course Andrew was arrested in February on suspicion of misconduct in public office
12:21
and was later released under investigation but the foreign prince has vehemently denied any wrongdoing
12:26
He has. And on that, whether Chris Bryant was not telling us more
12:31
simply because of the police investigation as opposed to having more documents that he couldn't release
12:36
And I think you're right. He made it clear that that was all he had. But he did talk about, he did push back
12:42
and we can talk to our guest about it in a few minutes, the Lib Dem MP, the Chief Whip, Wendy Chamberlain
12:48
who's going to join us because she asked the question. he pushed back on some of the questions she asked about um safeguarding and vetting and
12:58
uh lack of documents provided and stuff he did he did bring up the metropolitan police
13:05
investigation then didn't he or in fact i think it involves a number of police forces more than
13:09
just the met doesn't it um so clearly something about that investigation means he can do little
13:15
more than say, here we go, this is what these documents reveal. End of discussion
13:20
For now. For now. For now. Fair enough. Thank you very much indeed, Aggie. Aggie Shumbray, LBC's Deputy
13:25
Political Editor. As she rightly says, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor denies any wrongdoing. There is a police investigation
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