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It all began with a solitary photograph, possibly the most significant ever snapped of a royal family member.

There stood the Earl of Inverness, standing closely beside a young woman, while another individual smiled knowingly in the backdrop.

Lacking that image, taken at a social event in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the claims of a young woman who declared she was transported across the sea and obliged to have brief relations with a individual of the royal bloodline?

A strange, indicative gesture by someone who had overtly claimed to have never known about her, asserted he could not have had intimate contact with her, and yet paid a substantial sum of his mother's resources to settle a drawn-out lawsuit.

A Long Period of Scandal

Against this backdrop, discussions of the royal family acting firmly to distance themselves from Andrew are misguided. This scandal has persisted for the majority of 15 years since that photograph, and an additional photo of Andrew ambling pleasantly with a disgraced financier surfaced.

• Self-importance: To what extent did his siblings, possibly even his relatives, understand that Andrew was so presumptuous?
• Problematic Connections: They must have understood, if his employees and the authorities were fulfilling their roles, that he had some highly questionable friends given he openly hosted them to royal residences.
• Financial Extravagance: If the household did not know about his sexual proclivities, they certainly knew about his wastefulness with state resources.

Trips were documented in public records: helicopter flights from the estate to a sporting venue and back again in time for lunch, private flights instead of commercial flights, all for the benefit of "Airmiles Andy".

Existence of Entitlement

Additionally the entitlement which required respect when he appeared in a space or the supreme obsession about his royal titles used on his official documents in messages to his friends.

He could get away with it while his parent, who inexplicably indulged him, was still living. The sovereign did at least strip him of public duties and ceremonial ranks in the aftermath of his catastrophic and, as revealed, untruthful media appearance six years ago.

Current Situation

It was only in the last fortnight that events sped up, following the release of books giving more troubling information of his behavior and that of his connections.

More information have again revealed Andrew's thinking that he could get away with being untruthful about his contact with a convicted criminal.

People (and the journalists) were far in advance of the royals. There was not a single person of any consequence to support him, a outcome of all those years of hubris.

Monarchical Concerns

The wiser monarchical figures recognized that. The primary concern is to transfer the institution, if not as heretofore at least complete and untarnished.

Over time the last 190 years trying to undo the reputation of past sovereigns, demonstrating they are useful, responsible and responsive to their subjects.

Andrew was putting all that in jeopardy in an age when submission and privacy is no longer adequate.

The Fallout

Ultimately, the famously uncertain sovereign was prodded additional. There was no other option. The palace had surrendered command of the narrative.

Now it is the loss of titles and the persistent and permanent personal shame that will hurt Andrew most deeply.

• Reduction: Lowered to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Prior Instance: The primary member to surrender his designations in contemporary era
• Military Service: Notably stinging given his duty in the Falklands war

He is still a counsellor of state, theoretically able to act for the monarch, and he is still in the succession to the throne, but neither of these will actually come to pass.

Coming Developments

Do individuals he comes across still show respect to him? Will they still slip up and call him Prince? Will they even say Mr,

Of course, he is not moving to a common area, but to the monarchy's extensive property at Sandringham.

At that location, he will be provided by the monarch with one of the estate properties and given some form of private allowance.

This differs from his prior accommodation, where he paid a nominal rent for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit far, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Pending Matters

This is not over. There are still documents in the custody of US Congress to be revealed.

• Governmental Scrutiny: Might lawmakers seek further action
• Fiscal Review: Or examine the improper use of public money
• Criminal Investigation: There may even be a police investigation into his actions

Maybe for the time being the institutional damage to the monarchy is contained. The message from the palace was clearly that the stripping of honorifics was what the king, and notably other senior family members, desired.

Changed Stance

The cessation of deception that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, significantly, the brief communication showed clearly that the institution were siding with the complainant's narrative of events.

Additionally, for the first time they eventually showed regard for the affected individuals: "These actions are considered essential, regardless of the reality that he maintains his innocence of the allegations against him."

In the end it is presumption, selfishness and laziness that will destroy the crown. In his folly, personal excess and greed, Andrew gives the impression never to have understood that lesson.