The Guardian view on the Mountbatten-Windsor papers: they expose the collapse of Britain’s 'good chap' state | Editorial

New papers matter less for royal gossip than for what they reveal about the UK’s fragile constitutional culture of trust, prestige and informal power

The most shocking revelation in files released on Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s appointment as Britain’s trade envoy isn’t that he loves golf or prefers ballet over theatre.

It is that no one asked the obvious question: how risky would it be for a headline-grabbing prince with no business experience to front the UK’s commercial diplomacy https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/may/21/security-vetting-due-diligence-prince-andrew-uk-trade-envoy">without formal vetting?

The 11 documents that were released on Thursday show that having experience and being an expert weren’t as important as being a member of the royal family.

After the Epstein scandal, those assumptions no longer look merely anachronistic.

They look dangerous.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/may/21/queen-elizabeth-andrew-mountbatten-windsor-trade-envoy">The late Queen pushed, wrongly as it turned out, for her son to inherit the role from the Duke of Kent, according to the papers released through a humble address motion.

David Wright, then head of British Trade International, wrote that it was her wish for the then Duke of York to assume a “prominent role in the promotion of national interests”.

In 2000, royalty was not peripheral to Britain’s commercial diplomacy.

It was central to it.

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