Andrew is destabilising the Royal Family, but have they done enough?

Watch as Prince William was asked about Andrew during his visit to Saudi Arabia.

The first day in Saudi Arabia didn’t go to plan so the team around Prince William is hoping they might have better luck on Day 2.

Their chances are slim.

What we learn on this visit in Riyadh is that, right now, the work of the Royal Family is being seen solely through the prism of the Epstein files, and the allegations swirling around Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor.

And that is true, even when an official overseas visit is this big, for Prince William and for the British government.

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Prince William did not respond to a question about his uncle and the Royal Family’s response, when one was asked at the end of one of his engagements.

And his team are adamant that he won’t.

They say William has been asked to do a job by the government – it was their “number one ask”, they say – and he is determined to do it.

But perhaps this is one occasion when ‘keep calm and carry on’ won’t cut the mustard.

To say the two statements from the two palaces on Monday were unusual, would be to commit a journalistic crime of understatement.

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Firstly, at the start of his own trip, the Prince’s team were forced to clarify William and Kate’s position on the Andrew issue.

It made breaking news headlines even before William’s plane had touched down in Riyadh, as the Prince and Princess of Wales have never before made a public statement about the claims surrounding William’s uncle.

But even that moment was blown out of the water by the second royal statement of the day, this one from palace HQ, Buckingham Palace, and approved by King Charles.

And it is worth stopping for a moment to think about what the palace said: should the police need to launch a criminal investigation into the actions of the King’s younger brother, then we, as the institution of monarchy, stand by ready to help.

The King and Queen, rightly, re-expressed their “thoughts and sympathies” with all survivors and victims of abuse.

So why did one palace torpedo the official visit of another?

Because the allegations in the most recently uncovered emails from the Epstein files, were that a member of the royal family had used his position to benefit himself and had abused their privileged access to sensitive and confidential information to help one of their associates.

It goes to the heart of what monarchy is meant to be (or rather, isn’t meant to be) about.

Stir in two recently-announced police reviews into the Andrew allegations, and you have the recipe for a right royal mess.

In fact, it’s more than a mess.

It is Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor destabilising the very foundations of monarchy and what it stands for.

In the UK, monarchy exists at the permission of the people and in turn, it supports those who do good work across all sections of society and it represents the UK overseas.

And when you have a US congressman describing the situation as “the most vulnerable the British monarchy has ever been”, you get a sense of how serious this has all become.

Until their unprecedented statement on Monday, Buckingham Palace had relied heavily on that other unprecedented moment last October, when King Charles removed Andrew’s dukedom, his prince title and kicked him out of Royal Lodge in Windsor.

There came a moment on Monday, when the penny dropped with those around the King, that the Epstein storm had become too big, and another public statement was required.

Senior palace staff acknowledged the goodwill the king had earned from his decision last year (and it was a monumentally difficult to get Andrew to agree to it), had run out.

And they would rather volunteer to cooperate with the police than risk creating any impression they were being dragged to that position.

Just as Peter Mandelson has punched an enormous hole in the stability of Downing Street, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor is doing the same to the Royal Family.

The Royals need to find a way to meet the moment.

So far, they have been unable to do so.

This is the Talking Royals – our weekly podcast about the royal family, with ITV News Royal Editor Chris Ship and Producer Lizzie Robinson.