<\/p>\n
Changing your mind about something isn\u2019t always a comfortable business \u2013 particularly as a columnist, when the whole point of you is to have a fixed mindset on the issues of the day \u2013 especially when the person you\u2019ve changed your mind about is Prince Harry.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t misunderstand me. I still think he\u2019s a whiny and deluded national embarrassment, but when I read reports yesterday claiming that the 41-year-old had probably won the right to automatic armed police protection<\/a> while visiting the UK, I shocked the hell out of myself by thinking: \u201cThat was the right thing to do.\u201d<\/p>\n In my defence, we are supposed to be allowed to change our minds when presented with new information, and back in October new information presented itself in the shape of a stalker who came within feet of Prince Harry<\/a> on two separate occasions during his visit to the UK the previous month.<\/p>\n Obviously, he was always going to attract unwanted attention wherever he was in the world, but the fact that this woman had made it into a \u201csecure zone\u201d in the central London hotel where Harry was attending the WellChild Awards really brought the reality home. Imagine \u2013 God forbid \u2013 if something had happened to him?<\/p>\n Prince Harry<\/a> has brought so much upon himself in recent years. He deserves the anger he prompted by disrespecting his grandmother and his father. He deserves the ridicule he will forever get for demanding privacy and then becoming a royal Kardashian. As for publishing that parody of a frostbite-and-all autobiography, there is simply no way back in terms of credibility.<\/p>\n Being the King<\/a>\u2019s son, however, isn\u2019t his fault. It\u2019s not something he will ever be able to change, either. And as much as I resent any of our hard-earned cash going towards a man who has actively tried to damage the country\u2019s reputation abroad, I\u2019m afraid it is the right thing to do.<\/p>\n There is a limit, realistically, to how much time Harry is going to spend in this country. Meghan<\/a> won\u2019t be interested in coming back to this curious little backwater with its musty-smelling churches and \u201cbullying\u201d sisters-in-law, so while they\u2019re still together, it doesn\u2019t seem likely that he\u2019ll spend more than a couple of weeks here a year. In 2025, he spent only six to seven days in the UK across two separate visits, the second of which was predominantly taken up with charitable engagements \u2013 and, of course, that long-awaited meeting with his father<\/a>.<\/p>\n