Piers Morgan Uncensored - Does Kate Deserve An Apology?

Episode Date: March 25, 2024

It’s pretty clear from comments and feedback over the weekend that many people are very angry about the way Princess Catherine has been treated. We now know the real reason she’s been absent from public life in the months since her abdominal surgery, and it is worlds away from the frenzied speculation. But do we have a right to ask questions? Joining Piers to discuss this is Royal Editor, Sarah Hewson,  the Times' Former Royal Correspondent, Valentine Low, Royal Historian and Author, Tessa Dunlop and Fox News Contributor, Dr Marc Siegel.  . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It was pretty clear from comments and feedback over the weekend and many people feel quite angry about the way Princess Catherine, the Princess of Wales, has been treated. We now know the real reason she's been absent for public life in the months since her abdominal surgery and is whirled away from the conspiracy theories and frenzy speculation. In January, I underwent major abdominal surgery in London and at the time, it was thought that my condition was non-cancerous.

The surgery was successful. However, tests after the operation found cancer had. had been present. This, of course, came as a huge shock. And William and I have been doing everything we can to process and manage this privately for the sake of our young family. It has taken us time to explain everything to George, Charlotte and Louis in a way that's appropriate for them and to reassure them that I'm going to be OK. Well, first, I think Kate deserves enormous credit for delivering that statement with such poise, grace and composure. And yes, courage. This is a woman who's been at the centre

of an absolute firestorm for months, baited by trolls, mercilessly mocked by so-called comedians and TV stars, all while recovering from surgery, managing a spate of crises in the royal family, and we now know fighting cancer. It's been a pitch-perfect illustration of why she's so beloved and popular across the world. And if anyone knows her an apology,

I would suggest it's people like this. Isn't their motto, never complain, never explained? That's right. And they had her explaining on Twitter? Yes, there is a non-zero chance she died 18 months ago. They might be weekend at Bernie's in this situation. Non-zero. I'm not saying it happened. Right, but non-zero.

I'm saying it's non-zero. Until proved otherwise, until he'd see her with a copy of the day's newspaper. Internet sleuths are guessing that Kate's absence may be related to her husband and the future King of England, William, having an affair. Oh, no. Oh, no. Since 2019, according to tabloids back then,

when Kate supposedly confronted him about it, he laughed it off, saying there was nothing to it. Aha, always a good response when your wife accuses you of cheating. Well, it was actually a completely untrue story. Many popular and influential people turned legitimate questions about Kate's absence into a feeding frenzy. They speculated wildly, as we've seen, about extramarital affairs, plastic surgery,

even whether she was still alive at all. They fueled and emboldened. and the conspiracists who turned Kate's absence into an obsession. Kim Kardashian posted to her millions of followers that she was on her way to find Kate. James Barr, regular panelist and friend of his show, started selling free Kate T-shirts. Omid Scobie, the Lickspittle hack of the Sussexes, posted a countdown to Kate's announcement at the time where most people in his industry

had been briefed about what was to come. He deleted it, but he posted it originally, and that says it all. Harry and Megan have now privately offered their best wishes to Kate, so privately that we all know about it. And they talked about demanding privacy and peace for two people that they have been abusing for the last four years. And in Kate's case, branding her and King Charles racists. Is that what their idea of privacy and pieces when it comes to family matters? All of this was in rancidly bad taste, as is often the case with a digital frenzy. Too many simply forgot there's a real few.

human being at the centre of whatever soap opera they're harvesting the cliques. And that's where I think this went wrong. There is or should be a clear line between inquiry and mockery, and too many people crossed it. But I don't think it's wrong to ask questions. The Royal Family represents us. They're paid for by the taxpayer. And ultimately, it works for us, the British people. Britain benefits from the global fascination with the monarchy. And the Royals live a life of immense privilege as part of that unwritten social contract. Conspiracies filled an information vacuum. Case disastrously edited Mother's Day photograph simply fan the conspiracy flames.

This has been a learning curve for a lot of people, including the monarchy, in these rapidly changing times. It can no longer control the flow of information in the way it did for decades. I've nothing but incredible admiration for the way that the Princess of Wales gave her statement. And to Prince William, who deserves every plaudit now for the way he's going to be able to conducted himself. He missed his godfather's memorial, it turned out, because he just found out his wife had cancer. And besides that, he's done his best to keep calm and carry on with

public duties, even as he grapple with the death of a friend and the cancer diagnosis of his father of the king. On a personal level, I'm nothing but empathy, sympathy and admiration for the royal family, but we're not in North Korea. We must have the right to ask questions. For more on this, I'm joined by the Royal Editor Sarah Hewson, the Times of his former Royal correspondent Valentine Lowe, the Royal Historian, and author Tessa Dunlop, and the Fox News contributor, Dr. Mark Siegel. Well, Dr. Mark, great to have you back on the sensor. Let me ask you, first of all, about the medical side of this story, because a lot of people still quite confused about what preventative chemotherapy means and what may be really going on here and how serious it may be.

What is your professional take on where we are with Kate's health following her announcement? You know, Pierre, as we talked about this back in January, you and me, Let's start with the abdominal surgery, which you and I took very seriously. And one thing I didn't tell you is you never mock someone who's having a health problem. That's the third rail. You don't do that. Anyone who did that should be ashamed. And it was clear to me that she was having an extensive surgery of some kind.

And as you just said, she's dealt with it with class, with grace, with courage, with fortitude. Daffodils in the background of that video, resilience, life, celebrating life. tremendous, tremendous inspiration to me as a physician. Now, what was she suffering from? Here's why I'm starting with that abdominal surgery. If it was something like a gynecologic surgery, you'd be out in a day. And we were wondering why this was prolonged. And back in 2012, there was a lot of scuttlebutt about how she might have, and I mean might, being the emphasis here, inflammatory bowel disease. She was raising a lot of funding for them, Crohn's and ulcerative colitis. If that were the case, that could explain that surgery and you could find a cancer incidentally when you were doing a bowel resection.

I'm not saying that is what it is because, again, we don't have any definite information. But a lot of the oncologists and colorectal surgeons I've spoken to have put that at the top of the list. And the good news would be whatever this is completely resected. And she says that chemo is preventative, meaning that it's to make sure it doesn't come back. Now, another thing going for that possibility, and I'm not saying I know this, is that it doesn't look like she's lost her hair. There's debate over that in that video, but she looks pretty healthy. And if she got taxol, which is the chemo we use for ovarian cancer or cancer of the cervix or uterine cancer, that makes you really sick and you'll lose your hair. Certainly, GYN cancers are on the list because they also are something you might find incidentally.

If you were looking inside the abdomen or you were doing a hysterectomy, you might find something and then send it for pathology and find out later that it was an incidentally picked up early cancer. Again, early. We're talking early because she used the word preventative. So I think the chances of long-term survival here in full recovery are very high. That's excellent news. Dr. Mark, as always, a brilliant overview. I appreciate you joining us.

Thank you. Okay. That's the medical sort of analysis. And as you made clear, we don't know, but it certainly seemed a pretty well-informed take on possibilities here, Sarah. We spoke on Friday when this first blow. It felt like a real earthquake story, didn't it? And he's come on the back of so many others. You know, you think about the death of Prince Philip was only three years ago.

That was a huge thing. Huge funeral. Then the death of his wife, the queen. Huge, enormous. The coronation of the king. Then it turns out he has cancer. Now it turns out the wife of the next king has cancer. This is, I would argue, an unprecedented period

in the modern story of the royal family. It really is. And if you think about the age of Prince Philip and the Queen, they almost seemed invincible, didn't they, as if they were going to go on forever? And now we have, we're less than a year since the coronation. And here we have King Charles having been diagnosed with cancer and our future queen having been diagnosed with cancer.

And it really is unprecedented and extraordinarily, challenging for the royal family. And I think you can see from the reaction from the public and on social media just how much this has rocked the nation. And if you ever had any questions about whether the royal family was still relevant, I think that's paid to those now, hasn't it? Yeah, no question. Tessa Donald, I mean, the feeding frenzy that's gone on for the last few weeks, you know, like I said in the in a monologue, I think there's a line between legitimate scrutiny and interest, particularly given the lack of information that was being put out, by contrast to the information we were given about the king, for example, and the kind of widespread, wild, crazy

conspiracy theories. What do you think? Yes, I think you're absolutely right. And I wonder if you and I shouldn't both publicly apologize, Piers, because I sat with you on your platform. And we speculated as to why the future king hadn't turned up at his late godfather, the ex-king of the she's memorial service in Windsor. We speculated as to what had happened to Kate, whether she still had the will for the job and the role, which she expressed, I thought, very poignantly in that video explaining it gave her great joy. And we bit into that feeding frenzy. And I, for one, had a sense on Friday, almost a deja vu. Back when I was 21 consuming stories of Diana when suddenly down came the guillotine, that terrible story about the car crash. And I felt kind of part of this, voyeuristic wave that had consumed the late Princess of Wales. And when I saw that video of the current Princess of Wales, I felt an equivalent guilt.

And I want to publicly say, I think I got the balance a bit wrong. And I hope you'll share and join me in doing the same. Well, no, I don't actually. I don't think you did. And I certainly don't think I did. Because I do think there is a legitimate line for journalists and pundits and everyone involving the royal family when they're huge, huge stories like this,

that you are allowed to scrutinise and talk about it and try and work out what is happening. That is completely normal and legitimate. They are tax-fair-fpayer-funded. We couldn't have second-guessed or worked out what the real story was. Now, the moment you know what the real... Hang on, let me finish. The moment you know that the story is that she has got cancer,

of course, everything must change. That doesn't mean you have to apologise for doing your jobs before. Your job is to comment on these things. My job is to report on these things and comment on them. I don't think anything I've said crossed the line in terms of the kind of outrageous stuff that we saw in America

where people were talking about her possibly being dead. They talked about her marital situation, which was complete baloney. That crosses the line. But simply asking what is happening, the theorising, I don't have a problem with that. But we know, Piz, there is no line in the Wild West that is the internet and the training world.

What's expected from people, but what's expected from people like you me is higher standards. And actually, we knew that a youngish mother had had serious abdominal surgery, which was going to knock her out of action until after Easter, irrespective of what they found. And had we taken a step back, we might have said, you know, hands up, forget the clicks today, guys, forget the fee. I think that the Prince and the Princess of Wales, something's happening, very personal. We're going to give them the time that they asked for until Easter to sort it out, to hell with you, Tros. And I'm saying,

From my personal point of view, I wonder if I could have played my hand with more empathy and more effectively. And I'm actually humbled by the princess, by the way in which she sat there. I thought it was epoch defining for a royal family that's been floundering around for a role for a while now. And she's hard to match. Really, she became, because of the conspiracy theory, the most famous woman in the world. And she's pretty untouchable at the moment, Kay. Okay. Look, an interesting perspective. I mean, Valentine, you report on the rules for a very long time.

You're out of the game now, but you're back here, and I thank you. I mean, does Tessa have a point? I mean, should we be revisionist in the way that we were speculating? I mean, I actually don't think there's anything to apologize for. If you were doing it from a position of what has happened here and how serious is and so on, they, to me, are perfectly normal questions that the public were all demanding to no answers to. Our job as journalist, surely, is to try and find out what's happened. Once you know that she's got cancer, completely different.

as we've seen from all the coverage since that moment. But I actually think the way the palace handled it was pretty poor. You know, allowing that picture to be released on Mother's Day when it had been clearly edited many, many times, I think it was a massive error. Just fueled the conspiracy. So I think, yeah, you can criticize people along this way, but the real people who've been the villains here

are the ones making up all the crazy stuff, which was getting legitimacy on social media. Am I wrong? Yes, obviously, I mean, there are, Definitely legitimate questions you can ask, and I think journalist's job does not stop. I think what this exposes is the fundamental difficulty at the heart of the royal family, is they're both an institution which are there to represent the country, to be a unifying force for the country, to be the head of state or future head of state,

but also a private family. And I think in the modern media age, with social media, the palace hasn't quite grasped how to deal with those two different things pulling in different direction. You know who I think did, Sarah, is the Princess of Wales. I mean, I saw the editor of the son, Victoria Newton on the BBC yesterday, saying that it was two weeks ago that she took the decision to do a video message once, which is pretty soon after we understand she was told she had cancer, because it was quite soon after William suddenly skipped that memorial,

and we all wondered what could have been so serious. Well, now we know, obviously. But if it was two weeks ago that she planned this, it wasn't a reaction, actually, to a lot of the more absurd conspiracies. she probably recognised that in the modern era with social media the way it is, that this is the only way to deal with these kind of stories. And I thought she'd got it absolutely spot on.

And she recognised that it was about that bond of trust between them as royals and the public. She also recognised that if she just put out a print statement, there would still be more questions. And that also the shock might have been even greater. And let's not forget, she's not someone who is particularly comfortable public speaking. This was an address to the nation, an address to the world,

the very first time she has ever had to do this. And Tessa describing it as epoch defining, it was unbelievably significant. I thought when she said at the end, you are not alone. It had echoes of the late Queen's speech during COVID. Well, actually, it reminded me of another speech by the Queen, actually. I mean, that bit did, I agree with you,

where the Queen talked about, you know, we'll be together again evoking Vera Lynn and stuff. But actually, Valentine, the speech it reminded me most of was the Queen's speech after Diana died when for a few days the Queen didn't say anything. And the papers, I was one of the editors saying, speak to us, Mom, your people are hurting, which was true. And the Queen eventually came down from Balmoral

and it's all in the movie, the Crown, and it's exactly how it went down. And she made the speech without a crown, and she was very, like, I'll speak to you as a grandmother. And I thought she completely, nailed that speech. And I felt the same way about Kate, that this was suddenly not a princess. This was a woman talking about a profoundly serious moment in her life. Yeah, I mean, the queen, what was interesting about the queen's address after the death of Diana

was initially the palace officials when asked if she would do life, said the queen doesn't do live. And turned out the queen did do life. And of course, we all remember the line about speaking as a grandmother, which actually came from Downing Street, from Alastair Campbell, I believe. So he says. He claims a lot of credit of a lot of things, Alastair, turn out a lot of the times to be complete baloney. Tessa, let me ask you a wider question, which is what this has shown us, and we've talked about this before in the last few weeks, but the fragility of the monarchy and the royal family, given how few senior members there are now, They've lost some of their top players, Philip, the Queen, so on.

The Queen Mother. I mean, I remember the Queen Mother in the late 90s, 2000s. What an amazing figure she was for the family. Princess Margaret, all these great figures of the family have died. You've now got two of the top four who've got cancer. And who knows how that plays out. We just have to hope for the best. And I'm sure that will hopefully be the case.

But if it isn't, this could plunge the monarchy. into a genuine crisis, the like of which we haven't seen. I actually, I profoundly disagree with you. We've moved beyond the court circular ribbon cutting, minor royals being seen to unveil a plaque. What Kate's done is she's given our royal family global relevance. Almost overnight, in the last month and a half, I have had more calls from Australia, America, Europe,

tapping into the same narrative. Kate became world famous, and then she delivered a message that was almost a kind of, where were you moment? And when you're talking about which moment in history does this hark back to, I would go far further back. I would go to the princess Elizabeth when she was 21 years old in South Africa, pledging herself to a life of service. In that moment, you had vulnerability because she was young and she looked feminine and vulnerable, and you also had commitment and duty.

and Kate walked the same line. She was vulnerable. She's a woman with a young family with cancer and she is committing herself to this dutiful future, remembering other cancer sufferers, telling us that her dutiful role gives her joy. So I would say that actually, yeah, there are a half-fuel role.

I happen to agree with everything you just said, actually, about Kate. And her importance to this family is now stratospheric. What did you think about the statement issued by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex from their mansion in California? where they demanded privacy and peace for this couple who they've basically been terrorising for four years? I think that it's, I feel a degree, as you'd expect, peers of compassion for Harry.

Because I think in that moment when he discovered his sister-in-law had cancer, with all that means to a man who lost his mother young and what he understands the implications for his brother's young family and the uncertainty they feel, he must feel a bit foolish, very alone on the other side of the other side at the Atlantic, a bit cut off. And I believe, because I believe fundamentally, Harry's a good guy,

that he'll have extraordinary levels of empathy and feel a bit trapped in the narrative that he's spun over the last few years. But I don't, and I think we have to remember this. Valentine pointed out, this actress at the beginning of the show, that the fault line runs through monarchy. Harry was knocking the public face of the royal family, which included his brother and the position, his brother always had a step in front of him. And I don't think that will detract from the very personal situation the family find themselves in. You know, it redefines family relations when cancer comes knocking. And I think this will hasten Harry's desire to try and find a way back in,

at least personally, into not just his father's life, but hopefully so to his brother. I suspect he's going to make a brick wall with his brother, William, because William will have a long memory, as we know he does. And he will remember that this couple branded his wife a racist and his father are racist. We know this on the over with Scobie leaked book in our house. Amsterdam. This is what Mega Markle and Harry claimed. They'd expressed concern about the skin colour, potentially of baby Archie, which I've always thought was utter nonsense. But he also remember the digs about his wife in the book, you know, where Harry tried to imply that somehow

he married for love and William had to marry for duty. He'll remember all the jibes, all the secrets that Harry spilled, the conversations at Phillips' funeral in a garden. with Charles. I mean, he won't forget any of this. And the idea that they're going to suddenly have all sort of happy families again because of this terrible tragedy that's befallen Kate, I think is for the birds. Obviously he'll remember, but forgiveness is a little... Hang on, Tesla, hang on.

Forgiveness is about moving on and being prepared to forget and putting things into the past. But people have to apologise to get forgiveness. And there's no sign of Harry ever apologised. He thinks they're all. We should apologize to him for him trashing them for the last four years. I think that's ridiculous. That is ridiculous. But we read, and I don't know if this is true,

that Harry has moved on from the idea of demanding an apology that he now accepts that's not going to happen. So that shows a level of understanding and maturity by Harry. And your view of the monarchy and its survivability through this? I think this is a dreadful crisis for the royal family, but I don't think it's a major constitutional crisis. I think they will power on through. The anything which made me worried was seeing all these briefings in the newspapers on Monday morning.

The Royal Family will come back stronger than ever. That made me think... Oddly defensive. That made me think the palace is rattled. Well, they are rattled. Is that the sort of equivalent of in good spirits that always makes sense? There's also been a lot of upheaval in the palace press offices, right? We all know this and the media, particularly at Kensington Palace.

Well, they're advertising a wrong. for 25,000 pounds for a communications assistant. Well, you know what? Bump the money up. I'll get around there and give you some home truths because I think they need it. Actually, my only advice to them would be, look at what Kate did off her own back.

Look at the impact that's had worldwide. Look at the way it's basically killed most of the conspiracies. Not all. You're going to get the wackos there, but it's basically shut down all the frenzy. And look at the grace and dignity that she did. But look, also, what we had to go through before we get to that point. It reminds the immense damage that happened before then.

I agree, I agree. You think about Lancashire Police with that information void around the search for Nicola Bulley. And that was filled by conspiracy theory. And these are people who are making a lot of money. That's why I think what Kate's shown is actually you have to get on the front foot and you have to be more open. You cannot hide actually anymore.

I totally understood why I've got four kids. And when she talked about her children and wanted them to be told at the right time in the right way and for this to come out on their last day at school so they wouldn't have to go back to school immediately. I completely get that. And I think you have to have full respect for that. But there were other missteps they all made along the way

which contributed to the frenzy. And I think in that will have been William as well remembering just how awful it was to be at school when his parents' marriage breakdown was being played out and he and Harry were living through that. And when his mother died. Yeah. Right.

I mean, let's not forget that. I mean, William's been through a hell of a lot. And they are family first. always this couple. And so what they've done is say, we'll tell you this, and then we are going to retreat into our Norfolk bubble, the five of us and everyone else stay away. Let's give Tessa the last word,

because you love to have the last word, and you've been chomping at the bit. Go on. But I just think we have to bear in mind, this is the beginning of a journey for Kate, and I think we all have to ask ourselves, when do we expect the next statement, the next update? Because anyone I know who's had cancer,

the road goes like that. There's ups, there's down. What do we expect her to share? To what extent do we expect to be in the know? And I think this is a learning curve. We saw the Palace learn. They went from that appalling doctored photograph to the sublimely brilliantly filmed two-minute video

that Kate was anchoring. And I wonder where we all stand on the next move for Monarchy. Well, here you are again, speculating. You better get your apologies ready. Tessa, thank you. Valentine. Great to see you. Sarah, great to see you. Appreciate it. I'm sure the debate will run and run,

but I think with a lot more empathy than perhaps it was doing before. we know exactly what is going on. And our very best wishes, of course, go to Kate in particular, but also her family, and her three young children and her husband, who I think is doing an incredible job. Think about that for a moment.

His dad has got cancer, he's the king. He's the next king, and his wife now has cancer too, and he has three young children. That's a hell of a hell of a load for anyone. And I have a lot of sympathy for William right now.