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It all began with a single photograph, perhaps the most consequential ever taken of a royal family member.

Present was the Baron Killyleagh, standing closely beside a young woman, while a companion grinned suggestively in the background.

Lacking that snapshot, shot at a party in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the allegations of a teenager who said she was moved across the ocean and obliged to have cursory relations with a prince of the monarchy?

A curious, revealing gesture by someone who had overtly asserted to have not known about her, claimed he could no have had sex with her, and yet provided millions of his mother's resources to resolve a long-delayed lawsuit.

Years of Scandal

In this context, conversations of the royals acting decisively to distance themselves from Andrew are wide of the mark. This scandal has endured for the majority of 15 years since that picture, and an additional image of Andrew ambling pleasantly with a convicted sex offender came to light.

• Self-importance: To what extent did his siblings, possibly even his relatives, understand that Andrew was so presumptuous?
• Questionable Associations: They must have known, if his aides and the police were performing their duties, that he had some deeply disreputable companions given he unabashedly invited them to estates.
• Financial Extravagance: If the household did not know about his sexual proclivities, they certainly knew about his overspending with taxpayer funds.

Journeys were documented in public records: chopper transfers from the palace to a golf course and back again in time for midday meal, chartered planes instead of scheduled services, all for the benefit of "the frequent flyer".

World of Deference

Furthermore the arrogance which expected subservience when he walked into a area or the supreme consciousness about his designations used on his correspondence in messages to his associates.

He avoided accountability while his matriarch, who inexplicably spoiled him, was still surviving. The sovereign did at least strip him of official roles and military positions in the aftermath of his ill-fated and, we now know, deceptive public statement six years ago.

Recent Developments

Just in the last fortnight that events sped up, following the issuance of books giving more grim particulars of his actions and that of his connections.

Additional revelations have again revealed Andrew's assumption that he could get away with lying about his interaction with a notorious figure.

People (and the media) were far ahead of the royal family. There was nobody of any significance to defend him, a result of all those years of hubris.

Monarchical Concerns

The wiser royals realized that. The key objective is to hand down the institution, if not as previously at least intact and unstained.

Over time the last 190 years trying to undo the legacy of previous monarchs, proving they are valuable, dutiful and reactive to their people.

He was placing all that in danger in an age when respect and privacy is no longer enough.

Consequences

Eventually, the well-known hesitant monarch was prodded more. There was no alternative. The institution had surrendered command of the account.

Currently the stripping of titles and the continued and lifetime personal shame that will pain Andrew the most.

• Demotion: Reduced to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Prior Instance: The initial monarch to lose his honorifics in contemporary era
• Armed Forces: Particularly painful given his role in the engagement

He is still a royal advisor, theoretically able to stand in for the monarch, and he is still eighth in line to the monarchy, but none of these will truly occur.

Future Prospects

Do individuals he meets still defer to him? Might they still make mistakes and call him Your Highness? Might they say Andrew,

Of course, he is not retiring to suburbia, but to the monarchy's large estate at a royal residence.

At that location, he will be provided by the monarch with one of the estate properties and given some sort of financial support.

It is not his previous residence, where he paid a token lease for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit remote, but even so it may not be far enough.

Outstanding Concerns

This is not over. There are still records in the possession of US Congress to be made public.

• Governmental Scrutiny: Will parliament demand more
• Fiscal Review: Or scrutinize the misuse of public money
• Criminal Investigation: There may even be a criminal probe into his actions

Possibly for the moment the reputational impact to the institution is limited. The message from the palace was plainly that the revocation of titles was what the monarch, and notably other senior royals, desired.

Changed Stance

The cessation of illusion that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, remarkably, the concise communication showed evidently that the royals were supporting the complainant's narrative of incidents.

Even more, for the first time they finally showed consideration for the affected individuals: "These actions are judged required, regardless of the fact that he persists in refuting the claims against him."

Ultimately it is arrogance, self-interest and indolence that will undermine the monarchy. In his folly, self-gratification and venality, Andrew seems never to have learned that truth.