House Of Windsor

"I've been very open about how difficult it was when the tabloids criticised my weight and my choices and called me the "Duchess of Pork". I remember one headline when a newspaper had run a poll and claimed that 82 per cent of people would rather sleep with a goat than Fergie. Of course that undermines your self-confidence and your self-worth. You start to believe that the whole world does think you are fat and frumpy."

"I'm the luckiest girl . . . If you were standing up at my eulogy, it's just the most extraordinary life"

"I'm a very chameleon adapter to whatever situation I'm in"

"[On Diana, Princess of Wales] I loved her from the minute I met her when I was 14 to the minute she passed away."

"I'm very lucky to be a guest at Royal Lodge so I don't have to. I don’t cook, shan’t cook, won’t cook"

"[Explaining that he could not have had sex with Virginia Giuffre (then Roberts) at the London home of Ghislaine Maxwell] I was with the children and I’d taken Beatrice to a Pizza Express in Woking for a party at I suppose four or five in the afternoon. And then because the duchess [Sarah Ferguson] was away, we have a simple rule in the family that when one is away the other is there."

"[Explaining why Virginia Giuffre's allegations against him of sexual assault couldn't be believed.] I didn’t sweat at the time because I had suffered what I would describe as an overdose of adrenaline in the Falklands War, when I was shot at ... it was almost impossible for me to sweat."

"Andrew, unfortunately, exhibited classic symptoms of what is scientifically recognised as the Dunning-Kruger effect, the cognitive bias in which people come to believe that they are smarter and more capable than they really are. The combination of minimal self-awareness and dim wattage leads sufferers of this condition to overestimate their own capabilities. Years of enjoying unearned obeisance to his royal position allowed Andrew to bang on with a combination of overweening self-confidence and unchallenged ignorance. It also made him an easy mark for con men and crooks."

"My second encounter with Prince Andrew took place about a month later, at Epstein's townhouse in New York. Epstein greeted Andrew and brought him to the living room, where Maxwell and I were sitting. Another one of their victims, Johanna Sjoberg, arrived soon afterward. Maxwell then announced to the prince that she'd purchased him a joke gift, a puppet that looked just like him. She suggested we pose for a photo with it. The prince and I sat down next to each other on the couch, and Maxwell put the puppet in my lap, positioning one of its hands on one of my breasts. Then she put Sjoberg on the prince's lap, and the prince put his hand on Sjoberg's breast. The symbolism was impossible to ignore. Johanna and I were Maxwell and Epstein's puppets, and they were pulling the strings."

"Please make sure that every statement or legal letter states clearly that I am NOT involved and that I knew and know NOTHING about any of these allegations. I can't take any more of this my end."

"I met him [Prince Andrew] several times, including once at a state banquet where after dinner, I and my husband and another Labour cabinet minister had a drink with him, and I have to say the conversation left us slack-jawed with the things that he felt it was appropriate to say."

"I could have worse tags than ‘Air Miles Andy’, although I don’t know what they are."

"[On the 2001 photograph of himself with Giuffre (then Roberts) and Ghislaine Maxwell] I have absolutely no memory of that photograph ever being taken."

"[On his alleged meetings with Virginia Giuffre, his accuser] I don't know if I've met her but no, I have no recollection of meeting her."

"In the years since, I've thought a lot about how he behaved. He was friendly enough, but still entitled – as if he believed having sex with me was his birthright. I drew him a hot bath. We disrobed and got in the tub, but didn't stay there long because the prince was eager to get to the bed. He was particularly attentive to my feet, caressing my toes and licking my arches. That was a first for me, and it tickled. I was nervous he would want me to do the same to him. But I needn't have worried. He seemed in a rush to have intercourse. Afterward, he said thank you in his clipped British accent. In my memory, the whole thing lasted less than half an hour. The next morning, Maxwell told me: "You did well. The prince had fun." Epstein would give me $15,000 for servicing the man the tabloids called “Randy Andy”."

"I don't know exactly when I had sex with Prince Andrew for the third time, but I do know the location: a 72-acre island Epstein owned in the US Virgin Islands. The private sanctuary, right next to Saint Thomas island, was called Little Saint James, but Epstein liked to call it "Little Saint Jeff's". I also know that it was not just the two of us this time; it was an orgy. "I was around 18," I said in a sworn declaration in 2015. "Epstein, Andy, and approximately eight other young girls and I had sex together. The other girls all appeared to be under the age of 18 and didn't really speak English. Epstein laughed about how they couldn’t really communicate, saying they are the easiest girls to get along with." Since I gave that account, Epstein’s pilot has said in a deposition that a coded notation ("AP") that he made on his flight log for 4 July 2001, referred to Prince Andrew. He said that Epstein, the prince, another woman and I flew from Saint Thomas that day back to Palm Beach. I guess it's possible that the orgy I remember occurred in the days leading up to that flight, which would mean I was still 17. I'll probably never know the date for certain. What I do know, because Epstein told me, is that Jean-Luc Brunel, the French modelling agent who was also in attendance, supplied the other girls who took part."

"On 10 March 2001 we were in London, staying at [Ghislaine] Maxwell’s pied-à-terre – a white mews house a short walk from Hyde Park."

"Is this a Marie-Antoinette moment for the British monarchy? What first triggered animosity against the queen of France was a slew of excited publications stressing her extravagance and indulgence in flagrant luxury, as well as her alleged sexual decadence (an entirely false claim). Before being guillotined, her name was humiliatingly demoted – just like Andrew's – to "the Widow Capet"."

"(Former royal protection officer Paul Page speaking about the duke’s private apartment) It had about 50 or 60 stuffed toys positioned on the bed. And, basically, there was a card the inspector showed us in a drawer, and it was a picture of these bears all in situ on the bed. And the reason for the laminated picture was that, if those bears weren’t put back in the right order by the maids, he would shout and scream and become verbally abusive."

"[On his military service during the Falklands War in 1982] So whilst I think back to a day when a young man went to war, full of bravado, I returned a changed man."

"If you're a man it is a positive act to have sex with somebody [...] You have to … take some sort of positive action and so therefore if you try to forget it’s very difficult to try and forget a positive action and I do not remember anything."

"In 2001 I was in London when [redacted] met a number of friends of mine including Prince Andrew. A photograph was taken as I imagine she wanted to show it to friends and family."

"[Asked on how the photograph might have been faked] I don't believe it's a picture of me in London because . . . when I go out in London I wear a suit and tie. [...] Nobody can prove whether or not that photograph has been doctored but I don't recollect that photograph ever being taken. [...] I'm at a loss to explain this particular photograph."

"[Explaining why he stayed at the New York home of Epstein, a convicted child sex offender, in 2010.] It was a convenient place to stay... At the end of the day, with the benefit of all the hindsight one can have, it was definitely the wrong thing to do. But at the time, I felt it was the honourable and right thing to do. And I admit fully that my judgment was probably coloured by my tendency to be too honourable but that is just the way it is."

"Well, if you’ll pardon the expression, that really is the n***** in the woodpile"

"It’s a simple answer. That’s my life. That’s what I expect. Right? That is because of who I am and that is because of the life of the family within which I’ve been brought up. So to me this state of affairs is not extraordinary. To anybody else who looks in, they think I’m bloody mad! But that’s what we do."

"My reflection makes me think even harder and pray even more fervently for those in conflict today, for those family’s [sic] torn apart by the horrors they have witnessed."

"I put away childish things and false bravado and returned a man full in the knowledge of human frailty and suffering."

"[T]he people that I met and the opportunities that I was given to learn either by him or because of him were actually very useful."

"I kick myself for, on a daily basis, because it was not something that was becoming of a member of the royal family [...] And we try and uphold the highest standards and practices and I let the side down, simple as that."

"I have learned with the deepest concern the news about Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and suspicion of misconduct in public office. What now follows is the full, fair and proper process by which this issue is investigated in the appropriate manner and by the appropriate authorities. In this, as I have said before, they have our full and wholehearted support and co-operation. Let me state clearly: the law must take its course. As this process continues, it would not be right for me to comment further on this matter. Meanwhile, my family and I will continue in our duty and service to you all."

"In a world where so many things have changed for the better, there are –sadly - still many vulnerable, forgotten and neglected children. Each one of them has a unique story"

"There are lots of things I do feel strongly about, but if I speak about them I will be on my best behaviour."

"As a half-resident of Wiltshire I feel very loyal to the county."

"Poetry is like time travel, and poems take us to the heart of the matter"

"My grandfather, P Morton Shand, […] declared that ‘A woman who cannot make soup should not be allowed to marry’. You might not agree with his rants, but there was no doubting his passion for proper food"

"What I have learned from my travels is that by listening at least as much as we speak, and by trying to understand before we act, we perhaps stand a better chance of coming up with the right answers…"

"English students don't spend much time on their studies. They're more interested in partying and having fun."

"Being a friendly neighbour has always been the keystone of community life and just saying “hello” can sometimes make a huge difference"

"Reading is exciting. Reading is fun. Reading is cool. There is nothing quite like the thrill of opening a book and being drawn into another world to meet new people and to discover their stories - it’s like making new friends"

"Oh, oh, very badly. I would love to start again but maybe I’m too old"

"Oh, it's quite all right, we curse quite a lot around here."

"Baldwin ruled out the traditional compromise of a morganatic marriage, the sort that Archduke Francis Ferdinand had made when he married Sophie Countess Chotek von Chotkova, whose family was not of royal blood. As Duff Cooper noted, however, the timing of events was not to the King's advantage. He waited until after his accession to the throne to raise the question of marrying Wallis Simpson. Nor did it help matters that he was stridently supported by both the Rothermere and Beaverbrook papers, to say nothing of Winston Churchill, at that time in the political wilderness."

"[A]n entirely unscrupulous woman who is not in love with the King but is exploiting him for her own purposes. She has already ruined him in money and jewels..."

"I am sure there is only one solution, that is for me to remove myself from the King's life. That is what I am doing now."

"You can never be too rich or too thin."

"I never wanted to get married. This was all his idea. [...] I remember like yesterday the morning after we were married and I woke up and there was David [i.e., Edward VIII] standing beside the bed with this innocent smile, saying, "And now what do we do?" My heart sank. Here was someone whose every day had been arranged for him all his life and now I was the one who was going to take the place of the entire British government, trying to think up things for him to do."

"[From paragraph 194] Unfortunately, as a consequence of me bringing my Mirror Group claim, both myself and my wife have been subjected to a barrage of horrific personal attacks and intimidation from Piers Morgan, who was the Editor of the Daily Mirror between 1995 and 2004, presumably in retaliation and in the hope that I will back down, before being able to hold him properly accountable for his unlawful activity towards both me and my mother during his editorship."

"[From paragraph 191] They claim to hold public figures to account, but refuse to hold themselves accountable. If they're supposedly policing society, who on earth is policing them, when even the government Is scared of alienating them because position is power. It is incredibly worrying for the entire UK."

"[From paragraph 191] I fully accept and agree with the fact that journalists and the media own the public square, in as much as, if you are in a position of responsibility and or are funded by the taxpayer, the media should have the power to be able to investigate anyone, anytime, for pretty much anything. The problem is that, over the last 15 to 20 years, there are now incredibly powerful media companies who masquerade as journalists and who have, quite literally, hijacked journalistic privileges for their own personal gain and agenda, It’s an unbelievably dangerous place."