Prince Harry's U.K. Government Security Lawsuit: Who Is Sir Edward Young?

Prince Harry's legal battle with the U.K Home Office revealed a very real breakdown in his relationship with members of Queen Elizabeth II's closest staff members after it came to light that the government's decision to reduce the prince's security was made in consultation with Buckingham Palace.

In a High Court hearing on Thursday to determine whether the prince could move forward with his lawsuit against the Home Office over security, it was revealed by his lawyer Shaheed Fatima that "There were significant tensions between the claimant [Prince Harry] and certain people" who were on the committee that made the decision over his protection.

Harry also said he should have been told that members of the queen's staff were included in the decision which he claims has left it unsafe for himself and his wife, Meghan Markle, to spend time in the U.K.

As to who on the queen's staff was involved in the process, and by extent with whom it is presumed Harry has had "significant tensions," Fatima identified Sir Edward Young, one of the people working closest to the monarch, among their number.

Who Is Sir Edward Young?

Sir Edward Young, 55, is the Queen Elizabeth II's Private Secretary and Keeper of The Queen's Archives.

Educated at Reading School, Young went on to work in finance during the 1990s before becoming a government advisor to Conservative party members.

In 2004, after working as head of corporate communications for broadcasting conglomerate Grenada Plc, Young received his first royal appointment, joining the queen's staff as her assistant private secretary based at Buckingham Palace in London.

For thirteen years, Young worked closely alongside the queen's private secretary, Lord Geidt, who retired in 2017.

Geidt was credited with much of the modernizing that the monarchy had done since the millennium and after his retirement from the royal household went on to advise Boris Johnson, before resigning in 2022.

Young was subsequently promoted to Geidt's vacant role as private secretary to the queen, the most senior position on her personal staff.

Young, Harry and Meghan

Young's promotion to private secretary came as Meghan Markle and Prince Harry were working towards their May 2018 wedding with the young couple identifying royal roles they were interested in pursuing.

Later, in her 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey, Meghan spoke of the restrictiveness of royal life, with the royal household apparently unwilling to help her reach out to people and take part in the work she was seeking to do.

"One of the members of the family, she came over, and she said, 'Why don't you just lay low for a little while, because you are everywhere right now,'" Meghan explained.

"And I said, 'I've left the house twice in four months. I'm everywhere, but I am nowhere.' And from that standpoint, I continued to say to people, 'I know there's an obsession with how things look, but has anyone talked about how it feels? Because right now, I could not feel lonelier.'"

In his book Battle of Brothers, Robert Lacey writes that it was Young's lack of imagination in identifying an early role for Meghan that led to her unhappiness and ultimately the young duchess leaving royal life for the United States with Harry in tow.

"Young failed particularly when it comes to Meghan," Lacey wrote. "The queen had evidently noted the failure of Sir Edward Young and his staff to come up with a satisfactory role for the American newcomer's strongly defined talents."

When the Sussexes began to step away from royal life, Lacey said that a power struggle emerged between Buckingham Palace, headed by Young, and the duke and duchess' new staff.

"When it came to any Sussex matter," Lacey recounted, "the private secretary's authority was now being disputed by Sunshine Sachs channels through which Harry and Meghan had insisted on running their outreach activities."

When it came to the difficult negotiations between Harry, Prince Charles, Prince William and the queen about the Sussexes exit from royal life, Young is reported to have played a pivotal role as a go-between. It is during this period that relations between Young and the couple are reported to have become obviously strained.

During Meghan and Harry's interview with Winfrey, the couple expressed antipathy towards "The Firm," or royal household, with the duchess saying:

"My experience of the past four years is it's nothing like what it looks like...And I remember so often people within The Firm would say, 'Well, you can't do this because it'll look like that. You can't'."

Perhaps the biggest hint prior to information released as part of Thursday's High Court hearing, that Harry in particular had issues with members of the queen's closest staff, came in April 2022 in an interview given at the Invictus Games.

En route to the games in The Netherlands the royal, along with Meghan, had stopped at Windsor Castle to see the queen. Speaking with Today show host Hoda Kotb after the meeting he said:

"Being with [the queen], it was great. It was just so nice to see her. She's on great form. She's always got a great sense of humor with me and I'm just making sure that she's, you know, protected and got the right people around her."

This comment about having the "right people" around his grandmother was widely analyzed and led many to speculate that the prince felt that she might not have the right people in her inner circle, though Young remains at his post.

The High Court hearing regarding Harry's case with the Home Office over security is ongoing. However, it has been announced that the royal is seeking a second judicial review over claims that his offer to pay for security out of his own personal fortune was not passed on to the committee that decided to reduce his protection.