Queen's Ex-Aide Calls for Apology After 'Misquoting' in Prince Harry's Book

Prince Harry and his book publisher should apologize because "what is attributed to me is rubbish," Queen Elizabeth II's former spokesman told Newsweek.

Harry's memoir Spare describes how after Harry and Meghan Markle announced they wanted to quit royal duties, the Daily Mail "convened a 'Fleet Street jury' to consider our 'crimes.'"

Harry wrote: "Among them was the Queen's ex–press secretary, who concluded, with his fellow jurors, that we should hereafter 'expect no mercy.'

"I shook my head. No mercy. The language of war? Clearly this was more than simple anger. These men and women saw me as an existential threat."

Although the book does not identify the former press secretary by name, Dickie Arbiter, who was the late Queen Elizabeth's press secretary from 1988 to 2000, believes it is a reference to him.

However, the Daily Mail's story, published on January 10, 2020, actually attributes the "no mercy" quote to a different commentator, British broadcaster and former politician Trevor Phillips.

Arbiter told Newsweek: "Its attributed to an ex-press secretary. I'm not attributed to by name. It's an open interpretation.

"They should have done a bit of fact checking because I never said anything of the sort. I don't know what Trevor Phillips meant when he wrote what he wrote all I know is what is attributed to me is rubbish and an apology from Penguin Random House would be useful."

Asked whether Harry should apologize, Arbiter added: "I think an apology all round because they got it wrong and I've been accused of something I never did. There's enough interpretation and misquoting in this world without adding to it. But I haven't been named, it's by interpretation."

Newsweek has approached representatives of Harry and publisher Transworld Penguin Random House for comment.

Harry's words also appear to remove the context from Phillips' statement, which was predicting how some members of the public from both sides of the political divide would react.

He said: "Once outside the royal enclosure they will no longer enjoy the deference that Harry, at least, has had all his life. They will join the rest of us in the trenches.

"They can expect no mercy from those who like things just as they are and, to be honest, they'll get short shrift from the many activists who have endured a lifetime of calumny from the media, largely without complaint."

Arbiter was quoted in the same article, but said: "The Queen will bear this latest insult with the stoicism with which she has faced every other challenge in her life. But make no mistake, an insult it is.

"And Her Majesty will doubtless be feeling very let down right now, by a grandson she doted on."

If Harry, his ghost writer and his editor believed that Arbiter and Phillips had made their comments in conversation with one another, they perhaps should have read the article more carefully.

The Daily Mail story states that Arbiter made his comments to The Sun while Phillips made his comments to U.K. broadsheet The Times. The Mail appears to have simply aggregated quotes from around the British press.

Prince Harry has repeatedly accused the British media of lying about him and, as recently as his appearance on The Late Show, stripping away the context when they published extracts from his memoir suggesting he boasted about how many people he killed in Afghanistan.

Harry told Stephen Colbert: "It's really troubling and very disturbing that they can get away with it because they had the context. It wasn't like 'here is just one line,' they had the whole section.

"They ripped it away and just said 'here it is he's boasting on this.' When as you've said you've read and hopefully everyone else will have a chance to read it.

"And that's dangerous. And my words are not dangerous but the spin of my words is very dangerous to my family."