Overview

• Royal biographer Andrew Lownie alleges the duke demeaned staff in routine ways, citing examples in a Channel 5 documentary of summoning aides to pick up golf balls, calling maids from several floors to open curtains, and dropping used tissues for others to collect.
• In an interview about his book Entitled: The Rise and Fall of the House of York, Lownie describes further episodes of humiliation, including a 2005 rebuke of a senior aide at Hillsborough Castle and removing a visiting diplomat’s place setting to underscore status.
• The book reports a 2021 royal meeting concluded there was “no way back” for Andrew’s return to public duties, alongside claims that staff were reassigned over a facial mole or a nylon tie.
• Sources close to Andrew dismiss the accounts as inaccurate and recycled, while a palace spokesperson says it does not speak for him because he is no longer a working royal; Andrew stepped back from duties in 2019 after the Epstein fallout.
• Lownie says new sources have come forward since publication and he plans a substantially revised edition of his book for summer 2026.