Around this time last year, Kensington Palace excitedly announced that there were plans afoot to send Prince William and Kate on a “charm offensive” trip to Italy in 2024. As we know now, the trip never happened, but I’ve often cited those briefings of a planned trip to question the palace narrative that Kate’s abdominal surgery was “planned” as well. In any case, in November, Buckingham Palace claimed the Italian trip for King Charles and Queen Camilla – they will likely head to Italy at some point in the first half of 2025. But that hasn’t stopped “a source at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office” from expressing disappointment that William and Kate remain so unwilling to travel on state business.
The King and Queen are hoping to visit Italy next spring, partly to make up for William and Kate pulling out of a trip planned for earlier this year.
A source at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office whispers that there is a sense of frustration at the lack of ‘limelight royals’ – those who will attract crowds and headlines – available for the Government to deploy.
There is some annoyance that Wills consistently declares himself unavailable. Difficult family circumstances were perfectly understandable, says the source, and the FCO were suggesting only short-haul, short-duration trips for William sans Kate.
So they were somewhat surprised that he was able to head to South Africa last month to support his Earthshot Prize. He also made three trips to Germany to watch the Euros and turned up at the recent Notre-Dame reopening to glad-hand Donald Trump.
Yeah, there’s a sense that “everyone understands” why Kate no longer travels (she hates traveling, William doesn’t want her around, she doesn’t want a repeat of the Caribbean Flop Tour). There’s also a sense that everyone knows that William is a lightweight, so the Foreign Office begs William to just do quickie solo visits to various countries and he just refuses or claims that it would interfere with his “me time.” And yet he has all the time in the world to travel to football matches or his Earthshot busywork. When Charles was Prince of Wales, he was deployed internationally for decades, even when he sometimes made a hash of it, he still did it and showed up. Anyway, it’s interesting that the Foreign Office is muttering about this to the Mail.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.