Prince Harry's lawsuits against British tabloid media publishers over allegations of historic illegal information gathering could yield disappointing results in his overall struggle to change the media landscape, a new episode of Newsweek's The Royal Report podcast has heard.
Harry is currently suing three of the biggest news publishers in Britain, including Associated Newspapers Limited (publishers of the Daily Mail) and News Group Newspapers (publishers of The Sun).
The prince became the first senior royal to give evidence in a high court trial in more than 130 years in his lawsuit against Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) over a number of stories published in the Daily Mirror and People titles between 1996 and 2011, which he claims were sourced using illegal means, such as phone hacking.
In January 2023, Harry told a British interviewer that following his move to America in 2020—citing the British press' behavior towards him and his wife, Meghan Markle, as well as strained relations with royal family members—he was dedicating himself to "changing the media landscape within the U.K." making it his "life's work" to hold them to account for their actions.
However, Evening Standard Courts Correspondent Tristan Kirk, who witnessed Harry's eight-hour testimony in London earlier this month, told Newsweek that the prince's lawsuits over historic media wrongdoings may have little impact on the press today, even if he wins.
When asked by chief royal correspondent, Jack Royston, whether he felt it is "possible to redraw the landscape of the British media in the modern era based on allegations that are rooted in the past?" Kirk responded: "In a word, No. I think that you can tell from the way that Harry's approached this and the other lawsuits…he sees this as a vehicle for change, as to say to newspapers: 'You can't do this anymore.' But the reaction of the newspapers in the modern day, to him giving evidence is incredibly telling as to how this is going to go in the future.
"I think win or lose Prince Harry is always going to be the center of media attention, both in the U.K. and abroad, particularly in America. That's never going to go away and the newspapers are showing absolutely no sign of changing the way they go about this in terms of following around, intruding into people's private life, and, particularly, Prince Harry, reporting every scrap of detail they can.
"Ever since he's started waging this war in the courts against them, there's just increasingly hostile coverage of his activities," he continued. "So, he might want to redraw the landscape but he's actually putting himself even further into the spotlight by doing it. And it doesn't look like there's any sign from any of the major players in the media that that's going to change whether this case goes one way or the other."
Key to this flaw in the prince's pursuit of media change is the fact that his legal battle currently only pursues historic claims, meaning he might be fighting for changes that can already be claimed to have been made.
In relation to Harry's MGN lawsuit, Kirk noted that: "We're talking about, you know, as far back as 1996, we're talking about pre the death of Princess Diana when everything was supposed to change anyway.
"If the judge comes back and says, well, yes there's been, terrible behavior, unlawful activity back in the mid '90s then the newspapers will presumably—the ones that were responsible for that—turn around and say 'well, yes there was, but that's in the past. That's something that's not really relevant to the future.'"
Harry's unlawful information gathering lawsuits with Britain's three major tabloid publishers are all ongoing.
In court this month, MGN admitted to and apologized for one count of unlawful information gathering in relation to Harry, but has denied allegations that they hacked phones.
James Crawford-Smith is Newsweek's royal reporter based in London. You can find him on Twitter at @jrcrawfordsmith and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.
Do you have a question about King Charles III, William and Kate, Meghan and Harry, or their family that you would like our experienced royal correspondents to answer? Email royals@newsweek.com. We'd love to hear from you.
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About the writer
James Crawford-Smith is a Newsweek Royal Reporter, based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on the British royal family ... Read more
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