Prince Harry Handed Legal Boost by U.K. Government

Prince Harry has received a boost from the U.K. government as senior ministers have granted his legal team permission to use previously restricted documents as evidence in his phone-hacking lawsuit against publishers of newspaper Daily Mail.

On Thursday, a notice signed by Home Secretary James Cleverly and Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer was published, per U.K. newspaper The Daily Telegraph. It grants the prince's legal team permission to use ledger cards, which reportedly contain payment details between Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) and private investigators, as evidence at trial.

Harry is suing ANL, as are several other high-profile public figures in Britain—including singer Sir Elton John—over allegations of historic phone hacking and unlawful information gathering, allegedly used by the publisher's titles to obtain private information. ANL has denied the allegations, labeling them "preposterous." Newsweek approached representatives for Associated Newspapers Limited and Prince Harry via email for comment.

In 2023, ANL sought to have the cases thrown out of court. It said that they were filed outside of the six-year time limit imposed between claimants becoming aware they may have been victims of unlawful activity and the date of filing their lawsuit.

ANL added that the evidence supplied by the claimants from ledger cards was unable to be used at trial because they had been obtained despite a legal order making them confidential.

The ledgers had been supplied by ANL to the Leveson Inquiry, launched in 2011 as a wholesale assessment of the ethics and practices of the U.K. press. It was a response to a major phone-hacking scandal, which brought about the closure of the News of the World tabloid newspaper.

ANL and other publishers submitted private data to the inquiry, including payment ledgers and documents, on the understanding that they would not be made a matter of public record. This was confirmed in a formal restriction order issued at the time.

In November 2023, a high-court judge ruled that Harry and his co-claimants could take ANL to trial, finding that their claims could be heard despite the six-year expiration. However, a blow came when the judge also ruled that the legal team representing them could not use the ledger data as part of their evidence, unless they could convince senior ministers to bypass the Leveson order or have ANL provide them.

Thursday's news that the Home Secretary and Culture Secretary have granted their permission for the ledgers' use will serve as a boost to Harry as he prepares to bring his case to trial, a date for which has not yet been set.

The news follows a legal blow dealt to Harry on Wednesday in a separate lawsuit, this time over the government's decision to remove his state-funded, full-time police detail when he stepped down as a working royal.

In a judgment handed down on February 28, it was ruled that RAVEC (the Royal and VIP Executive Committee), a subsidiary group under the Home Office, had acted legally in its decision-making process to remove Harry's full-time protection and implement a bespoke case-by-case detail whenever he visits Britain.

Lawyers for the prince said that he intends to appeal the court's decision.

James Crawford-Smith is Newsweek's royal reporter, based in London. You can find him on X (formerly Twitter) at @jrcrawfordsmith and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.

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