Prince Harry’s christening of Lilibet as a princess is ‘irregular’, says royal commentator

PRINCE Harry’s decision to christen his daughter as Princess Lilibet Diana is “slightly irregular” as the title would normally be awarded by the King, according to royal commentator Michael Cole.

He told GB News: “What you’ve got here essentially is the Sussexes pre-empting things, I would normally have expected the King to formally bestow the titles so Prince and Princess on to Archie and Lilibet, as is their legal right under the letters patent in 1917.

“But they’ve actually gone ahead and had the child christened at a ceremony noting the church at their hilltop fortress at Montecito near Santa Barbara in California, with the bishop John Taylor of Los Angeles presiding at an Anglican service.

“They refer to him in the communication as the Archbishop of Los Angeles. Well, that’s somebody quite different. He’s a Roman Catholic archbishop.”

In a discussion with Patrick Christys, he said: “They refer to her throughout as Princess Lilibet  Diana, I can’t imagine  that they’ve actually christened her the name ‘princess’. I think that would be slightly irregular.

“But we imagine that she has been named Lilibet Diana. Now in the old days in the Church of England, it had to be a proper name…in America, you are forbidden to name a child king, or queen, or Santa Claus or even Adolf Hitler, but you can name them pretty well anything else except a trademark or a number or an emoji.

“I’m not quite sure from reading that whether she has been named Princess Lilibet or she has been christened just Lilibet Diana.”

Asked about Ngoni Fulani’s new accusation that Buckingham Palace did not do enough to protect her from a social media backlash, Mr Cole said: “My sympathy is very much with Lady Susan Hussey, who I knew over many years.

“There could never be anybody less racist than Lady Susan Hussey, but for her to be dragged into this in this way, in a very unfair way, or in a very partial way, without giving her being able to answer those allegations at the time.

“It’s a very sad affair. I don’t think it reflects very well on this young woman.”