DAN WOOTTON: It is time for Harry and Meghan to unite with the Firm

DAN WOOTTON: Charles and William have done everything possible to make concessions to the Sussexes. Now it’s time for Harry and Meghan to put the late Queen’s wishes for a united family ahead of their own quest for revenge

As far as offering forgiveness at a time of overwhelming grief, King Charles and Prince William have been both compassionate and statesmanlike over the past seven days.

Members of the Royal Family, quite understandably, haven’t forgotten that in the days before Queen Elizabeth the Great’s death, the media briefing and social media campaign by their son and brother respectively Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle had continued at pace.

In fact, their odd little PR guy Omid Scobie, who, it turns out, doesn’t know that Scotland is part of the United Kingdom, was furiously tweeting that the Sussexes had no desire to meet up with any of their blood relatives, until the perma-victims received an apology for their apparent mistreatment.

DAN WOOTTON: As far as offering forgiveness at a time of overwhelming grief, King Charles and Prince William have been both compassionate and statesmanlike over the past seven days

DAN WOOTTON: Members of the Royal Family, quite understandably, haven’t forgotten that in the days before Queen Elizabeth the Great’s death, the media briefing and social media campaign by their son and brother respectively Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle had continued at pace

That’s despite the Duchess issuing a thinly veiled threat to reveal all about her horrid days as a member of the Royal Family during an interview with the woke US magazine The Cut, which this week grimly published a hit piece against Charles as he grieved his mother.

There was an all too striking similarity to the weeks before the death of Prince Philip, where the Sussexes pressed ahead with a derisory and largely untrue expose with Oprah Winfrey, despite being informed the Duke of Edinburgh had been taken to hospital.

So the backdrop to the warring Windsors coming together in tragedy could hardly have been more fraught.

But Charles, who has many faults, showed one of them is certainly not his ability to forgive and move on.

Quite the opposite. This week, his priority has been making Harry and Meghan feel as if they’re still part of the family.

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It’s happened in many ways, some more subtle than others.

There was the declaration of love for his son and daughter-in-law in his historic King’s Speech, even if he conceded they were building their lives overseas.

The couple were right behind their father at Buckingham Palace as Elizabeth II returned for the final time, while the next day Meghan rode with Sophie Wessex (like a second daughter to the late Queen) on the way to Westminster Hall.

But the most significant concession will come tomorrow night when Charles has agreed to overturn protocol by allowing the Afghanistan veteran Harry to wear his precious military uniform as he stands at the foot of the late Queen’s coffin as her eight grandchildren stand vigil in what will be a historic piece of royal theatre.

Charles is a father deeply hurt by his son’s public rejection, including horrible jibes in both the Oprah and Cut interviews, which he believes is unfair.

After all, he walked Meghan down the aisle after her falling out with her own father Thomas Markle and even agreed to help fund the couple’s move to California post-Megxit.

But Harry’s sense of victimhood, seemingly encouraged by his wife, goes back further, and seems to consume his every decision, even if it involves trashing his family and the institution of the monarchy.

William’s magnanimous display of public unity by offering a joint walkabout with the couple to greet mourners at Windsor is even more significant.

The new Prince of Wales remains deeply angry at his younger brother, especially the attacks on his wife in the Oprah interview, which he feels the couple are unable to respond to, and the highly damaging claims of racism that helped derail the couple’s Caribbean tour earlier this year.

However, in the darkest of times, following the Saturday joint appearance, William agreed to march shoulder to shoulder with Harry behind the Queen’s coffin as it made its way to Westminster Hall.

DAN WOOTTON: However, in the darkest of times, following the Saturday joint appearance, William agreed to march shoulder to shoulder with Harry behind the Queen’s coffin as it made its way to Westminster Hall

It was a poignant repeat of the psychologically inappropriate episode of 25 years earlier when the brothers were forced to march behind their late mother’s coffin, a trauma for which Harry is still believed to blame his father.

Significantly, at the funeral of Prince Philip last year, relations were so strained between Wills and Harry that their cousin Peter Phillips had to separate the brothers in the procession.

Whatever the reasons for the show of tolerance and contrition by Charles and William – most likely for the focus to remain on the life of the Queen, not petty Montecito melodrama – there should now be an expectation for Harry and Meghan to show the same grace.

While it might sound trite, we all know the Queen would have expected her relatives to unify around her eldest son, whose success or failure will help to determine the future of the Union and the monarchy itself in the years to come.

DAN WOOTTON: Whatever the reasons for the show of tolerance and contrition by Charles and William – most likely for the focus to remain on the life of the Queen, not petty Montecito melodrama – there should now be an expectation for Harry and Meghan to show the same grace

That’s why it’s so disappointing to learn of reports that Harry and Meghan have been ‘relentless since the Queen died’ on their insistence that Archie and Lilbet are made prince and princess.

Not only is it highly inappropriate to be having such discussions at this moment, I find it utterly bizarre that a couple so opposed to the institution would be so desperate to burden their American children with titles that carry such responsibilities.

It’s also unconscionable to me that, given the circumstances, Harry will still agree to the publication of his tell-all autobiography, which is widely expected to contain pointed criticisms of both the new king and queen.

If the book is released before the coronation next year it will almost certainly destroy Charles’s hopes of a honeymoon period as monarch.

DAN WOOTTON: It’s also unconscionable to me that, given the circumstances, Harry will still agree to the publication of his tell-all autobiography, which is widely expected to contain pointed criticisms of both the new king and queen

It’s my view that Harry must cancel the book altogether, rather than simply delay its publication to a later date, causing another unbearable wait for the Royal Family.

Of course, the book is just the start of the hyper publicity drive planned by the Sussexes to maximise their finances and prove they’re a valuable asset to their bosses at Netflix and Spotify, which have both demanded their pound of royal flesh.

It would be a crushing disappointment if, after being included at the heart of such a moment of history, Harry and Meghan use the events to further their seemingly unending desire for commercial gain.

While I found her comments more than a little ironic, given it was her journalistically flawed ‘interview’ that unleashed much of the hell of the past two years on the Queen, perhaps the couple should take the words of their friend Oprah Winfrey seriously.

DAN WOOTTON: It’s my view that Harry must cancel the book altogether, rather than simply delay its publication to a later date, causing another unbearable wait for the Royal Family

As she said in a US TV interview this week: ‘When all families come together for a common ceremony, the ritual of, you know, burying your dead, there’s an opportunity for peacemaking. And hopefully, there will be that.’

Well, the opportunity for peace has been offered by Charles and William to the Sussexes, even though they have been subjected to a string of highly damaging ad hominem and factually inaccurate attacks, of which it is impossible for them to respond.

Now it’s up to Harry and Meghan that they can, for once, put the Queen’s wishes for a strong and united family in the wake of her death ahead of their own futile and ultimately damaging quest for revenge.

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