Celebrity3 min(s) read
Published 11:44 02 Jun 2021 GMT
More than 45,000 people have signed a petition to remove Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's royal titles.
The Change.org petition was created last month and came after the royal family announced in February that while Harry would not be returning to his senior duties, he would be allowed to keep his title.
Biographer and royal expert Lady Colin Campbell decided to start the petition, which also calls for the couple's funding to be removed because she believes Harry should "voluntarily ask The Queen to put his royal style, titles, and rank into abeyance".
Campbell told the Daily Star that she created the petition to remove Harry's title because "it's the right thing to do".
She told Daily Star: "I have spoken to people, many people, who think it's the right thing to do and it is the solution. It is the best solution because it frees Harry to be able to indulge himself without consequence and without doing damage to the institution of the monarchy of the British nation, the British people and himself."
She explained that if Harry voluntarily gives up his title, it will free him from its constraints and the "constitutional conflicts which his beliefs are creating, with all their implications at home and abroad, in particular in the United Kingdom and the United States of America, where his articulated beliefs are in open conflict with the accepted tenets of both the United Kingdom and American Constitutions."
The petition continues: "His invitation to The Sovereign, being of his own accord, will resolve conflicts that would otherwise be inevitable, and will permit him to enjoy the credit of having put both national and international interests above his own, personal ones, in the process gaining him respect that he otherwise will not enjoy."
Campbell explained that by becoming a "purely private citizen", Harry would have the ability to "indulge his personal beliefs… [and] be free to articulate beliefs, no matter how objectionable, without the fallout that is otherwise inevitable as long as he possesses royal status."
She explained that there is no continued benefit for Harry in being known as a prince and he, therefore, "doesn't need" the royal titles as he is "too big for them now" and "still gets publicity and attention".
The petition has now garnered a total of 49,493 signatures.
