Buckingham Palace ends Meghan bullying report – but does not want to say what it says

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Michael Stevens – the Crown Finance Officer – told a news conference to discuss the Royal Household’s financial statements that the private company tasked with investigating the allegations had completed its work.

Stevens said several recommendations were made, but he did not provide significant details about the conclusions that were reached or recommendations that were made. Because the review was privately funded, there was less pressure on the Crown to make its findings public.

“However, I can confirm that it was a review of how the allegations were handled, aimed at allowing the royal households to consider possible improvements to staff policies and procedures,” Stevens said. “The review has been completed and recommendations regarding our policies and procedures have been implemented, but we will not comment further on them.”

A senior royal source said the palace is keeping quiet about the investigation to protect the anonymity of those who cooperated.

“We recognize that those individuals who participated in the review participated on the understanding that these discussions with the independent law firm would be kept confidential, and as such we are committed to respecting that confidentiality,” the source said.

The source said the palace made several policy changes after the review, but declined to disclose them in detail.

“Whenever you conduct an independent review or an investigation of this type is conducted, there are always lessons to be learned, there are always opportunities to improve processes and procedures,” the source said. “Normally we wouldn’t disclose every change to our policies and procedures.”

The allegations surfaced last year when The Times in the UK published an article citing unnamed sources alleging the Duchess had evicted two personal assistants from her household at Kensington Palace and undermined the trust of a third employee.
Buckingham Palace initially said it would investigate the claims but later hired an outside law firm to do so.
At the time, a spokesman for the Sussexes dismissed the Times report as “a calculated smear campaign” because it was released just days before Oprah Winfrey’s bombshell interview with Meghan and Prince Harry aired.

The interview marked the first time the couple spoke publicly after announcing plans to step down from senior positions in the British royal family in 2020.

Meghan told Winfrey that at one point, life as Britain’s royal became so isolated and lonely that she “didn’t want to be alive anymore.” She described herself as a victim of an image-obsessed Buckingham Palace, which affected everything from her son Archie’s dark complexion to the frequency with which she went out to lunch with friends.