Melbourne, Australia — Prince Harry and his wife Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, arrived in Melbourne on Tuesday for their first Australian visit. his official royal visit in 2018.
The low-key four-day Australian visit came after the couple announced in 2020 that they planned to “step back” as senior royals and become financially independent in their California base.
The Sussexes described their trip as privately funded, and they flew from Los Angeles to Melbourne business class on a commercial Qantas Airways flight. But the couple’s visits to Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney have drawn public complaints about the extra security costs for police agencies.
The cost of security explains why the couple will not be greeted by thousands of people at public events, as they were during their 16-day tour of Australia as newlyweds in 2018. New Zealand, Fiji and Tonga.
The couple’s children Prince Archie, 6, and Princess Lilibet, 4, are not travelling with them. Meghan announced she was pregnant with her first child when she was pregnant with Sydney in 2018.
Melbourne’s Herald Sun newspaper described the latest visit as a “fake royal trip to shore up the Brandi Sussexes”.
There has been criticism of couples attending ticketed events in Australia.
The Sussexes rejected criticism that the trip was a publicity tour.
“The programme is rooted in long-standing areas of work for the Duke and Duchess, with a clear focus on growing organisations that deliver measurable impact. The tour prioritises listening, learning and supporting communities rather than campaigning,” the Sussexes’ office said in a statement.
The statement also said there were “a small number of private partnerships” to “support wider commercial, charitable, and business objectives.”
Afua Hagen, a media commentator for the British royal family, said that the news media generally portray the Sussexes as “villains.”
“It’s a privately funded trip. To pay for it, they have to have some business interests,” Hagen told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
“If they didn’t have business interests, the problem would be: ‘Oh my God, these people are defrauding the royal family and the taxpayers, whether they’re making their own money or not. How dare they make their own money.’ “They can’t make up for the wrong thing by doing the right thing,” Hagen said.
Giselle Bastin, a Flinders University expert on British royals, said the Sussexes’ decision to use their titles to pursue personal interests would be perceived by many as a conflict of interest.
“It is well known that the Sussexes are in desperate need of income and therefore staging a quasi-royal tour of Australia is being considered a desperate attempt to monetise their status as royalty,” he said.
His first public appearance was at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne. Harry’s grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, opened the facility in 1963 and her parents, Princess Diana and then-Prince Charles, visited in 1985.
As they entered the hospital lobby, the Sussexes shook hands with dozens of well-wishers and posed for photographs on hundreds of spectators’ phones.
When a reporter asked Harry what he was most looking forward to about his Australian trip, he replied: “Everything.”
“It feels wonderful to be back,” he said.
Also in Melbourne, Meghan is scheduled to visit a women’s shelter and Harry is scheduled to visit an experiential art museum.
Affleck will visit the Australian War Memorial in the national capital, Canberra. The pair will attend the Invictus Australia sailing event on Sydney Harbour.
In 2018, the couple hosted the opening of the Invictus Games in Sydney. Harry founded the sporting event in 2014 where sick and injured military personnel and veterans compete.
[…] Prince Harry and Meghan arrive in Australia for a low-key, privately funded trip […]