There have only been two major (or rather stories of public interest) involving the Harkles recently, and that has been the ANL decision, and the alleged Harkle family (the non-dom, the persona non grata, and non-bio offspring) visit to the UK. Liam’s WhatsApp groupies had been busy bees posting speculatively on the visit, and then having to backtrack when their exclusives proved to be false flags. Social media also played its part with many speculating, commenting (critically and otherwise), but what was actually factual?
Besides a vaguely worded statement from BP, claiming that the King and Queen hosted the Sussex family at Highgrove House, there has been no actual factual evidence that the statement itself is accurate. In the past, BP has been caught out issuing statements that were either misleading or that were factually inaccurate, so can the statement even be trusted (remember, it issued a statement that TW was in labour at midday, only to issue another later statement claiming a child had been born at 5:30am) ? Do we even care? It only matters in so much that if C3 did see the Harkles, then he has shown himself to be a weak monarch, and as a result it will lead to the People opting to halt support for his reign and the Monarchy.
More than a couple of weeks have passed since the ANL decision was handed down (7 July 2026), and the fellowship of the ‘hacked off’ groupies appeared to have fallen apart when all the claims were dismissed, because the Claimants failed to prove that unlawful information gathering (UIG) has been used as a source for articles. Most people under the age of 30 won’t have heard of most of the Claimants, because most of them are no longer in the public eye, or are of public interest.
Elton John, some people have still heard of him and is the wealthiest of the fellowship. His husband, David Furnish was also a Claimant, but most people these days have no idea who he is or what he does. EJ’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour will have brought in a hefty fortune. Looks like he can say ‘farewell’ to several million in this case and he might have to cover the costs for others.
Doreen Lawrence. The mother of Stephen Lawrence who was murdered in a racist attack back in 1993. Not a national treasure as some of the media has claimed, and unlikely ever to be after it was revealed she had been vindictive towards Stephen’s father, refusing him an invite to a memorial and then exhuming the body and moving it to another location without the decency to tell him. A woman that the country pitied and sympathised with, but never a national treasure, but who has been used as a pawn by the Hacked Off team and Harold.
Elizabeth Hurley. Best known for being Hugh Grant’s ex partner and for wearing a Versace safety pin dress back in 1994.
Simon Hughes. A former Liberal Democrat MP back in 1983, who had concealed and denied that he had been involved in same sex relationships.
Sadie Frost Law. Best known for being married to Gary Kemp, and then leaving him for Jude Law, as well as being best friends with Kate Moss and partying with her, back in the 1990s.
Harold, and his race card puppet (Doreen Lawrence) issued a scathing and rant like joint statement within hours, basically accusing the judge and the judicial system of being corrupt. Needless to say, if they had contemplating a leave to appeal, that went out the window even though it was highly unlikely. If they went to the Court of Appeal to apply for permission to appeal, they would need to prove that Nicklin J, erred in law.
“We came to Court seeking justice and accountability. But we have received neither.
“This judgment represents a complete reversal of the position which previous Judges have taken in relation to the hacking claims successfully brought against both News Group Newspapers and Mirror Group Newspapers (who were represented by, at the time, the Judge who made this decision).
“Generic findings about various private investigators that were held by the Courts in these parallel claims to have carried out unlawful activity at the very same time in relation to similar stories and well-known individuals have been wholly ignored.
“The fact that this Court has chosen to dismiss them represents an inconsistency which is hard to understand or reconcile with common sense, or the evidence heard in the court room itself.
“It is a complete and obvious whitewash, but sadly not altogether unexpected.
“However, the lengths to which the Court has gone to exonerate the Mail is as shocking as it is totally unwarranted.
“When the Court says there is not sufficient evidence of wrongdoing, despite the documents showing otherwise, then one does wonder how justice was ever going to be achieved.
“One need not look past when a private investigator the Mail used actually admitted on tape to having unlawfully blagged Baroness Lawrence, or when a journalist recorded the name of the private investigators she used to find out about highly sensitive medical information (that even the Mail was too worried to publish) or when another private investigator emailed one of the journalists with the actual British Airways seat number and ticketing details for a young girl simply visiting her boyfriend in return for payment.
“It feels here like one rule for the newspapers and another for the claimants. While the Claimants presented evidence, Mail journalists simply gave denials, and the Court chose uncritically to believe them, even in the face of inconsistencies, contradictions and blatant untruths that were obvious to neutral observers in Court when compared to the documents.
“We presented to the Court evidence which we believed was compelling at the time and and remains so now.
“We would like to thank our legal team for all their hard work and all the witnesses who were brave enough to came forward in the pursuit of justice.”
But what about the other members of the ‘fellowship’? After more than a week, there has been silence. No statement, no hint of them seeking leave to appeal, but the Jim Armitage article in The Sunday Times (11 July 2026) highlighted reasons as to why even David Sherborne, the lead lawyer in the case has chosen not to comment or to make a statement.
This brings us to indemnity costs, and ANL has said that they would take steps to recoup the £50 million in costs. Despite the caps that the case management hearings had set ( £4.1 million for the claimants and £4.5 million for ANL), indemnity costs can be awarded if the losing party had engaged in dishonest behaviour or improper litigation. From Armitage’s article, and other disclosures from the case, there have been a number of questionable and dubious acts from the Claimants in the case.
ANL’s Editor in Chief, Paul Dacre made this statement:
“Four years ago, lawyers for Prince Harry, Doreen Lawrence and Elton John accused the Mail, in a blaze of publicity, of placing bugs in homes, cars, cafés and landline phones.
“We described these charges – some related to stories that were over 30 years old – as ‘lurid and preposterous’. Today, in what was a momentous victory for the Mail, the High Court dismissed every single one of the 97 claims.
“That is an overwhelming vindication of our journalism. The Mail’s famous front-page naming five thugs as Stephen Lawrence’s “MURDERERS”, could have seen me jailed for contempt of court.
“Instead, it triggered the Macpherson Inquiry and the eventual jailing of two of the killers. Stephen’s father, Neville, says he owes the Mail everything.
“Why Baroness Lawrence – for whom we have always had profound respect and sympathy – chose to turn on both the paper, and the brilliant reporter who campaigned for justice for her son for over two decades, is something I will never be able to comprehend.”
What about the legal insurance (about £14.1 million in total for the Claimants, £2 million each approximately) as won’t that cover the costs? Most legal insurance policies are taken out and accepted only if there is a good chance of success (51% chance of winning), and in the decision, it was stated that Simon Hughes and Sadie Frost Law had zero chance of winning because their claims were time-barred due to the acts of ‘camouflage’ employed by the ‘Hacked Off’ researchers.* They decided to rewrite a story in Byline Times, (all funded from the estate of Max Mosely ) to muddy the waters, or basically to circumvent the law as to when the Claimants knew of the alleged UIG, knowing that the case would be time-barred.
This can be interpreted as the court saying Simon Hughes and Sadie Frost Law’s cases should never have been submitted as they were time-barred. Thus, technically it meant their cases had no chance of ever winning, therefore, their insurance policies would more than likely be invalidated. This could mean that they would have to pay all their own legal costs (about £2 million each) , and at least 1/7 of the ANL anticipated costs (if the full £50 million is awarded that’s about £7 million per Claimant). In total, each Claimant is looking at up to £7-8 million each in costs depending on the costs hearing at the end of July 2026. Much depends on the small print in their policies, and what is decided at the hearing on 29-30 July 2026, but it looks like most of the Claimants will have to part with some cash.
The other instance is during the case management conference (9 December 2025), the court took the unusual step of advising/warning the Claimants that they should consider whether to go to trial as if they lost, the legal costs would exceed their current insurance cover. Some might interpret that as the court telling the Claimants that they were likely to lose with the evidence presented and that they needed to understand the financial consequences before proceeding as it seems their legal team may not have provided the guidance.
That in itself told the Claimants that they did not have a good chance of success, and that was in the public domain. Therefore, the insurance companies would have a right to refuse payment because the Claimants were told that they had little chance of success, and could avoid a costly trial by withdrawing the claims, and to mitigate their own costs
What factors does ANL have to put forward to seek indemnity costs? Off the top of my head there are quite a number that are in the public domain.
The acts of camouflage*, as above where email exchanges showed a conspiracy to circumvent the law by altering the timeline as to when Frost Law and Hughes were made aware of the alleged UIG for the purposes of the lawsuit.
The Sherborne legal team failing to disclose discovery documents that were referred to, by claiming the research team had only been hired in April 2022 (Engagement Agreement) and thus any documents prior to that they said they had no access to and were not part of discovery. This was overturned by the court as the researchers did make documents available to Sherborne and his colleagues, and the researchers had been providing the legal team with documents and communicating with them before being formally engaged.
The legal team of the Claimants had paid some witnesses for their statements, where some had been misled into giving a ‘statement’ thinking they were offering an opinion.
According to Gavin Burrows in the Armitage interview, the alleged witness statement the Claimants produced was a fake and the signature was forged. He then said that he had been hired to give an expert opinion, and this was then reassembled and rewritten without his consent or knowledge into a witness statement. It was this alleged witness statement that persuaded some of the Claimants to join the class action. Without it, many Claimants would not have considered legal action, and the fact it has been confirmed as fake, means the case itself appeared to have been manufactured and was based on fraudulent documents.
What about Doreen Lawrence? It looks as if she was duped into being part of the case by Sherborne and his colleague, Sangani (who quit the case before the trial began) who claimed that she had been a victim of phone hacking, and convinced her that ANL (Daily Mail) had been spying on her. Then Harold got hold of her personal email and had been in contact with her, also to convince her to join the fellowship. Out of all the Claimants, she is the one without the financial resources (a few million pounds to spare) to cover the legal costs, and it is believed that she accepted to be part of the case when Harold said he would cover all her legal costs. Yes, she put her trust in a man who can’t pay his mortgage in a timely manner but has a Prince title. She could have backed out when the evidence, or rather the lack of it showed that there wasn’t any UIG, or that there were reasonable explanations for information in the articles mentioned.
The hard facts are that the Claimants could not prove UIG had taken place and all their claims had been dismissed, so they lost and are liable for all legal costs. How much they will have to pay for ANL costs depends on the hearing on 29-30 July 2026, where ANL have stated they will seek to recover all legal costs. While they may not get the full £50 million they state it has cost, they will more than likely receive more than the capped £4.5 million if they can prove there was misconduct from the other party.
One should also remember that the lengthy trial has been a costly drain on court resources (time and money), when the decision stated that all claims were dismissed and essentially had no merit. The courts will not get a refund on this, but may use this case as a deterrent to others who seek to use the courts to play out vendettas, acts of revenge (that was the aim of ‘Hacked Off and its existence’) knowing their witness statements in a court protects them from legal action.
The other facts are that the costs will also look at the fishing expeditions (request for further information) made by the Claimants, thus, by forcing ANL to carry out additional unnecessary legal work, those costs can be considered in full. I believe in some instances the work totalled £200,000 for one ‘request’.
Given that there has been questionable behaviour from the Claimant’s legal team, it’s more a question of how much, who will pay, what the split will be for the additional costs that ANL are likely to be entitled to IMHO.
How did this all start? It seems that EJ introduced Harold to David Sherborne at a planned meeting at his home in the South of France, and the latter convinced Harold to be part of what appears to have been a well planned ‘attack’ on the media by a group supported by the estate of Max Mosley. Therefore, shouldn’t EJ bear the brunt of the costs if the pockets of the others aren’t that deep?
What are the facts behind the alleged Harkle family visit to the UK? There are none, we saw Harold, and announcements were made that the family would visit Althorp for a family reunion (aka to film the Diana grave for some documentary footage).
No one admitted to seeing Harold or the other arrive or leave Althorp, nor did anyone admit to seeing them arrive or leaving Highgrove House. It could well be that no one except for Liam’s groupies cared as normal people watched Wimbledon and the World Cup.
In essence, we had Liam’s groupies posting ridiculous propaganda posts, and allegedly BP issued a statement that the King and Queen hosted the family at Highgrove House. Once upon a time, statements from BP could be trusted because why would they lie? However, for the past decade or so, BP has issued statements that have been factually incorrect or misleading, so no, we cannot trust a vague statement issued around 6:30pm, but then again, do we care if the Harkle family was in the UK?
Then we have the odd timelines, with Harold in Birmingham until around 1:30pm, rumours that TW had landed via a private plane around 2:30pm, and C3 who was in Oxford carrying out engagements until 4pm. We then heard that C3 returned to London that evening, so any visit can’t have been more than an hour at the most.
More stories circulated that they were checked for recording devices, but that’s not new and that has been in place since the Oprah interview. They were checked at the Platinum Jubilee, but by the looks of things they managed to slip them back on after being checked, hence why both were fiddling with their collars during the service at St Pauls. Did they check the faceless children as it’s easy to slip a device on a hair clip or bracelet?
On one hand, if they did arrive in the UK it proves that they didn’t need high level security and were not in danger as Harold claimed, and that RAVEC made the correct decision.
If they didn’t enter the UK, and the alleged visit was a smokescreen, then what was the point? To pacify the people telling C3 he needs to mend bridges and to see the non-bios? The only fact we can ascertain is the public reaction to C3 agreeing to see TW and the non-bios
Most of the comments on social media expressed disappointment and anger at C3 for validating treasonous behaviour. I omitted the handles (and swearing) only to avoid the posters from being targeted by nutty trolls.
The general terms used were a ‘weak’, and ‘spineless’ King. I didn’t see any positive comments bar people saying it was none of our business (so why did BP feel the need to make a statement?).
Others said they had supported the King but could no longer do so using much stronger language.
Many others said it was the final straw and by C3 failing to put his country and duty before the traitors, said they were done with the Monarchy.
A tiny percentage (about 0.5%) sat on the fence (and were likely to be sentimental parents or grandparents) who said he wanted to see the non-bio grandchildren and should do so. One could say they are quite deluded because C3 has verified biological grandchildren and step grandchildren, and the faceless children don’t know anyone bar Doria and Archewell staff.
The simple fact is that there are only a small handful of people who know the truth as to whether a visit did take place or not because it was private and no photos (if any) will be released. If TW wanted to be seen in the UK, she could have done that easily, and somehow, no one saw any of them arrive or leave the UK, or on the road to Althorp (even though we all knew they were headed there weeks ago).
What reason would BP have for issuing a misleading statement? Perhaps to appease the people who say that C3 should see the non-bio grandchildren? Perhaps to take control of the ridiculous will they/won’t they stories? Whatever the reason, it failed as the People see C3 as a weak man, and the sugar media can spin it as a reconciliation. There can be no reconciliation while TW pulls Harold’s strings, and a visit where you aren’t even invited to stay for dinner doesn’t give off welcoming vibes either.
Harold did attend the Scotty’s Summer Festival at Maxstoke Castle in Warwickshire, but there was no sign of TW or the faceless children, even though it was a family event, and if they were in the UK, it would have been a fun day for them to run around.
Who is Joe Marler? An ex rugby player with a podcast who blurted out that Harold approached him to be on his podcast. My, times are low and dark when Harold has to beg to be on a podcast.
The most memorable event of Harold’s trip was a goat walking over what was left of Harold’s balls. Not even RPO security could have protected Harold from a goat messing with his balls.
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