Prince Harry has stated that the United Kingdom is his home, and that he and Meghan were “forced” to step aside from frontline royal duties and leave the country for the United States.
The Duke of Sussex stated in a written witness statement prepared for his legal action against the Home Office in the High Court over a change in his security arrangements when visiting that he and his wife thought they had to leave the nation in 2020.
Shaheed Fatima KC, the duke’s lawyer, said at a hearing in London on Thursday that Harry did not accept it was a “choice” for him to stop being a “full-time working member of the royal family.”
The lawyer read out an excerpt from the duke’s statement in which he said: “It was with great sadness for both of us that my wife and I felt forced to step back from this role and leave the country in 2020.
“The UK is my home. The UK is central to the heritage of my children and a place I want them to feel at home as much as where they live at the moment in the US. That cannot happen if it’s not possible to keep them safe when they are on UK soil.
“I cannot put my wife in danger like that and, given my experiences in life, I am reluctant to unnecessarily put myself in harm’s way too.”
After a two-and-a-half-day hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice concluded on Thursday, Harry now awaits a judge’s decision on his legal action against the Home Office.
The duke’s lawyers are contending that the Executive Committee for the Protection of Royalty and Public Figures (Ravec) decision to change the level of his publicly financed protection in February 2020 was “unlawful and unfair.”
Because the case featured classified evidence about security procedures, the majority of the hearings were held in private, without the public or press present.