Prince Harry Police Security Quest Came at a Heavy Price

Prince Harry’s lawsuit against the British government has cost almost $650,000 in taxpayers’ money, though a lawyer told Newsweek he may wind up paying most of that himself, plus his own expenses.

The Duke of Sussex sued the Home Office twice over the decision to remove his police protection team and lost the case in February. His team indicated they will appeal.

A Freedom of Information request by The Daily Telegraph revealed British taxpayers have so far paid out £514,000, amounting to just short of $650,000.

However, unless Harry wins his appeal, it is the royal not the public who will ultimately foot most of the bill—and he will have his fees to pay on top—leaving a final price tag that could rise past the £1-million mark.

Mark Stephens, of U.K. law firm Howard Kennedy, told Newsweek that Harry’s own costs “might be a bit more because he may have had to put together the evidence, so it will be in total over a million.

“It’s fair to say that a lot of his cases have been done on a ‘no win, no fee’ basis, so it’s thought by lawyers that they were so strong that he didn’t need to cough up. I think this is one of the few cases that doesn’t fall into that category because you can’t do judicial reviews on a ‘no win, no fee.’

“I think the fact they are appealing is indicative that his team’s counsel and the legal team think there was an error of law, otherwise they would have just shut it down. So they obviously think they’ve got a good chance because going in and having it refused would be quite humiliating.”

If the prince wins the appeal, the British taxpayers will have to pay the costs, though he may add a little extra to his own bill through the appeals itself process if he loses.

The next stage is the Court of Appeal deciding whether to give him permission to appeal, a process which Stephens said would cost “probably £25,000” if he loses.

If he is granted permission, but is ultimately unsuccessful after a full hearing, this could rise to “probably another £100,000,” Stephens added.

“It’s not going to be much because it’s a paper-driven exercise. The majority of the costs are expended in putting together the original papers. After the first instance hearing, all you’re really doing is arguing over whether there’s a legal point or not where the judge has fallen into error and so there’s no evidential gathering, which there is in the first phase.”

If Harry wins, he gets himself out of picking up the tab and also forces the government to revisit its decision to strip him of his police team, though it is possible they will simply make the same decision using a different process.

For example, if told they should have given Harry a better chance to make his case, they could simply give him that chance before deciding it has not changed their minds.

Harry already faces the prospect of cutting a major check to a sworn tabloid enemy in another case, a libel lawsuit against The Mail on Sunday that he dropped.

The Mail reported it estimates his legal bill in that case in the region of £750,000, close to $950,000.

That means in total, he could wind up being down more than $2 million dollars across the two cases. By comparison, he won a lawsuit against Mirror Group Newspapers on historic allegations of phone hacking and was paid just over £140,000 in damages.

The media company settled some remaining claims and costs for a further, undisclosed amount, but there is nothing to indicate that any net gain would touch the costs in the other two cases.

There are therefore many reasons for Harry to hope against hope that he wins his appeal against the government.

Jack Royston is Newsweek‘s chief royal correspondent based in London. You can find him on X, formerly Twitter, at @jack_royston and read his stories on Newsweek’s The Royals Facebook page.

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