Enraged palace aides are seeking the source behind the genuinely disturbing leak of top-secret plans that are to be enacted when the Queen dies.
The details of Operation London Bridge, including ministerial protocols and funeral arrangements, were published yesterday morning in a move described by Whitehall insiders as disturbing, unnecessary and upsetting.
The plans for the enormous operation were only shared with a tiny group of people and revealed that all Whitehall flags must be lowered to half-mast within ten minutes followed by a TV address and UK tour by Prince Charles and a pre-planned memorial service at St Paul’s Cathedral for ministers that will be made to look spontaneous.
Their exposure has stirred anger at Buckingham Palace, with sources saying there’s now a major desire to discover who the mole is and what their motive was.
And a royal source told a newspaper outlet that it was genuinely disturbing that such private information, which was not only deeply personal to the Queen but also had far-reaching security implications.
It’s thought the plans were leaked after being updated during the pandemic.
Whitehall bosses are also believed to be on the warpath to hunt down the source and could narrow down the likely offenders by examining which version of the documents were released.
A Cabinet Office source said that they’d looked into which version had emerged so that they could decide whether this dereliction of duty demanded a formal government investigation.
It sets up a possibly awkward meeting for the Prime Minister tomorrow, as Boris Johnson and Carrie will be meeting Her Majesty this weekend at Balmoral despite the courtier’s mounting concerns over COVID. It will also be the first time their 16-month-old son, Wilfred meets the monarch.
Buckingham Palace has refused to comment, but a royal insider said officials aren’t happy, adding that they’re not talking about this and that it was a matter for the Government.
Royal expert Angela Levin said that she thought it was awful and cruel to release the top-secret plans about the Queen’s demise.
The ten-day plan was leaked to POLITICO after being updated during the coronavirus pandemic with the day she passes away being called D Day.
It was first hatched in the 1960s but was never published in such granular detail. And there’s no suggestion that Her Majesty, 95, is in bad shape, but there are major questions about how documents so sensitive could be made public, although I’m not sure what all the excitement is about because many of these details have been known for years, perhaps not all of them, but some of them.
What the fuss is all about is not that we now know what’s going to happen when the Queen departs, although these plans will presumably be changed now, but that they were leaked by someone else.
And of course, you also have to consider that the people that work in the Royal Palace, workers, aides et cetera are all a pack of traitors, especially when there’s money involved because they will then always leak, sell and stir up drama about the Royal Family, perhaps they should be mindful of who they have working for them.
But it’s constantly being printed about information about the Royal Family from royal insiders or palace sources, so why feign outrage now?
And yes, it might be in poor taste to air such details, but nothing is shocking here, it’s just a timetable and logistics.
