Earl Spencer has been forced to issue an apology to Piers Morgan just hours after his new book about Princess Diana went on sale, but Morgan told ITV News Royal Editor Chris Ship that he’s still pressing ahead with legal action and questioned the credibility of the whole book
Piers Morgan has told ITV News that he still intends to take legal action against Earl Spencer over claims made in his new memoir despite the brother of Princess Diana issuing an apology.
Based on “false” claims made in the book about him, the journalist and broadcaster asked: “What else can we trust?”
In an interview with ITV News Royal Editor Chris Ship, Mr Morgan accused Earl Spencer of “defamatory” claims and said he would be “taking legal action against him and his publishers” and “probably have the book removed”.
Charles Spencer has made a raft of claims in Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, which was published on Tuesday, including that the King said “we’ll forget her soon enough” after she died and sounded “giddily elated” in the wake of the fatal car crash.
Piers Morgan claims Charles Spencer ‘lied’ about the tone of their conversation in the wake of Diana’s death in an interview with ITV News
The Earl also suggested Mr Morgan was responsible for publishing photographs, taken with hidden cameras, of Diana in a leotard working out at the gym, in the Daily Mirror newspaper in 1993.
But Mr Morgan was working at The Sun at the time, and did not join the Mirror as its editor until 1995.
The Earl apologised and said as a historian “accuracy was important to him”, but he stood by his account that Mr Morgan was “surly and annoyed” when he called the journalist to tell him he was not welcome at Diana’s funeral.
“I’m spitting blood about this,” Mr Morgan told ITV News. “I mean, he’s made an egregious defamatory series of claims about me which had nothing to do with me.
“And all right, He’s apologised, he’s admitted that he was wrong, but that’s not enough, I’m sorry.
“This book is out there now. It’s going to sell a lot of copies. He’s going to make millions and millions of pounds around the world hawking his story about his sister, having vowed never to do that.
“We are sending a legal letter today. I’ve instructed Shillings, the legal firm, to send a legal letter to him and to his publishers, Penguin, demanding they withdraw these now admitted false claims in the book about me.
“And you know, honestly, I may not be the only one because, you know, if he’s done this to me, it was only after I checked the entries on me. Who else has he done this to?
“But I don’t think this book should be allowed to continue being out there to sell it contains an admitted defamatory lie.”
A statement issued earlier on Tuesday on behalf of Diana’s brother said: “Earl Spencer’s account of his conversation with Piers Morgan is accurate.
“Mr Morgan was surly and annoyed when Earl Spencer called personally to tell him that he was not welcome at his sister’s funeral.
“The book then records Earl Spencer’s assumption that Mr Morgan’s response was because he was editor of the Daily Mirror when the Mirror Group had published highly intrusive photographs of Princess Diana at the gym.
“The photographs were published by the Sunday Mirror on 7 November 1993. Mr Morgan has pointed out that he did not join the Daily Mirror until October 1995. As a historian, accuracy is important to Earl Spencer.
“He therefore wishes to clarify that his assumption was incorrect. Earl Spencer apologises to Mr Morgan for this error.”
In his interview with ITV News, Mr Morgan raised the suggestion that Earl Spencer was “about as far removed from a historian as you could possibly be”.
He said: “Earl Spencer wants us to believe every word of his book, and in particular the incendiary claims he’s made about phone calls and things that now King Charles is reputed to have said.
“But my belief, based on what he’s written about me, which has turned out to be completely untrue, is that he’s about as far removed from a historian as you could possibly be.
“How could he be claiming to be an historian, putting this out for public record for centuries to come when he can’t even get a basic story right involving me within a two-year range? It’s preposterous.”
When asked specifically about what Mr Morgan remembered about the conversation with Earl Spencer, he said: “It’s an absolute lie to say that I was surly. I could not have been more respectful.”
Mr Morgan also pushed back when he was asked if his firm stance against Earl Spencer’s book had anything to do with his well-documented criticism of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
“Irrelevant, irrelevant, irrelevant,” the broadcaster responded.
The claims Earl Spencer made relate to a single week in the period before Diana’s funeral, where he discussed who could attend the ceremony with several tabloid editors.
It was the same week Earl Spencer said in his book the then Prince Charles reacted angrily to the Earl suggesting William and Harry should not walk in the funeral procession.
The Earl wrote he rejected this comparison, pointing out that Charles had been 30 years old when he walked in Lord Mountbatten’s funeral procession, whereas William and Harry were still boys aged 15 and 12.
“Prince Charles continued his stream of anger, without me interrupting. Then he stopped,” he writes.
“I assumed the pause signalled an effort to bring himself under control, but then he unleashed down the phone what I have always taken to be his pent-up contempt for Diana, and his horror that the world was so bowled over by her death. ‘Rest assured’, he hissed, ‘we’ll forget her soon enough!”‘
The Earl says he then hung up the phone.
Buckingham Palace issued a response to the book, without directly commenting on any individual claim.
The palace said: “The pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory in ways others do not recognise.”
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