Prince William dodges query about whether or not it is ‘onerous being a prince’

Prince William was requested a uncommon query about life as a member of the royal household on Thursday throughout his go to to northeast Scotland along with his spouse, Kate.

The Prince and Princess of Wales (identified by the Scottish titles Duke and Duchess of Rothesay whereas within the nation) visited communities in Moray and Inverness the place they met teams of kids at Burghead Main Faculty.

Within the information Screenshots Because the prince spoke to the kids, he was heard being requested a sequence of questions by the group, together with what his favourite soccer group was and whether or not “being a prince is tough”.

“Is it onerous to be a prince?” William repeated this earlier than evading any difficult response, saying: “It’s troublesome to be a pilot… How is that this a solution?”

Newsweek I reached out to Kensington Palace for remark through electronic mail.

William is a skilled helicopter pilot and hung out within the RAF as a search and rescue pilot earlier than becoming a member of the air ambulance service after retiring from the armed forces.

In 2017, the prince left his function as an expert pilot to tackle royal duties full-time, though he nonetheless flies for leisure functions.

William’s evasion of answering the query of addressing the difficulties related to royal life comes at a time when the prince has confronted a sequence of public challenges over the previous three years, particularly associated to his youthful brother, Prince Harry.

In 2020, Harry and his spouse, Meghan Markle, left Britain after separating from the monarchy, and have since cited points with the media, royal aides and members of the family (together with William) as a part of their motivation for doing so.

In January 2023, Harry printed his record-breaking memoirs, furtherwhich included a lot of damaging claims towards William and unsavory descriptions.

Amongst these accusations, the prince alleged that his older brother bodily assaulted him in a 2019 altercation at Kensington Palace over Meghan’s remedy of palace employees, leaving him with seen accidents.

William has not responded to his brother’s claims, in step with the general “no remark” stance taken by Buckingham Palace and the royal household on the whole.

Over the previous yr, William has additionally seen his public {and professional} profile improve as he takes on the senior royal function of the Prince of Wales following the demise of his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II.

On this capability, he attended the coronation of King Charles and Queen Camilla in Could, the primary occasion he had attended with Harry since then. further’Printed. Though the brothers took their seats in Westminster Abbey for his or her father’s historic ceremony, no public interactions between the 2 had been captured on digicam.

William wasn’t the one royal to face questioning from schoolchildren in Scotland on Thursday. The Princess of Wales was additionally caught on digicam talking to teams at Burghead Main Faculty, the place she was requested: “Who’re you?”

She replied: “Who am I? I am married to William.”

James Crawford Smith NewsweekRoyal correspondent, primarily based in London. You will discover him on X (previously Twitter) at @jrcrawfordsmith And skim his tales on Newsweek‘s Kings page on Facebook.

Do you’ve a query about King Charles III, William and Kate, Meghan and Harry, or their household that you prefer to our skilled royal correspondents to reply? Electronic mail royals@newsweek.com. We might love to listen to from you.