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This episode commenced with a single photograph, possibly the most significant ever snapped of a royal family member.

There stood the Earl of Inverness, arm-in-arm a female youth, while an associate grinned knowingly in the background.

Lacking that image, shot at a gathering in 2001, it would have been difficult to accept the claims of a young woman who stated she was trafficked across the Atlantic and obliged to have perfunctory sexual encounters with a member of the royal family?

A curious, indicative action by someone who had overtly asserted to have no been aware of her, said he could never have had relations with her, and yet handed over a substantial sum of family money to avert a long-delayed lawsuit.

Years of Disgrace

Against this backdrop, discussions of the monarchy acting swiftly to cut Andrew off are wide of the mark. This scandal has continued for the better part of 15 years since that picture, and a further image of Andrew walking amiably with a convicted sex offender surfaced.

• Hubris: To what extent did his family members, maybe even his mother and father, know that Andrew was so presumptuous?
• Dubious Friendships: They must have known, if his employees and the authorities were doing their jobs, that he had some extremely unsavory friends given he unabashedly hosted them to estates.
• Fiscal Irresponsibility: If the family did not know about his sexual proclivities, they certainly knew about his wastefulness with taxpayer funds.

Trips were documented in public records: private aircraft transfers from the royal residence to a sporting venue and back again in time for midday meal, exclusive air travel instead of scheduled services, all for the convenience of "Airmiles Andy".

World of Deference

Additionally the arrogance which required respect when he entered a area or the supreme awareness about his honorifics used on his letterheads in letters to his friends.

He avoided accountability while his matriarch, who unaccountably indulged him, was still alive. The sovereign did at least revoke him of official roles and honorary colonelcies in the wake of his ill-fated and, as revealed, deceptive television interview six years ago.

Recent Developments

Merely in the last fortnight that events accelerated, following the issuance of biographical works giving more grim particulars of his conduct and that of his associates.

Additional revelations have again highlighted Andrew's assumption that he could escape being untruthful about his contact with a convicted criminal.

People (and the journalists) were far ahead of the monarchy. There was no one of any significance to defend him, a consequence of all those years of hubris.

Institutional Fears

The wiser royals recognized that. The one imperative is to pass on the institution, if not as previously at least whole and unblemished.

Over time the last 190 years trying to reverse the image of earlier rulers, showing they are useful, responsible and responsive to their subjects.

He was placing all that in danger in an time when submission and discretion is no longer sufficient.

The Fallout

Finally, the notoriously indecisive monarch was pushed further. There was little choice. The institution had relinquished authority of the narrative.

Currently the stripping of honorifics and the ongoing and permanent public humiliation that will hurt Andrew most severely.

• Downgrading: Demoted to just a private citizen
• Past Example: The initial monarch to surrender his titles in recent history
• Armed Forces: Notably painful given his duty in the conflict

He remains a constitutional officer, on paper able to stand in for the monarch, and he is still in the lineage to the crown, but neither of these will ever happen.

Future Prospects

Do individuals he meets still show respect to him? Might they still make mistakes and call him Prince? Would they say Andrew,

Certainly, he is not moving to an ordinary town, but to the royal family's extensive grounds at Sandringham.

In that place, he will be furnished by the king with one of the estate properties and given some type of financial support.

It is not his previous residence, where he paid a minimal payment for more than 20 years, and the county is a bit far, but even so it may not be adequate distance.

Unresolved Issues

Matters remain unresolved. There are still records in the hands of overseas authorities to be disclosed.

• Governmental Scrutiny: Will legislators seek further action
• Financial Investigation: Or examine the waste of public money
• Criminal Investigation: There may even be a criminal probe into his behavior

Perhaps for the present the institutional damage to the institution is contained. The message from the palace was clearly that the revocation of designations was what the king, and notably other senior monarchical figures, sought.

A Shift in Position

No more pretence that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, notably, the short announcement showed plainly that the monarchy were aligning with the victim's version of occurrences.

Furthermore, for the premiere occasion they ultimately showed regard for the affected individuals: "The censures are considered essential, notwithstanding the fact that he maintains his innocence of the accusations against him."

Finally it is presumption, self-interest and indolence that will kill the institution. In his folly, self-gratification and venality, Andrew gives the impression never to have learned that lesson.