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William’s significant move marks a step forward in healing rift with Harry – but his hurt is still greater, says expert
Royal expert Hugo Vickers sees there is a chance of a reconciliation between the brothers
PRINCE William has made a significant move in a “step forward” towards healing the rift with Harry, a royal expert has said.
The Prince of Wales, 42, remembered how Princess Diana took her young sons to a homeless shelter in London in a new documentary.
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The programme, Prince William: We Can End Homelessness, includes unseen photographs of William and Diana at the Passage of Westminster.
In one photo when Diana and William visited on June 14, 1993, the prince is seen playing chess with a homeless man at the shelter.
In another picture, taken in December the same year, William is seen standing with his mother at the shelter, his arms holding presents to give out.
William says: “My mother took me to the Passage, she took Harry and I both there... I'd never been to anything like that before and I was a bit anxious as to what to expect.
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“My mother went about her usual part of making everyone feel relaxed and having a joke with everyone... I remember having some good conversation, playing chess and chatting.
“You meet people, like I did then, who put a different perspective in your head.”
The royal brothers continue to be estranged from one another.
It’s thought William has not mentioned his brother’s name in public or in an interview since 2018, when the two princes, alongside the Princess of Wales and Meghan Markle, were interviewed at the Royal Foundation Forum.
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The royal biographer and broadcaster Hugo Vickers has said the mention indicates a “step forward” for the brothers to reconciliate.
Mr Vickers told The Sun Online: "Prince William was talking about a historical event going with his mother to the homeless place, which I remember them doing at the time, and of course it would have been very strange if he hadn't mentioned Prince Harry since Prince Harry was quite clearly there with him.
"However, having said that, it's nice that he did, and I'm a great believer that every time there's a step like this it's a step forward, and, as I've said on many occasions, if people are prepared to compromise, there's always the chance of reconciliation.
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Mr Vickers added: "I'd like to say that I see it as an olive branch to his brother, but I think it's more the case that since he was talking about an event where Prince Harry was present, it would have been very odd if he hadn't mentioned him.
"On the other hand he could have specifically excluded him, which would have been indicative of a complete breach between them.”
Mr Vickers added that he thought there could come a time when the brother once again appear in public together.
He said: "I think, as time goes on, sometimes the bitterness becomes less strong, and the King has been brilliant because he hasn't responded in any way at all to any of the jibes that have come from Prince Harry or Meghan.
"I think that Prince William is, I would imagine, rather less forgiving, and in a way the hurt is greater. Harry attacked Catherine, and that's not very nice.
"I mean, nobody likes that. But possibly there will come a time when they appear together in public for various reasons.
"I think probably Prince William has got enough on his plate frankly worrying about his wife getting better, and his father."
Earlier this month, William called for “systemic change” to tackle the homelessness problem.
In a heartfelt speech at the Centrepoint Awards, Prince William also highlighted the need to ensure “all young people have truly affordable options to live and thrive independently”.
It comes as royal experts have previously suggested Meghan and Harry are increasingly living "separate lives".
Tina Brown has also claimed in a podcast that Harry was being led like a "lamb to the slaughter" and who "follows Meghan Markle like a child".
Prince Harry is said to have had a “three-week break”, which included a solo trip to Lesotho in Africa in honour of his charity, Sentebale.
Harry also attended a string of events in New York unaccompanied by his wife, and also did a surprise TV stint and tour of a haunted maze on the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon.
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It follows the revelations that Harry celebrated the night of his milestone 40th birthday without Meghan in September.
The duke went on a hiking trip with pals to celebrate his big day, leaving his wife and their kids at home.
A timeline of Prince Harry and William's 'feud': Brothers 'at war'
In 2018, the Sun told how "simmering tension" began when William questioned the speed of Harry and Meghan's engagement.
The first hints of friction reportedly came after William was introduced to Meghan when she was staying at Kensington Palace.
Once she'd returned home to Canada, William and Harry sat down for a brother-to-brother chat.
He knew Harry was already head-over-heels for her but it has been claimed he advised him to take it slowly.
The younger prince reportedly didn't take too kindly to the advice, with one royal source saying he "went mental".
Then in June 2019 Harry and Meghan officially split off from the charity they shared with William and Kate.
The Royal Foundation will be divided between the Sussexes and Cambridges as the couples focus on their own separate charitable endeavours.
Prince William and Prince Harry first established the Royal Foundation in 2009 before Kate joined two years later shortly after their engagement was announced.
The trio would often appear together at events and the Foundation had huge successes with projects like the Invictus Games for injured veterans and the mental health Heads Together campaign.
The Royal Foundation said the decision was made following the conclusion of a review into its structure - but added both couples will continue to work together in the future.
Harry and Meg were living in close proximity to Kate and Wills within the Kensington Palace estate, but they switched to Frogmore Cottage in Windsor before baby Archie was born.
The move further increased rumours of a fallout.
Harry, 39, also hinted in his ITV documentary "Harry and Meghan, An African Journey" that he and his brother had grown apart.
It came after Prince Philip called Meghan the "D.O.W" after the Duchess of Windsor — the American divorcee who led Edward VIII to abdicate.
And he warned the late Queen to be "cautious" of Harry's then bride-to-be, a royal author claims.
Ingrid Seward revealed in new book My Mother And I that Prince Philip felt it was "uncanny...how much Meghan reminded him of the Duchess of Windsor".
In 2021, Harry and Meghan give their bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey where Harry accused his dad of cutting him off financially.
Harry then jetted back to UK to join William in unveiling a statue to their mother Princess Diana in the grounds of Kensington Palace.
But sources claimed William didn’t want to attend the memorial amid their ongoing rift.
In 2022, just before their grandmother the Queen died, sources claimed Kate acts as a "peacemaker" between the brothers.
Last year Harry claimed his brother "knocked him to the floor" during an argument about Meghan.
In his book Spare, Harry said William branded Meghan "rude" and ";difficult" during a row.
Harry alleged William "grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and … knocked me to the floor".
He said he was left with a visible injury to his back following the argument in 2019 at Nottingham Cottage on the grounds of Kensington Palace, where he was living at the time.
In January this year, Harry flew in to be with Charles after the monarch's shock cancer diagnosis.
Harry flew back to the US the following day - without seeing Wills.
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