PA who scared the Prince 'rigid'

By CAHAL MILMO


When Elaine Day wrote to her employer suggesting he improve his organisation by encouraging his workers to aspire to more senior jobs, she may have been forgiven for expecting a positive response.

After all, Prince Charles had made much of his progressive attitudes on issues from mixed housing and education to the virtues of organic food and homeopathy.

His personal mission statement, announced this northern summer, says he will "do all he can to use his unique position to make a difference for the better in the United Kingdom". But, an employment tribunal heard yesterday, when it comes to such apparently liberal notions as "child-centred" schooling and self-improvement, HRH the Prince of Wales is determinedly old school.

In an extraordinary memo, the heir to the throne railed against the idea of his employees aiming for more illustrious roles.

Labelling such aspirations as "social utopianism", the Prince blames an education system which he criticises for making people "think they can all be pop stars ... or even infinitely more competent heads of state" without the necessary effort or ability.

The document, written in March 2003, followed a request from Day, 45, a former personal assistant at Clarence House, for PAs with university degrees to be allowed to train as private secretaries - the senior courtiers in charge of the day-to-day running of the royal household.

The PA, who is claiming sex discrimination and unfair dismissal after she left her post earlier this year, said her note to the Prince was written in the hope that he might take steps to reform the "Edwardian" standards of his managers.

Instead, the Prince wrote his memo back to Day's immediate boss, Paul Kefford, an assistant private secretary in charge of social, educational and religious matters, criticising the PA for being terrifyingly politically correct.

The Prince wrote: "What is it that makes everyone seem to think they are qualified to do things far beyond their technical capabilities?

"This is all to do with the learning culture in schools. It is a consequence of a child-centred system which admits no failure and tells people they can all be pop stars, High Court judges, brilliant TV presenters or even infinitely more competent heads of state without ever putting in the necessary effort or having abilities. It's social utopianism which believes humanity can be genetically and socially re-engineered to contradict the lessons of history."

Asking Kefford how he should reply to Day, the Prince added: "She's so PC, it frightens me rigid."

The document, read out to a packed court room in a concrete office block in Croydon, south London, only came to light after the PA resigned from her job in April after five years working at the heart of the Prince's household.

Asked by her lawyer what she had taken the memo to mean, Day, from Belvedere, east London, said: "I completely felt that people could not rise above their station."

The former royal functionary said Clarence House was run on principles often contrary to those espoused by its head.

She said: "It's hierarchical, elitist, everyone knows their place and if we forget our place the system will punish us."

The allegations will do little to help attempts by his officials to dispel criticism that the heir to the throne's privileged lifestyle fuels his more eccentric views and habits.

Clarence House said it would "vigorously contest" Day's allegations, which also included a claim that she was one of three females members of staff who were sexually harassed by Kefford.

The case is continuing.

- INDEPENDENT