‘The pressure is on’ Prince William & Kate to travel abroad after the king’s US visit

We expected to see some highly critical commentary of the Prince and Princess of Wales following King Charles and Camilla’s US state visit, and here it is. Basically, as soon as Charles and Camilla decamped (separately) from the US, all of the royal reporters and commentators were like… wow, that went better than expected, thank god Work-shy William isn’t king. It was perfectly obvious to everyone, even casual royal-watchers, that William and Kate would not have been able to handle that kind of important state visit, and that they constantly look like colonialist horse’s asses whenever they travel, which is rare because they’re so lazy. Well, now Richard Palmer has written about all of this and more – how “the pressure is on” William and Kate to get off their asses and represent the UK abroad. Don’t hold your breath, royalists.

A working-royal shortage: The King’s diplomacy masterclass in the US has boosted the monarchy but highlighted the shortage of family members undertaking similar blockbuster tours supporting British foreign policy. It has prompted calls for the Prince and Princes of Wales in particular to start travelling more to make the most of their own soft power on the world stage.

The Waleses are also under pressure from the Sussexes: But the apparent success of the US trip, coupled with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s high-profile quasi-royal visit to Australia last month, and Harry’s speech in Ukraine in which he challenged the US to uphold its historic security guarantees, has also highlighted the shortage of other royals with sufficient clout and star power to go on these missions. “It’s just the King supported by the Queen, and William and Kate,” said Richard Fitzwilliams. “They are the real stars.”

The 2022 Caribbean Flop Tour: The heir to the throne and his wife, who celebrated their fifteenth wedding anniversary on Wednesday, have not been on a major overseas tour together since their ill-fated trip to the Caribbean in 2022 to mark the late Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, when they faced protests and critics accused them of looking like out-of-touch relics of a bygone imperial age.

Work-shy Willy: They remain Britain’s most popular royals but William, 43, has struggled at times to shed criticism that he is workshy, despite explaining that the couple want to work in a different way, focusing on a campaigning style of engagements designed to have “impact” and bring change rather than the more traditional type of ribbon-cutting duties.

The laziest Prince of Wales in history?? However, William – who went on five foreign trips last year, three the year before, and five in 2023 – has travelled nowhere near as much as his father did at a similar age. When Charles was in his early to mid-40s, he visited up to 16 countries per year. Last year, the Prince of Wales’s foreign duties accounted for just 7.2 per cent of the family’s engagements abroad. It was similar in 2024 at 7.3 per cent. Before Kate’s illness, the couple accounted for 9.2 per cent of the total in 2023, and 18.7 per cent in 2022 when they completed 97 overseas royal duties including their Caribbean tour. Some royal watchers argue that in future they will have to step up at home and abroad, especially as they are the only working royals under 60.

Unease among diplomats: According to Patricia Treble, whose Write Royalty website measures royal workload by compiling a tally of official engagements each day, William undertook only 36 of 499 foreign engagements by members of the Royal Family last year. Treble’s figures are calculated using publicly available information from the Court Circular, the official record of the Royal Family’s activities. “That we don’t know whether he wants to increase that share in years to come, or when his wife will again return to foreign travel, must be of concern for not only the realms that require regular visits to keep their close bonds with their head of state and his heir,” Treble added. “But it also must provoke unease among diplomats who cannot be sure that they will be able to call on the soft power of royalty to help with their efforts.”

Missing the Sussexes: Joe Little, managing editor of Majesty magazine, believes Harry and Meghan’s trips have shown what the monarchy has been missing, adding to the pressure on William and Kate to travel more to the Commonwealth and on other big overseas tours. “The couple are not as visible as they need to be and they are certainly less visible than the previous Prince and Princess of Wales in their early days when they were firing on all cylinders,” he said. “They handle royal duties in a very different way…They can’t rely on their popularity forever.”

Kate will continue to focus on family: She and William have no regrets about focusing on family and quality, not quantity, of official engagements. “That will continue,” a royal source said. The couple, who take every school holiday off with their three children, George, Charlotte, and Louis, are firmly settled in their new eight-bedroom Georgian Grade II listed home, Forest Lodge, in Windsor Great Park, which is expected to remain their main residence even when William becomes King. It will be handy for Eton, the favourite to be Prince George’s new school in September, although the family are keeping their choice under wraps for now. Other possible destinations are reported to be Marlborough or Wellington, a 20-minute drive from their home. “My gut feeling is that it will be Eton for George and Wellington or possibly Marlborough for Charlotte, and one of those for Louis,” said Melanie Sanderson, managing editor of The Good Schools Guide, who has been taking regular soundings.

[From i News]

So many funny quotes and asides – “The couple, who take every school holiday off with their three children….” Yep. Will and Kate think they deserve to take off for “school holidays” too, and that “good parenting” is “never working during your kids’ five months’ worth of school holidays.” The thing about the 2022 Flop Tour – “critics accused them of looking like out-of-touch relics of a bygone imperial age” – is really funny too, because anyone with sense would have told them “okay, you actually have to modernize your whole vibe and energy, you can’t just wander around these tours in your colonizer cosplay.” William and Kate really decided that if they couldn’t play colonizers abroad, then they weren’t going to travel anymore! And here we are, four years later, and they just look like they’re too lazy and close-minded to actually DO THE WORK. Anyway, Palmer suggests that Kate will probably skip the trip to the US in July, but she might go to India in the fall, for Earthshot. The last time she was in India, she flashed everyone at a war memorial. Sigh…

Photos courtesy of Instar, Cover Images.

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44 Responses to “‘The pressure is on’ Prince William & Kate to travel abroad after the king’s US visit”

  1. Elizabeth says:

    Someone, please explain to me what impact the few engagements that they do have have had on their charities or the few places they have visited in the UK. What has Kate’s Early Years Childhood Centre accomplished?

    • Jensa says:

      I was wondering this too. Where’s the “impact”? Where’s the “quality”?
      And what are their actual interests? Do they have any?? I don’t buy that William is interested in environmental issues, or Kate in Arly Yars. Or Naychur for that matter, unless she means the 150 acres of private grounds where she can wander without risk of meeting the great unwashed.
      One of the things that worked so well on KC’s US trip was when he visited Harlem Grown – it was right up his street, because it played to his own interest in gardening etc. and it just looked a relaxed fun event all round. What would be the equivalent for PW or Kate?
      Neither of them could have pulled off that US visit like KC did.

    • Blujfly says:

      Im surprised Palmer didnt mention it because he was a skeptic of it at the time, but for a brief period in like 21/22 the Wales were planning “impact days” where they would tour somewhere and actually come with a check or some other tangible support. I think they did it once, and have never done it again.

      • BeanieBean says:

        Once. Zero follow-through, these two. Zero consistency. You know, I’ve been reading the Sheldrick Trust’s annual report on things accomplished for the past year (they post it on their IG), so I’m thinking if Kate’s Early Years or Bill’s Earthshot actually were to compile their annual figures, what would they show? Where’d the money go?

  2. “quality not quantity visits”? Seriously? Quality? Quality must mean short, jazz hands, manically smiling and PR photo op only visits and for Peg if there is day drinking then he is all in! I seriously doubt the two of them will do a royal tour together!

    • Jais says:

      The Caribbean tour distinctly lacked quality so at this point they are underperforming on both quality and quantity.

  3. Jais says:

    There’s an alternate scenario in which William and Kate could have responded to the Caribbean disaster tour by doing more trips and being more thoughtful, showing they’re not colonialists and then that tour could have been slowly less of a thing. But they just didn’t. So now it’s still the last tour on everyone’s minds. What delicate snowflakes. They got criticized and just decided to never tour again. And I don’t they are going to step up on that front despite the criticism from the BM.

    • Harla says:

      You’re exactly right and I said something similar a few days ago. Since WandK refused to participate in any foreign trips, after their Flop Tour, it’s the only tour people remember. I will say that I’m neither shocked or surprised that they are unable to manage their way out of a wet paper bag.

      How is your leg healing up? I had another surgery on my wrist on Friday and found myself thinking of you and hoping that your recovery is going well!

  4. Neeve says:

    The couple…in 2022 they completed 97 overseas royal duties. Is this a typo??? When and where?

    • Lauren says:

      I think there counting each event attended as a separate “duty”

    • ShazBot says:

      I have to assume that when they show up somewhere together they count that as 2 engagements. 1 for each of them.
      And since they posted video of their scuba diving trip, they probably counted that as 2 engagements too!

    • JulieK says:

      I think they counted every individual place they went to on tour, including their “rest day” snorkeling trip.

    • SussexWatcher says:

      Neeve – they literally count deplaning and shaking hands as one royal engagement. Arriving at the destination, shaking hands, and taking a photo is another. Lunch counts as another, etc. That’s how they rack up the numbers. The numbers are very padded and essentially meaningless.

    • Nic919 says:

      Each of them gets credit for the engagement activity so that number is likely the total for both of them together. That Caribbean tour would only have 3 maybe 4 engagements per day and they there over a week. It doesn’t get to 96 engagements each.

    • Becks1 says:

      Like others have said, its probably for both of them and William does those random short trips a few times a year. It probably is something like 30 for Kate and 60 for william? maybe? or it could be totally wrong, ha.

  5. Dee(2) says:

    All of this is very obvious. And I do wonder about the so-called validity of them being the most popular royals, if they’re going off of YouGov, and what that popularity means outside of that sample.

    I don’t think they want to stop the colonial cosplay, because it’s the only way that they can guarantee respect is afforded to them. One-on-one interactions that rely on their charm, charisma, and previous results would leave them with a minimal amount of things to discuss. So they won’t go anywhere where everything can’t be stage managed to the 15th degree.

    In any case it’s obvious that they pale in comparison and are lightweights. To Elizabeth and Phillip, Charles and Diana, and even at this point Edward and Sophie and Anne. But with them being the only working royals under 60, and with their kids being at least a decade away from being able to do engagements on a regular, they better figure it out. Because they are correct their “popularity”, won’t sustain them into the 2030s while they are in their 50s, still listening and learning.

    • Jerseygirl says:

      And clearly they’re not instilling any sense of duty or work ethic in the kids either. The royal lineage is shriveling and dying before our eyes.

    • Barb Mill says:

      I remember a few years before Kate’s illness the Duke of Kent had more engagements that her. She was 9th out of 10.

  6. Me at home says:

    “… or when his wife will again return to foreign travel”. Excuse me, she’s very happy to travel internationally for luxury ski vacations, beach vacays in Mustique, or an Aegean cruise on the megayacht Opera (which is owned by Epstein and Andrew bff Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan).

    I raised two kids while my husband and I both worked full-time, and it made our time with the kids on evenings and weekends even more special. I truly doubt WanK are helping their kids with algebra homework. More likely, they do the occasional bicycle ride or trampoline bounce, which they could easily fit into their light schedule of couple of work engagements a week–oh wait, they need to travel internationally for this to be a true “holiday” in the WanK sense of word.

    Hovering over your kids and insisting they be joined to you at the hip is pretty terrible, too, especially as these kids enter their teens. There’s going to come a time when George and soon Charlotte are going to push back. Although it’s an open question whether Kate and Carole will allow the kids to push back and live somewhat independent lives, or whether WanK just vacation separately in front of the TV or exercising (which tbh maybe they already do).

    • Teddy says:

      Cathy is still playing the cancer card re: workload and the tabloids are going along with it. How long does that last?

    • Royal Downfall Watcher says:

      BINGO! My husband and I work full time with no outside help at all while raising our kid. Must be nice to take 5 months (at least) of vacation per year when you have nannies, housekeepers, gardeners, chefs, butlers, drivers, and unlimited tax payer money to spend on clothes and vacations….

      They really are so down to earth….. (My eyes are rolled to heaven as I type this)

    • Blujfly says:

      I don’t even think the bring home homework. Part of the British private school experience involves working with both in house and private tutors. They even have Saturday mandatory school at Lambrook.

    • Becks1 says:

      yeah, I know we’ve said this before, but the whole idea that they can’t work when the kids are off school or that they can’t work MORE in general because of the “school run” or whatever else – its just insulting to the millions of working parents who don’t have a choice. I can’t take three months off in the summer. Most people can’t – even a lot of teachers work over the summer break!

      There’s a middle ground between Charles’ working hours when his sons were growing up and what W&K do.

  7. Lauren says:

    The Wails could have easily gotten great PR and increased their international “work” by attending the King of Swedens big 80th birthday gala last week. The Brits were the only European Royal Family that didn’t send members

    • BLACK ELDERBERRY says:

      Maybe they didn’t invite them because they didn’t want Kate’s bare butt in the photos 😀

      • irisrose says:

        Some royals have made it clear they don’t want her around. The BRF announced W&K would attend the Lux royal wedding. Luxembourg Court pushed back and said they had invited Edward and Sophie. Kate and her camera hogging weren’t welcome.

  8. Royal Downfall Watcher says:

    CUT. THEIR. FUNDING. THEY DO NOT NEED TAX PAYER MONEY TO STAY AT HOME.

  9. QuiteContrary says:

    This is all hilarious because, of course, this is the monster that Charles created by being too afraid of his incandescent son to kick his ass into gear, and by fearing the charisma and energy of Harry and Meghan.

    “They can’t rely on their popularity forever,” says the editor of Majesty magazine, a publication devoted to kissing royalty’s ass. That is GOLD.

  10. Eurydice says:

    If William wants to do things differently, he should abdicate and get a different job. No one is asking him to save the environment or end homelessness, but they are asking him to represent his realm and subjects, whether it be locally or globally. It’s fine if he has personal interests, but they don’t come first.

    • Lady Digby says:

      Agreed 💯@Eurydice it is his job, duty, destiny ( sound the trumpets!) to represent the nation at home and abroad. The largesse, duchy income, houses, security, deference and press fawning are in exchange for a life of public service. Abdicate if he now knows the public role is not right for him for whatever reason rather than take all the goodies and just limp along making yourself and others totally miserable. Instead he’ll continue to coast until he’s king and crashes once he’s run out of excuses as to why he can’t undertake various duties.

  11. Digital Unicorn says:

    The Caribbean tour showed that these 2 twits can’t be trusted to do a tour properly – Chuck and Cams showed how its done with their recent trip to the US and Bermuda. I remember the trip to Butan where they p!ssed off the press when they wanted to leave them behind while they had a ‘private’ moment at the top of the mountain that had taken everyone about 3 hrs to climb.

    The reality is no one wants them to visit and the foreign is unwilling to send them anywhere as they will embarrass us.

  12. Truthiness says:

    3ish years ago William wanted to conquer the US and become the more popular son of Charles here. So his team booked an Earthshot event in Boston where they got booed at a Celtics game, pissed people off by creating a traffic jam preventing them from getting to Market Basket for their groceries, and Kate wore a green dress that people used as a green screen to have photoshop battles.

    So Will’s desire to conquer the US in popularity became just a desire to conquer People magazine? Womp womp.

  13. Lala11_7 says:

    So…the 🇬🇧 Princess who sponsors charities that end up closing & the 🇬🇧Prince who is socially off putting needs to get out & do more events? I AM HERE FOR ALL OF IT!🫨

  14. Lady Digby says:

    What really is going on here with Will and his inability to work consistently at anything? He has a total of 5 months off work each year and then only shows up in public say twice a week. The events are mostly jollies: sports matches, celebrities and drinking, military cosplay and big cars so not substantial. This has been dragging on for his adult life using various excuses that are getting feebler and feebler. Does he really equate working regularly with child neglect of his family? How is he going to cope with the demands of kingship at home and abroad, just say No to most things? Okay while the King is alive there isn’t a crisis but Will should be stepping up more and he just isn’t. Quite the reverse since he became PoW he has faltered and is pushing out and briefing how being royal isn’t going to impinge on his family life too much!! What are the Palace and king doing behind the scenes to get Will back on track. King has a responsibility to his heir to see he’s suitably prepared and experienced to be king. Intervention needed pronto Tonto!

    • Interested Gawker says:

      I think that’s why there’s so many articles disparaging and distancing the York princesses, William doesn’t want the job but he doesn’t seem to want anyone else to have it either. ‘Queen Beatrice’ taking over would drive him crazy; I’m sure that’s why he doesn’t want the York girls to have Andrew’s house-a place they have the right to inherit- no quarter for the competition.

  15. Blujfly says:

    Even if she goes to Earthshot, who cares? It’s not a government sponsored trip and it’s not a diplomatic mission. It’s a vanity project. Also, won’t Charlotte be in the thick of the exams for private school? She just turned 11, the same age George was when that was the excuse.

  16. TheWigletOfWails says:

    Yeah sure, Earthshit is the reason why she’s going to India *insert JLaw meme here*

  17. BeanieBean says:

    Oh, y’all! This cracked me up!: ‘…struggled at times to shed criticism that he is workshy, despite explaining that the couple want to work in a different way.’

    You don’t get it! William explained it! He’s not lazy, he’s just doing things differently! Not working is different! He has more houses to acquire, he can’t leave the country for work! Unless of course, you have a yacht for him to use, or a ski chalet, or a beach house; but other than that! He already explained it!

    🤣🤣

  18. Jes says:

    I don’t think either of these two are viewed as an asset by the UK govt.. the risks of them messing up are so known and visible. This pressure then could only be coming from the media. And they are as happy with disasters or happier, than with diplomatic successes. Even the family has to see that their standing suffers when these two screw up. I have to guess everyone is happy with them being benched except the media.

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