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The Crown

Moderniser who steered monarchy

Elizabeth II inherited a monarchy whose political power had been steadily ebbing away since the 18th century but whose role in the public life of the nation seemed, if anything, to have grown ever more important.

Crown pebbles

That this brouhaha over a reel-life controversy comes simultaneously with a row over the real-life, famously ‘last-straw interview’ given by Princess Diana to the BBC’s Martin Bashir which the journalist has been accused of using fake bank statements and other misrepresentations to procure, is further grist to the mill.