Prince Andrew booed by parts of Coronation crowd

The Duke of York was booed as he was driven down The Mall in a state car ahead of the Coronation service.

Parts of the crowd in a grandstand in front of Buckingham Palace booed as Prince Andrew went past.

As a non-working member of the Royal family, the Duke will play no formal role in the ceremony.

He will not take part in the procession back to Buckingham Palace or appear on the balcony.

On Friday night, Prince Andrew joined his children, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, at Mayfair club Oswald’s for dinner.

They were joined by Prince Edward and Sophie, Countess of Wessex, as well as the Princess Royal and her husband Vice Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence.

Princess Anne’s daughter Zara Tindall and husband Mike were also there.

The Duke of York is no longer a working royal, having been effectively sacked by his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth, following his disastrous Newsnight interview in November 2019 in which he failed to express any regret over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender, or empathy for his victims.

It emerged last month that Queen Elizabeth realised how disastrous the Duke of York’s Newsnight interview had been as soon as she read the transcript.

As the working royals rehearsed procedures for the Coronation this week, the Duke of York was pictured in his Range Rover on a solitary drive around the grounds of Windsor Castle.

Duchess of York not attending ceremony

His former wife Sarah, the Duchess of York, is not attending the ceremony.

She said that she understood why she was not invited, saying “you can’t have it both ways”.

The Duchess, 63, noted that it was a state occasion and that she was no longer married into the Royal family, having separated from the Duke of York in 1992.

“Being divorced … I don't think you can have it both ways,” she told ITV’s Good Morning Britain in April.

“I am divorced and I’m really loving being divorced to my ex-husband - not from him but to him, it’s important to differentiate.

“Just because I’m not there on the state occasion, but in private I can be there, and that's a lovely feeling to be part of, it really is.

“As I said, you can’t have it both ways. You mustn’t sit on the fence - you’re either in or out, don’t muck around.”