So, Andrew has been exiled to the far reaches of the solar system, or as near as King Charles could manage – the depths of the Sandringham estate in Norfolk.
The King’s decisive action in removing his younger brother’s remaining titles – and booting him out of Royal Lodge, his stately home for the past two decades – was both dramatic and unprecedented.
But the move was also a desperate attempt to insulate the monarchy from the nasty contagion Andrew has been spreading.
In 1666, Londoners raced to tear down buildings to stop the Great Fire from spreading. Famously, they were successful – but Charles’s efforts at a firebreak are unlikely to produce such a clean result.
The flames lapping at the doors of Buckingham Palace show no sign of dying down.
For one thing, there is almost certainly more to be revealed about Andrew’s decades of misbehaviour.
The United States Congress is ploughing through a mountain of email traffic relating to his friend, the late billionaire sex-abuser Jeffrey Epstein. Unlike the authorities over here, the Americans will have no qualms about publishing what they find.
For another, MPs have been making enquiries of the Crown Estate – a publicly owned body – about Royal Lodge, the 30-room mansion in Windsor Great Park from which Andrew and ex Fergie have finally been crowbarred out.
The MPs – along with just about everybody else – have found the ‘peppercorn’ (effectively rent-free) terms of Andrew’s lease offensive.
And they will find it even more offensive if, as seems likely, Andrew gets a payment of £500,000 for leaving early, supposedly as compensation for the repair work he has undertaken.
Andrew might even be called before Parliament to give evidence. It wouldn’t take long for MPs to realise that similar ‘peppercorn’ arrangements might apply elsewhere, perhaps even to Bagshot Park, the 120-room mansion occupied by Prince Edward and his family.
As the King will know only too well, there is mounting pressure to examine the finances of the Royal Family as a whole, not least because next year brings a review of the bloated Sovereign Grant – the taxpayer money used to fund the running costs of the monarchy.
The huge increase in the size of this grant – from £7.9million in 2011 to £132.1million this year – has been indefensible. And that’s without discussing the unique tax exemptions the royals enjoy.
Altogether the monarchy now costs us around half a billion pounds a year.
Foolish, self-obsessed, entitled Andrew has uncorked the bottle – and the genie is out.
Much attention has quite rightly focused on Andrew’s links with Epstein and the financier’s bizarre world of sexual perversion, although Andrew himself denies any wrongdoing.
But I believe we have only scratched the surface when it comes to Andrew’s still more troubled relationship – with money.
Andrew spent his time as a trade envoy batting not just for Britain but himself.
He cosied up to convicted fraudsters, to dictators and even those the UK authorities believe to be spies. The common factor? These people had access to exceedingly large piles of lucre.
Fergie, the other half of the grasping duo, is known to have accepted funds from her ‘supreme friend’ Epstein and in 2010 was even caught attempting to sell access to Andrew for £500,000.
But this royal ‘firebreak’, however dramatic, won’t work. Charles has bought some time, but no more than that.
If he is wise, he will use it to cut the cost of the monarchy and end their outrageous tax exemptions – before public opinion forces it upon him.
To avoid further damage to the monarchy, the King must get ahead of the game instead of trailing behind it with concession after concession wrenched out of him.
As for Andrew, he faces a lonely, friendless life.
Expect the ex-prince to spend some time in the Abu Dhabi palace reportedly made available to him by that country’s ruler – a sort of disgrace and favour residence where his sleazy history will trouble no-one at all.
Norman Baker’s new book, Royal Mint, National Debt, is published by BiteBack later this month
