Squidgygate: Encyclopedia II - Squidgygate - Squidgygate II?

Squidgygate - Squidgygate II?

There is a curious coda to the "Squidgygate" affair. On 31 August 1997, most of the British press was caught in the spotlight.

A number of early editions of Sunday's papers were already in circulation, and these carried stories that can only be described as both surprising and worrying. The majority of these were simply tasteless jokes about the Princess's persistent "dumb blonde" image, which must have caused their editors some nasty moments. A piece of "psychological profiling" about the Princess's ever-present role in public life, for the Sunday Times, featured a large picture of Diana, and began with the unfortunate words "There is something missing from all our lives today."

The tabloid Sunday Mirror carried the story of how Palace Courtiers were ready to press the Queen to let the Royal warrants for Harrods lapse: "It would be a huge blow to the ego of store owner Mohamed al-Fayed - and would infuriate Diana [...] but the Royal Family are furious about the frolics of Di, 36, and Dodi, 41, which they believe have further undermined the Monarchy."

"Prince Philip, in particular has made no secret as to how he feels about his [former] daughter-in-law's latest man, referring to Dodi as an 'oily bed-hopper'."

After noting that MI6 had prepared a report on the al-Fayeds, which would be presented at an early September meeting of the Royal policy think-tank, The Way Ahead Group, the paper quoted a friend of the Royals as saying: "Prince Philip has let rip several times recently about the Fayeds: at a dinner party, during a country shoot, and while on a visit to close friends in Germany. He's been banging on about his contempt for Dodi and how he is undesirable as a future stepfather to William and Harry. Diana has been told in no uncertain terms about the consequences should she continue the relationship with the Fayed boy. Options must include exile, although that would be very difficult, as - when all is said and done - she is the mother of the future King of England ^[34]."

Mirror columnist Chris Hutchins couldn't have been aware that events later that night would mean his words would be read in a very different light. He had written in the paper's "Confidential" feature:

"Just when Diana began to believe that her current romance with likeable playboy Dodi Fayed had wiped out her past liaisons, a new tape recording is doing the rounds of Belgravia dinner parties. And this one is hot, hot, hot! Labelled Squidgygate II, the tape is of a completely different conversation the Princess had with her sometime beau James Gilbey.

'It's absolutely outrageous,' says a woman friend who heard the tape last week, but was too polite to ask her hostess if she could make a copy for "Confidential". 'It's full of sexual innuendo, and far more explicit than the one we all heard before'."

Hutchins concludes: "I must remember to take it up with Diana next time we find ourselves on adjacent running machines at our West London gym."

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the second "Squidgygate" tape disappeared from the media without trace, before it had even had a chance to appear, and no further information on its contents, origins - or its sudden surfacing in private hands after a gap of some seven years - seems likely to emerge.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Squidgygate II?", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki