Royal scandal

The Document series on Radio Four is often an absorbing pursuit of information triggered by the discovery of one document which leads to another. The sleuthing involved can be revealing about an historic event and occasionally is of some importance. But not always, it seems to me. This week’s programme, A Right Royal Affair (Monday) — the second in the current series of four — began without a document, namely the will of the Queen Mother, who died three years ago. The Queen succeeded in having her mother’s will sealed, its contents remaining a secret.

This puzzled the presenter of Document, Mike Thomson, who told us that he’d always understood that wills were public documents available to anyone who wished to see them. As he delved into it, he discovered that royal wills have been private since 1911 when the future Queen Mary applied to the High Court to have the will of her brother Prince Francis of Teck sealed.