Piers Morgan and ex-MP Norman Baker among figures calling for Meghan Markle and Harry to lose royal titles

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Critics are calling on the Queen to strip the couple of their HRH title
Damir Sagolj/Reuters

Several figures have called for Meghan and Harry to lose their royal titles after the couple announced they were quitting as senior royals.

Piers Morgan urged the Queen to “unceremoniously strip” the pair of their HRH address and “dispatch them back into civilian life”,

In a strongly worded article for the Daily Mail, the Good Morning Britain host said “the very future of the Monarchy may be in serious jeopardy if these two renegades have their way.”

His damning assessment came as former Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker issued his own warnings against the royals “having their cake and eating it”.

It also came bookmakers slashed the odds on the pair relinquishing their titles from 5/1 to 5/6.

Ex-Home Office minister Mr Baker told the Express: “You can't be one foot in, one foot out. You are either a member of the royal family or you are not.”

And while he believes Harry is “entitled to absent himself and become a private citizen”, he said the duke can’t just drop royal duties and expect the state to continue paying for him.

Mr Baker, who remains a member of the Privy Council, also demanded that the couple pay back the public money spent on refurbishing their Windsor home, Frogmore Cottage.

Harry and Meghan said in their bombshell statement that they would work to become "financially independent".

“He (Harry) should give the money back spent on Frogmore Cottage and pay himself for the jets between the UK and America. And pay for his security,” he said.

Norman Baker said the couple should repay the £2.4m spent on Frogmore Cottage

Morgan, meanwhile, was less measured in his condemnation of the duke and his wife.

He said their “astonishingly brazen and selfish antics” left the Queen no choice but to “cut them loose and fire them both from the Royal Family.”

“They want to be super-woke celebrities (...) who get to keep all the trappings of royal life without any of the hard, boring bits and the right to cash in on their status however they choose,” he wrote in his comment piece.

“So, they want the glitz, the glamour, the splendour and the stupendous wealth….they just don't want to have to actually earn it.”

Morgan wrote 'Deluded Meghan and Harry should be stripped of their titles before this pair of grasping, selfish, scheming Kardashian-wannabes bring down the Monarchy'
Rex Features

Harry has been an HRH since birth and was given the title the Duke of Sussex on the morning of his wedding in 2018.

Former actress Meghan Markle became an HRH and the Duchess of Sussex after saying her vows.

He and Meghan were handed the Scottish titles the “Earl and Countess of Dumbarton” at the same time.

Their statement on Wednesday made no mention of them losing their HRH titles, nor of Harry being removed from the line of succession.​

Graham Smith, chief executive of anti-monarchy campaign group Republic, said: “My own view is that they should not be hanging on to all their titles if they don't want to do the job.

“They can't have it both ways - keeping the perks but not wanting to stay and do the work. There's a long history of royals taking titles and doing nothing else with them.

“If I lived in Dumbarton I would be pretty miffed they had taken the title but not supported the community they claim to represent.”

Republic later posted on Twitter: “Harrymeghan would have had more sympathy, and our full support, if they had renounced their titles, immediately given up any claim to public funding and said they wanted to live private lives in North America.”

Ladbrokes said it was now 5/6, from 5/1, that the pair will give up their royal titles.

Alex Apati of Ladbrokes said: "It's now an odds-on shot that Harry and Meghan relinquish their HRH titles after Wednesday's breaking news."

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