Prince William tells children about homelessness on the school run – like Princess Diana did for him
Prince William said he tells his children about homelessness on the school run – like Princess Diana did when he was young.
Speaking in a new ITV documentary, The Prince of Wales said that Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis have asked him why people are sleeping rough while being taken to school.
He said: “The first few times I thought ‘do I bring this up or should I wait to see if they notice?’
“Sure enough, they did. They were sort of in silence when I said what was going on.”
The prince also told ITV that Diana would talk to them about homelessness when he and Prince Harry were children.
“When you are that small you are just curious and trying to work out what’s going on,” he said.
“You ask the question ‘why are they sitting there?’ My mother would talk to us a bit about why they were there and it definitely made a really big impact.”
Prince William visited homelessness charities and shelters with Princess Diana as a child. Pic: The Passage
Filmed over the last year, the documentary follows William and his Homewards initiative, which aims to eradicate homelessness and make it “rare, brief and unrepeated”.
The royal launched the five-year scheme in June 2023, with six locations – Newport, Lambeth, Aberdeen, Belfast, Sheffield, and Dorset’s Poole, Bournemouth and Christchurch – chosen for the initiative.
William also said in the documentary: “There has to be a better way than just accepting that homelessness is there and we just live with it. I don’t believe that. I won’t accept that.”
In another clip from the documentary, the prince also defended his work trying to tackle homelessness despite criticism for being a member of the Royal Family.
Anti-monarchy campaigners Republic previously suggested his involvement in the issue was at odds with his privileged position and the number of properties that he has access to as a royal.
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William said he comes “with no other agenda than desperately trying to help people who are in need”, and added he sees the initiative as “part of my role”.
Prince William: We Can End Homelessness airs on 30 and 31 October at 9pm on ITV1 and ITVX, STV and STV Player.
The crash involving a cargo ship and oil tanker off the East Yorkshire coast is bad news for the sea, fish and air in the area. What we don’t know yet is quite how bad it will be.
That depends on a few things – but the speed of the collision, clouds of filthy black smoke from the fires and the leaked fuel are certainly worrying.
Firstly, it matters what was on board those two massive vessels.
Follow live: Jet fuel spilling into sea after tanker collision
Analytics firm Vortexa estimates the 183m-long tanker was carrying about 130,000 barrels of jet fuel (kerosene), which is now leaking into the sea.
Jet fuel is not as sticky or viscous as heavier types of oil, thankfully, so it’s less likely to clog the feathers and fur of birds and seals. It can also be broken down by natural bacteria.
But it can still poison fish and kill animals and plants on the shoreline if it makes its way into the soil there.
The Marine Conservation Society has pointed out the site in the Humber estuary is close to some protected areas and is important for seabirds and harbour porpoises.
And both ships will have been powered by a dirtier, heavier kind of oil – likely marine gas oil or heavy fuel oil, though we don’t know the details yet.
Heavy fuel oil is nasty stuff.
Pic: Bartek Smialek/PA
Cheap, thick and tar-like, it can smother animals and is very dangerous if they consume it, and is extremely difficult to clean up. Let’s hope this isn’t creeping around the North Sea already.
We don’t know how much of either the jet fuel or the oil powering the ships has leaked, or how much will be burned off in the violent fires – which themselves are ploughing black smoke and filthy air pollution into the surrounding atmosphere.
And we don’t know for sure what was on the Solong cargo ship and if, or what, will go into the sea.
Cargo ship ‘had sodium cyanide on board’
It was carrying 15 containers of sodium cyanide among other cargo, according to a report from maritime data provider Lloyd’s List Intelligence.
The container vessel was also transporting an unknown quantity of alcohol, said the casualty report – an assessment of incidents at sea – citing a message from the local coastguard.
Plastic takes hundreds of years to break down, and potentially can choke or trap animals.
Many of us have seen that uncomfortable viral video of a turtle having a straw yanked out of its nose. Previous accidents on cargo ships have seen plastic Lego pieces wash up in Cornwall 25 years later.
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Secondly, the impact depends on the sea and weather conditions around it.
Things like the wind and currents affect how an oil spill spreads in the sea. Scientists can draw up computer models to simulate how the oil could behave.
Thirdly, it matters how quickly this is all tackled and then cleaned up, if necessary, and if it can be.
Usually the slower the response, the worse the impact.
The coastguard has said the incident “remains ongoing” and it has started assessing the “likely counter pollution response” that will be required.
Such a response might need the help of numerous public bodies: the government environment department, the transport department, the Environment Agency and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency.
So for now the best we can hope for – aside from the welfare of the people involved – is that not all the oil is spilled or burnt, that conditions are calm and that rescuers and those cleaning up can work swiftly.
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