Josiah Mortimer

josiahmortimer.bsky.social

17 July 2026 10:01

When material is released on the royals it is often heavily censored. Lownie says of the Lord Mountbatten case: “They tried to redact every single mention of the Royal Family in those 3,000 pages. Really innocent stuff: ‘Prince Philip came for tea,’ ‘Princess Elizabeth had her birthday party today’"

Josiah Mortimer

josiahmortimer.bsky.social

17 July 2026 10:01

An FoI fight with Southampton University and the Cabinet Office over Lord Mountbatten’s diaries in 2021 left the historian out of pocket by £500,000 in legal costs. Lownie eventually won his battle, but believes many times his own costs in public money were spent fighting the requests

Josiah Mortimer

josiahmortimer.bsky.social

17 July 2026 10:01

The FCDO and DBT have used a scattergun of exemptions, seen by Byline Times, to block requests on who accompanied Andrew on trade trips – including claiming it would harm law enforcement, national security, health and safety, and even describing Lownie’s efforts as “vexatious”

Josiah Mortimer

josiahmortimer.bsky.social

17 July 2026 10:01

Berry wants to open up the royals to Freedom of Information requests – something almost every public body is subject to and which allows researchers, journalists and the public to ask for documents in the public interest bylinetimes.com/2026/07/17/m...

Josiah Mortimer

josiahmortimer.bsky.social

17 July 2026 10:01

Siân Berry’s bill to amend the Freedom of Information (FoI) Act, introduced this Tuesday, would end the outright exemption for the King, the heir to the throne and the “wider royal family” from the 2000-era transparency law bylinetimes.com/2026/07/17/m...