THE Prince of Wales came close yesterday to blaming Scotland Yard for the collapse of the two royal butler trials as he rejected criticism that controversy over the sale of gifts had damaged the Royal Family.

St James’s Palace revealed, in an unusual public briefing, that the police had admitted only days before Paul Burrell’s trial started that they had not found any evidence that he had been selling stolen artefacts overseas. But two senior officers had told Prince Charles and Prince William in August 2001 that the police had intelligence that Mr Burrell had an American market for “items” owned by the late Diana, Princess of Wales, and Prince William. The next contact with the police came just before the trial began.

The pressure on the Palace was further eased yesterday when Tony Blair criticised the Crown Prosecution Service over the two courtroom fiascos.

Mr Blair, speaking at Prime Minister’s Questions, said: “The Crown Prosecution Service are learning the lessons of both cases and I hope they will learn them quickly.”

Sir Michael Peat, private secretary to the Prince of Wales, has invited Mr Burrell and Harold Brown — against whom charges were dropped on Monday — to take part in his inquiry into the sale of royal gifts. All 85 of Prince Charles’s staff will be questioned about gifts received and sold. Asked whether there could be prosecutions, Sir Michael said: “That is a possibility.”

Sir Michael denied reports that the Palace had obstructed the police investigation and singled out a Daily Telegraph report for criticism. The newspaper on its front page alleged that Scotland Yard believed that the Palace had failed to “come clean” over the scale of the royal gifts culture. He said the report was baseless. “We have fallen over backwards to be as helpful as we can.”

Sir Michael had telephone conversations yesterday with Sir John Stevens, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, and Sir David Calvert-Smith the Director of Public Prosecutions. “The Director of Public Prosecutions said that there is no question of the Crown Prosecution Service having been misled (by us),” Sir Michael said. “Sir John Stevens has said he doesn’t believe we did hinder the investigation.”

Scotland Yard is to hold its own inquiry into police handling of both cases, which rested on an assumption that members of the Royal Family would not have given items of value to servants. It was therefore assumed that goods found in the possession of Mr Burrell or sold by Mr Brown must have been stolen.

The police maintained that they had not been told that Prince Charles and the Princess gave many gifts to their staff. But that idea was ridiculed by Sir Michael, who said: “They knew he (Burrell) had been given vast treasures.”

Scotland Yard issued a terse statement: “We have no intention of prejudicing the review.” Glen Smyth, chairman of the Metropolitan Police branch of the Police Federation, said: “I stand by the officers in the case and they stand by their investigation. I don’t want to go into an undignified slanging match with Sir Michael.”

Laughing matter

• Peter Brookes, The Times political cartoonist, has received the highest design honour with his appointment to the Royal Designers for Industry faculty of the Royal Society of Art. The Times pocket cartoonists Neil Bennett and Tony Husband were also recognised at the Cartoon Art Trust awards last night.

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