Meghan’s Geneva Pitch Was an Audition for a Political Role No Electorate Would Ever Give Her

She delivered her unobjectionable consensus material impeccably. But grandstanding for technocrats is probably as far as Meghan’s political career can go.

I have been in Geneva this weekend, watching Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, trying to step into international public life.

On Sunday evening, at the Place des Nations — that broad, fountain-flanked square in front of the United Nations building dominated by the famous Broken Chair monument — Meghan stood alongside Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Director-General of the World Health Organization, and opened the Geneva leg of the Lost Screen Memorial, a touring installation of fifty illuminated lightboxes, each showing the home-screen photograph of a child who lost their life to online harm.

Meghan looked impeccable in a black Giorgio Armani trouser suit, hair pulled back severely, manner pitched precisely between gravity and warmth. She hit her marks. She delivered her lines. As a piece of pure platform craft, the performance was professional. She did not fluff a syllable.

The substance of the speech, taken in isolation, was entirely unobjectionable. “Children today are being shaped by systems designed to capture attention at any cost: relentless algorithms, exploitative engagement, and endless exposure to harmful content that they are not seeking out.”

Few parents would dispute that.

“Children must be safe by design, not safe by chance.” Yes, again.

The descriptions of the deaths of Katie, Mason and Englyn — three of the fifty children memorialised in the exhibition — were genuinely affecting, as they were meant to be. The closing call to action — write to your representatives, demand transparency, support legislation — was the language of any number of campaign groups working on this issue.

Why, then, did the whole event feel so strange?

I couldn’t help thinking, that if this is the stuff she wants to do, wouldn’t she have been a thousand times more effective doing so from within the incredible platform being a member of the royal family would have given her? Wouldn’t that platform have been worth any number of fights over backstabbing, bridesmaids dresses and lip gloss, or a broken dog bowl?

I don’t think anyone involved thinks yesterday’s speech will make an iota of difference to the way tech companies regulate their products for kids.

What it may just do, is make a difference to how Meghan is perceived within the unelected advocacy, NGO and charity world.