Piers Morgan threatens legal action over Charles Spencer's Diana memoir
Piers Morgan says he will pursue legal action against Charles Spencer and his publisher over a claim in Spencer’s new memoir about Princess Diana.
Spencer, the brother of the late princess, is the author of Swan Song: Diana, My Sister. Morgan set out his objection on his programme, Piers Morgan Uncensored, according to Deadline.
The book is published by Penguin Michael Joseph. It was due to go on sale in Australia on September 23, 2026, according to Nine. That publication is reported to contain more than one claim about Morgan.
At the centre of the dispute is Spencer’s claim that Morgan published intrusive gym photographs of Diana while Morgan was editor of The Daily Mirror. Morgan says the timeline does not fit.
He says the photographs were printed by The Sunday Mirror on November 7, 1993. He says he did not join The Daily Mirror until October 1995. At the time the pictures appeared, he says, he was writing a showbiz column for The Sun.
Morgan said on Piers Morgan Uncensored that Spencer and his publishers “will be hearing from my lawyers.” He has demanded that the passage be removed from Swan Song and that a donation be made to the King’s Trust, a charity founded by King Charles III.
The memoir also makes a separate allegation about the King. Spencer writes that in 1997 he spoke with the then-Prince Charles about whether Princes William and Harry should walk behind Diana’s coffin before her funeral.
Spencer alleges that Charles told him on the phone: ‘Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough.’ Spencer presents it as Charles’s view that Diana would soon be forgotten after her death.
Buckingham Palace said it does not comment on books as a matter of principle. It added that His Majesty is mindful that fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory.
What makes this stand out is the timing. The legal threat has arrived just as the book reaches shops, leaving two very public disputes running side by side: one over what Morgan did as a newspaper editor in the 1990s, and one over what was said in private in the days after Diana’s death.
