"Every mobile phone would have tracked her every step. It would have been five, ten times worse," says former royal correspondent Nicholas Owen. Photo / Getty
"Every mobile phone would have tracked her every step. It would have been five, ten times worse," says former royal correspondent Nicholas Owen. Photo / Getty
Veteran television presenter Nicholas Owen has opened up about his time as a royal correspondent, revealing his fears that Diana "wouldn't have coped" with the intrusion of privacy in the internet age had she lived.
Father-of-four Owen, 69, spent six years covering the Royal Family for ITV, and was heavily involved in reporting Diana's death for the broadcaster in August 1997.
Speaking to Country Life magazine, Owen also revealed that the Queen was his favourite royal because of her "plain-speaking" while there was "a bit of falling out" with Prince Charles.
The presenter, who lives in Surrey in the UK, said he had been thinking about Diana ahead of the 20th anniversary of her death next year.
Owen told the magazine: "Imagine how she'd have coped in the world today. Imagine how many selfies she'd have been asked to be in.
Diana with her sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, at the piano in Kensington Palace. Photo / Getty Images
Owen, who was royal correspondent for ITV from 1994 until 2000, said that he admired the Queen and had many "happy memories" of meeting her and admits that while he did occasionally fall out with Charles, they generally "got on pretty well".
He praised the Queen's "straightforward" personality while recalled that meeting the Duke of Edinburgh could be a trickier affair.
Owen trailed the couple on royal tours including to South America, the Falklands and India. He describes Prince Philip as having a more "acid" side, saying: "He's famous for the occasional acid aside, and I've had one or two of those from him.
Nicholas Owen spent six years covering the royal family. Photo / Getty Images
He adds: "Sometimes he wasn't very keen to see me, and I was very wary of seeing him."
Owen, who's now an ambassador for The Prince's Trust, said he was very mindful of how interacting with the royals, particularly the Queen Mother meant he was privy to British history.
"I always thought it was extraordinary to have a few words with somebody who embodies so much of recent British history, right the way back to the abdication and the Second World War.
"You think, 'Oh my god, I'm actually talking to this person!' It seemed extraordinary at the time."
Owen started his career in newspapers but ended up as a television journalist after trying his luck at the BBC's version of the job centre.
He explained: "In those days the BBC had an Appointments Department in a kind of shop across the road from Broadcasting House in London.
"So one day in 1981, on a whim, I walked in and the lady behind the counter said, 'Can I help you?' as if it was a branch of Sainsbury's. I said I'd like to work for the BBC and she told me about a job as a regional journalist in Newcastle.
"I'd recently divorced, my father had died, so I decided to give it a shot. I drove up to Newcastle and met the two men running the newsroom, who asked me two questions: one about the political make-up of the Northeast, which I was able to answer, the other about football in the area, which I knew nothing about.
"'Well, you'd better not cover that, then!' they said, and gave me the job. It turned out to be the best place to learn the trade and I found the Geordies the nicest people... once I could understand what they were saying!"
