Inquiry will not talk to Queen or be independent

Palace announces internal investigation into events and allegations surrounding the collapse of the trial of former butler

The suggestion that a royal conspiracy lay behind the series of events that ended the trial of Paul Burrell was dismissed last night by Sir Michael Peat, the private secretary to the Prince of Wales.

Sir Michael, speaking in a series of interviews to announce the internal inquiry into issues stemming from the collapse of the trial, said the idea that the event was contrived to avoid royal embarrassment at anything the former butler might disclose in the witness box was "absurd" and "implausible".

Sir Michael, who will conduct the inquiry with the leading QC Edmund Lawson, appeared to pre-empt his own conclusions, which will be published before Christmas. He said: "I can give you my 100 per cent assurance that there was no interference at all.

"The Queen remembered some information and it was passed on to the police in the normal course. No one ­ the Queen, the Prince of Wales, members of the household ­ knew whether this information would stop the trial or not."

He added: "The conspiracy thing is a little absurd, because even if there was an intention to stop the trial, why leave it till then? Why not do it earlier? The conspiracy theories are, the politest you could say, implausible."

Sir Michael said: "Concerns have been raised in the newspapers. Underlying it may be some matters that may well be of concern to people, and therefore we are going to look into these matters.

"I, and more importantly the Prince of Wales, are totally committed to openness and accountability. Points have been raised and the Prince of Wales has asked me to address them."

Significantly, Sir Michael did not rule out the idea of an external inquiry, which some reports have suggested was being considered by St James's Palace and Buckingham Palace. He said: "We are looking at issues that took place here at the Palace and do not involve the misuse of public money. It is up to me to make sure that this office is whiter than white.

"It would be difficult to have an independent external review of this office in isolation because some of the questions, such as the termination of the Paul Burrell trial, involve others as well as ourselves, such as the police and the Crown Prosecution Service. If it is decided in due course that there should be an external review, then we would be delighted to help in any way we can."

A Buckingham Palace spokeswoman, asked why the Queen would not take part in the inquiry, said: "All the information regarding the Queen's involvement has been widely published by the media. There will be no meeting between the Queen and Sir Michael because he already knows what the Queen said and did."

The spokeswoman said the Queen would not be receiving an advance copy of Sir Michael's report. "She will see the outcome of the review when it is published," she said. "If there is anything that affects the Royal Household in general, then that will be considered very seriously."

Although the inquiry will also examine whether there was any cover-up of the alleged rape of a royal valet, George Smith, by an aide to Prince Charles, who is said to be footing the man's legal bills, there is no suggestion that it will look at claims by Mr Smith that he witnessed "an incident" involving the same man and a member of the royal family.

Sir Michael insisted that Mr Smith had refused to repeat the rape allegations when asked during the palace inquiry and did not want to take the matter further. He said: "It is not for the office to get in touch with police if a crime is committed, it is for the alleged victim." Police only heard about the matter during the Burrell investigation.

Sir Michael pledged to re-examine the whole case during his review. "I'm going to look into it. I'm new in this office, there have been concerns expressed about the possibility of a cover-up, I have started to look into it, and what I have seen of the files so far gives me assurance that everything was done properly," he said.