Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are set to begin their quasi-royal tour of Australia, which will feature a ‘girls’ weekend retreat costing as much as £1,700 a ticket.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s office said the four-day visit will ‘focus on mental health, community resilience, and support for veterans and their families, alongside private meetings and special projects’.
The couple’s children, six-year-old Prince Archie and four-year-old Princess Lilibet, will not be joining their parents on the privately funded visit from Tuesday to Friday – which will not include any walkabouts to meet the public.
Harry and Meghan will also take part in private commercial engagements separate from a programme of public-facing visits.
The Duchess will be interviewed on stage at a ‘girls’ weekend’ retreat in Sydney, costing £1,400 per ticket.
VIP tickets for the event at the five-star InterContinental Coogee Beach hotel cost £1,670 and include a group table photo with Meghan.
Her appearance was announced last month by Gemma O’Neill, host of the Her Best Life podcast, which is organising the 300-person event.
Harry will be a guest speaker on Thursday at the InterEdge Summit, which explores the ‘intersection of leadership, psychosocial safety and human connection in the workplace’.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle during their visit to Sydney, Australia, in 2018
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex visiting Bondi beach in Sydney, Australia, in October 2018
Delegate tickets for the summit, hosted at Melbourne’s Centrepiece conference venue, are available for £525, with platinum tickets costing £1,250 and a virtual ticket allowing on-demand access to Harry’s speech costing £260.
The Office of Harry and Meghan said: ‘Across all engagements, the visit will highlight the Duke and duchess’s continued commitment to supporting mental health, strengthening support for the armed forces community, and championing the power of connection and shared experience to drive positive change.’
A petition on Change.org demanding ‘no taxpayer funding or official support for Harry and Meghan’s private visit to Australia’, and arguing that ‘public funds should not be used for private visits’, has attracted more than 45,000 signatures.
The New South Wales Police Force said it would ‘conduct an operation to ensure public safety is maintained during the visit by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’.
A spokesperson for the force, which is responsible for policing Sydney, told the Press Association: ‘The operation will require some additional security measures throughout their stay in New South Wales, while minimising any disruption to the community.’
Victoria Police said it ‘does not provide comment on specific operational arrangements’.
A spokesperson for the force, which is responsible for policing Melbourne, added: ‘Police are aware two high-profile people are visiting Melbourne in a private capacity in April.
‘Police routinely assess events and visits and will deploy resources as necessary to ensure community safety.’
Beginning in Melbourne, the Duke and Duchess will engage with organisations delivering services to young people and vulnerable women, alongside a visit to one of Australia’s leading children’s hospitals.
Meghan Markle at an event in Washington DC in October last year. The Duchess of Sussex will headline a women-only three-day retreat in Sydney next week organised by the Her Best Life podcast
Meghan’s appearance was announced last month by Gemma O’Neill, host of the Her Best Life podcast, which is organising the 300-person event
Meghan will also undertake an engagement highlighting community-led support for women at a homeless services centre.
Harry and Meghan’s office said the couple will ‘place particular emphasis on the veteran community’, joining families and artists connected to the Australian National Veterans Art Museum and supporting Invictus Australia.
It added that this will continue in Canberra, where Harry will attend engagements at the Australian War Memorial, including the Last Post Ceremony.
Harry and Meghan also have engagements with Movember and Australian mental health organisation Batyr.
In Sydney, the couple will join members of the Invictus community on the water in Sydney Harbour and meet past competitors.
The visit will conclude at a rugby fixture in Sydney between New South Wales Waratahs and Moana Pasifika at the Allianz Stadium on Friday.
The Sussexes carried out an official royal tour to Australia in 2018, five months after their royal wedding, and Meghan’s pregnancy with Prince Archie was announced shortly after their arrival.
Harry said in his autobiography that Meghan ‘dazzled’ crowds on the ‘hugely demanding tour’, but warned her she was ‘doing too well’ and ‘making it look too easy’ like Diana, Princess of Wales.
In Spare, published in 2023, he wrote: ‘Everyone knew that Mummy’s situation went from bad to worse when she showed the world, showed the family, that she was better at touring, better at connecting with people, better at being ‘royal’, than she had any right to be.’
Harry’s parents, Charles and Diana, visited Australia with their recently born son William on their first major royal overseas tour in 1983.
The 21-year-old princess proved a big draw with the Australian public, and the royal tour was hailed a success in promoting the monarchy.
After returning home to ‘jubilant welcomes and exultant headlines’ following their own Australia tour, Harry said in his memoir that he and his wife began to receive negative press, including a ‘work of fiction about Meg making her staff miserable’.
The Sussexes carried out an official royal tour of Australia in 2018, five months after their royal wedding. Pictured: The couple in Sydney during the tour
Harry also undertook a portion of his gap year living and working as a ‘jackaroo’ on a cattle ranch in rural Queensland, saying in his autobiography that ‘Tooloombilla was nothing like Eton’ and he enjoyed the ‘hard, sweaty, non-stop labour’ in ‘relentless heat’.
Writing in Spare, Harry said of his nine-week stint in Australia in 2003: ‘This wasn’t merely work. Being a jackaroo required stamina, but it also demanded a certain artistry.
‘You had to be a whisperer with the animals. You had to be a reader of the skies, and the land. You also had to possess a superior level of horsemanship.’
The Duke added that he took to wearing a felt cowboy hat and adopted the nickname ‘Spike’ while in the country after comparisons were made between his haircut and the spines of an echidna from Sydney’s Taronga Zoo.
The King is the monarch of Australia, one of the Commonwealth realms, and serves as the country’s head of state.
Charles visited Australia as King in 2024, accompanied by Queen Camilla, on a tour that saw the couple take part in a community barbecue and a walkabout at the Sydney Opera House.
A referendum on Australia becoming a republic in 1999 was defeated by 54.4 per cent of voters, despite earlier polls suggesting that a majority supported the change.
Australia’s current prime minister, Labor Party leader Anthony Albanese, is a lifelong republican but last year ruled out calling a referendum on the issue during his time in office.
The development of the Australian monarchy began in 1770, when Captain James Cook, on behalf of King George III, claimed the east coast of Australia.
Colonies under British rule were eventually established across the continent, and six of them united to form the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901.
Queen Elizabeth II became the first reigning monarch to visit Australia in 1954, where she was greeted by huge crowds across the nation with millions seeing her in person during the tour.