Prince William received a less-than-favourable review of his latest documentary about homelessness after one royal commentator labelled it an “abject failure”.
The Prince of Wales appeared in ITV’s two-part documentary titled Prince William: We Can End Homelessness to talk about his Homewards initiative and how he plans on eradicating homelessness in the UK.
The campaign is a major long-term focus for William, who has told how visiting shelters with his late mother Princess Diana when he was a child left a deep and lasting impression and inspired his work.
Homewards aims to develop a blueprint for eradicating homelessness in all its forms, “making it rare, brief and unrepeated”.
During the past year, the Homewards teams in six UK locations – Newport, Lambeth, Belfast, Aberdeen, Sheffield and three neighbouring Dorset towns, Poole, Bournemouth and Christchurch – have been building collaborations between the public, private and third sectors.
But royal commentator Marianne Levy was critical of the royal’s documentary and said more information is needed about the political causes behind the issue.
She wrote in i news: “For if homelessness in the UK is to end, we need to know why it is at an all-time high.
“We need to know about cutbacks to social services, how the NHS is struggling to provide frontline care, the burden on GPs (general practitioners).
“We need to know about investment in and the building of social housing. Of these issues, and the many more that have contributed to the crisis William has announced his intention to solve, there was nothing. It made for dismal television.
“The contributors talked of hope, but what this documentary was missing was anger.
“William is clearly committed to his cause, but he simply cannot galvanise his audience at the ballot box, in the workplace, and in the wider social arena to fix this inhumane problem once and for all.
“As an hour of factual television that was supposed to prove it is possible to end homelessness, this documentary was an abject failure.”
However, the majority of royal fans were impressed with Prince William’s appearance.
One user wrote on X: “Prince William can bring people together to help others, and people are drawn to his positivity.”
A second one wrote: “Incredibly inspiring work by Prince William. This puts all of those other ‘homeless organisations’ to shame. All these years of siphoning millions upon millions into their own pockets without even helping the homeless Prince William is showing it can be done.”
