Paul Burrell

If the environment was just an eerie coincidence, what do we make of this documented paper trail?

We really have to examine that letter she wrote in 1996 to her butler, Paul Burrell.

Because this was not just some vague diary entry expressing general anxiety about public life, was it?

No, not at all.

You know, when Diana was alive, I used to talk to her regularly, you know.

I had lunch with her and William at the palace once, just the three of us, with a certain butler called Paul Burrell, you may remember him, actually serving the food.

And it was an amazing lunch.

And then Di used to call me.

A scenario so unlikely that it can be realistically discounted.

In 1993, Diana sent a handwritten note to her butler, Paul Burrell, which read, "...this particular phase in my life is the most dangerous.

My husband is planning an accident in my car, brake failure and serious head injury." Later in 1995, Diana's lawyer, Lord Mishkon, made a note of a conversation with her in which she predicted she would be got rid of in an accident in her car such as a pre-prepared brake failure or by other means.

Mishkon was so concerned by this note that after her death he forwarded it to the Metropolitan Police.

There were actually different documents and recollections that became blended together in public discussion.

Diana's former butler, Paul Burrell, later published a letter in which she wrote about fearing an accident involving her car.

Separately, lawyer Lord Mishcon made a contemporaneous note after a 1995 meeting in which Diana described information she had received about the possibility of an accident being arranged around her.

Read after the Pont de Lama crash, these words are undeniably chilling.

And also you talk about the me- he's also, you know, in the past he's been critical of the Diana Memorial Fund for their commercialization of, of accusing them of commercialization.

Also criticizing her former butler, Paul Burrell, in his book, um, b- where he says that things, certain things that he said, you know, were wrong and didn't, and didn't happen.

So from that point of view, I'm, I'm in two minds.

Look, I want to see it, because I'm a journalist, and I want to s- see what he says, and I'm sure it'll be, you know, great.

Yes.

So I'll be interested to know, there was also [laughs] there's always the story from Paul Burrell, Diana's valet, that, um, uh, that, uh, Charles Spencer didn't want Diana in hi- her lifetime, but was quite happy to charge 20 pounds a time for people to come and visit her grave.

Mm.

Uh, which he, which he thought was pretty [laughs] ironic, to say the least.

Well, I think that, that, that, that's all that and more because after all, the one person who did try and help her was Prince Philip.

Mm.

And his letters, of course, were in that mahogany box which got into Paul Burrell's possession, and the letters disappeared.

Uh, but it's terribly important to understand that I'm not aware of any letters or whatever from Charles Spencer-

She did tell me that she still got nervous going out and meeting people if there's been something unkind written about her in the newspapers that day.

Former royal butler Paul Burrell has even said he occasionally tried to protect Diana by removing particularly upsetting newspapers before she could read them.

"I took a strong line when something was personal and upsetting and thought it was best for her not to see it," Burrell said.

"But Diana usually noticed.