Earl Spencer ‘rarely spoke to Diana in her final five years unless he wanted Wimbledon tickets’

EARL Spencer rarely spoke to his sister, Princess Di, in later years unless he wanted Wimbledon Royal Box tickets, it is claimed. The Earl, who is expected to make a mint from his Diana memoir, had not been supportive when she needed him, says her former butler Paul Burrell. Burrell said the nobleman — who once claimed he would never profit from her death as it would be “so low it’s inconceivable” — “wasn’t there” for her. Appearing on Piers Morgan Uncensored, Burrell, 68, added: “They barely spoke. He was not part of her world.” Referring to the Earl’s Diana memoir, Swan Song, he said: “I’d think those last five years . . . are pretty vague in the book because he knows nothing about them. “She said, ‘My family only want me when they want the best seats in the best restaurants or want to sit in the Royal Box at Wimbledon’.” READ MORE ON THE ROYALS Diana and her younger brother fell out when he refused to let her live in the Garden House at Althorp, the family’s 13,000-acre estate, after her separation from the then-Prince Charles became public in 1992. Earl Spencer, who inherited that year at 27, said the Garden House was a security risk as it was near a road. He said: “The police knew it wouldn’t work.” He said he offered every suitable property on the Northants spread. Most read in Royals Among his attacks on the now King, Spencer said Charles told him after his father’s funeral that he was “so lucky” to inherit so young. He accused Charles of being “giddily elated” after Diana’s death in 1997, saying: “We will forget her soon enough.” Buckingham Palace said the “pain of fraternal grief” may have affected the Earl’s memory. Broadcaster Piers is suing the Earl after he wrongly claimed in his book that he was editor of the Daily Mirror when it published intrusive images of Diana. He said: “I’ve only checked the references to me. “So who knows how many other people he’s done this to, right?” The Earl has apologised. Burrell, meanwhile, said he thought the Earl was wrong to have buried Diana on an island at his estate. The public can visit the estate for a fee but only the family can visit the grave. He said Di should be buried where the public could pay their respects. He added: “It’s shocking the way that she’s been claimed back by the Spencers in death. “They were not there for her in life.”