“COLOURED immigrants or foreigners” were not allowed to work as anything other than domestic servants at Buckingham Palace until the late 1960s, the National Archives documents have revealed.
According to the documents, the Queen’s chief financial manager had informed civil servants in 1968 that “it was not, in fact, the practice to appoint coloured immigrants or foreigners” to clerical roles in the royal household, although they were permitted to work as domestic servants.
It is not clear when the ban was revoked.
The documents also shed light on how Buckingham Palace negotiated controversial clauses such as the Queen's consent to secretly influence the content of British laws.
They also reveal how when the Labour government sought to eradicate racism in the late 1960s by banning discrimination in employment or services such as housing, the Queen and her household were excluded from those laws, which made it "impossible for women and ethnic minorities working for Buckingham Palace to complain to the courts if they believe they have been discriminated against,” claims media report.
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Reacting to the allegations, Buckingham Palace said in a statement that its records showed people from ethnic minority backgrounds being employed in the 1990s but refused to answer questions about the ban and when it was revoked, adding that before that decade, it did not keep records on the racial backgrounds of employees, The Guardian reported.
Furthermore, Buckingham Palace did not dispute that the Queen had been exempted from the laws, though it added that it had a separate process for hearing complaints related to discrimination.
The revelations come at a time when the palace has been accused of systemic racism by Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, Duke and Duchess of Sussex, in their March interview with talk show host Oprah Winfrey, when the Duchess alleged that before their son Archie was born, a member of the royal family commented on how dark the baby's skin might be.
Bags of rubbish and bins overflow on the pavement in the Sparkbrook area on June 02, 2025 in Birmingham, England. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)