The royal family were left in stunned silence after Princess Diana started a debate over their relevance during Christmas dinner , an author has claimed.
She is believed to have raised the question as to whether the royals would remain pertinent in a federal Europe, leaving the likes of the Queen and husband Princes Charles shocked.
Writing in his book 'Diana: Her True Story', Andrew Morton claimed the royals brushed over her comments during the festival meal at Sandringham, the Express reports.
The author wrote: "The Queen, Prince Charles and the rest of the royal family looked at her as if she were mad and continued with their debate on who shot the last pheasant of the day, a discussion which occupied the rest of the evening."
Diana's strained relationship with the royal family has been well-documented.
The book continues: "As a friend says: ‘She finds the monarchy claustrophobic and completed outdated with no relevance to today’s life and problems.
"'She feels that it is a crumbling institution and believes that the family won’t know what has hit is in a few years’ time unless it changes too’."
Princes Charles and Princess Diana separated in 1996 following 15 years of marriage.
One royal expert said on the day Diana, mother to Princes William and Harry, parted ways with Charles, she asked him a touching question.
Ingrid Seward, writing in her book 'The Queen and Di: The Untold Story', claimed the two met at a first-floor drawing room in Kensington Palace.
As she walked into the room, Diana is alleged to have asked Charles: "Why did this have to happen?"
Princes Charles went on to marry Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall, in 2005 - eight years after Princess Diana's death in a car crash in Paris in 1997.
