Earl Spencer says Mohamed Al Fayed groped and propositioned Diana

Earl Spencer's memoir Swan Song reveals that Princess Diana reported being groped and sexually propositioned by Mohamed Al Fayed, billionaire Harrods owner and father of her partner Dodi Fayed. This disclosure gains significance given that Al Fayed has since been posthumously accused of being a voracious sexual predator who abused hundreds of women before his death aged 94 in 2023.

According to Spencer, Diana told him that Al Fayed grabbed her buttocks and made a crude joke suggesting that in Egypt, a father-in-law has the right to sleep with his son's new partner first. The memoir also reveals that Spencer initially included Dodi in his famous funeral eulogy for Diana but removed the reference before delivering it; Spencer now expresses regret at this omission. Harrods has established a redress scheme for abuse survivors, which operated from March 2025 to March 2026 and paid out £4.1 million in compensation.