Queen vows to keep fighting to end domestic violence until she ‘can do no more’

Yvonne Traynor, former CEO of Rape Crisis South London, describes how in 2009 she wrote to around 100 high-profile celebrities looking for someone to make their case, but received no response.

Ultimately, she decided to take the Queen and then the Duchess of Cornwall to court, realizing she seemed “a very strong woman”, but admits she “couldn’t have been more surprised when she actually got a response saying: Yes, she was interested.”

The documentary features footage of Camilla welling up and visibly emotional as she listens to the harrowing stories of women survivors of domestic violence, and others who lost their lives at the hands of abusive partners in 2016.

It was the first time the Queen had met Mrs Parkes. Surprised to see someone from her own generation in the room, she describes how she had tried to put herself in her shoes, thinking it was her own daughter. “I’m afraid my reaction was to cry,” she says, adding that the encounter was “engraved in my heart.”

“If there was a spark, Diana lit it,” she adds. “And there I went.”

Inviting conversation

Mrs Simpson’s best friend Hetti Barkworth-Nanton, who was appointed CBE last year for services to people affected by domestic abuse and murder, revealed at a preview screening last week the Queen’s desire to change the discourse around domestic destigmatize violence.

Eight years ago, the Queen declared that she wanted to “do something to lift that veil of shame and be a catalyst for change” and has since been “undeterred” by her increasingly senior profile, saying she continues to use it for good.

The Queen was motivated to take part in the documentary in the hope that it would “spark conversations in homes, schools and workplaces across the country”.

A palace spokesman said: “If they can happen here, in a palace with a queen, they can and should happen anywhere. Because it is through these conversations that some of the many tens of thousands of women and men who suffer in silence today can be told that they are not alone.”

Her Majesty The Queen: Behind Closed Doors airs on ITV on Monday 11 November