Harry and Meghan were accompanied during their Nottingham walkabout by Beth Herlihy, a former Kensington Palace aide and one-time soap-opera actress, Our News Outlet can reveal.
As the couple greeted members of the public, Herlihy followed a short distance behind, helping to carry the flowers and balloons presented by supporters.
The Sussexes’ programme coordinator, reportedly paid $155,000 a year, co-founded the public relations firm Herlihy Loughran. She previously worked for the Royal Family before becoming one of Harry and Meghan’s most trusted advisers.
Herlihy travelled with the couple to Nottingham on Thursday after helping organise their engagements in the city. She remained a few paces behind as Harry and Meghan greeted a crowd of around 100 people.
Video footage also showed her positioning schoolchildren shortly before the couple arrived to cheers from the crowd.
Before entering royal circles, however, Herlihy pursued a very different career. She worked as an actress and appeared as a stripper in a Hollyoaks spin-off.
Using the stage name Bethan Coundley, she played Honey in two episodes of Channel 4’s Hollyoaks Later in 2011.
In the storyline, her character slept with a man and drugged him, leading him to hallucinate that he had killed her with an axe.
The deception was eventually exposed when a supposed burial site was found to contain the body of a pig, not a human being.
Herlihy also appeared in several provocative photoshoots, including a 2012 shoot in which she wore a PVC catsuit.
Away from acting, she built a career in public relations and, within a few years, had joined the team at Kensington Palace. She now works with Harry and Meghan after launching an advisory firm focused on prominent figures and organisations in the philanthropic sector.
One of the Duke of Sussex’s most trusted staff members, Herlihy (right) travelled to Nottingham with Harry and Meghan on Thursday
Under her stage name Bethan Coundley, Herlihy played a stripper in two episodes of Channel 4’s Hollyoaks Later in 2011
Herlihy has established a career in public relations and now works with Harry and Meghan through an advisory firm serving prominent philanthropic figures
Herlihy established the business with Clara Loughran, another former royal aide. Loughran previously served as Harry’s programme manager and is married to Nick Loughran, the Duke’s former assistant communications secretary.
Loughran was appointed a Member of the Royal Victorian Order by the Queen, an honour recognising dedicated personal service to the monarchy, following a recommendation from Harry.
The firm describes itself as ‘a small, high-trust advisory working with high-profile individuals, founders and organisations to build and deliver meaningful philanthropic work’.
Its bespoke offering includes advice, positioning and delivery, with the stated aim of helping clients ‘do meaningful things, exceptionally well’. The consultancy’s services come at a significant cost.
A tax return filed by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s charity, Archewell Philanthropies, states that Harry and Meghan paid Herlihy Loughran $155,000 for strategic advisory services. The firm received $127,807 in 2022.
The six-figure payment may reflect the time Herlihy and Loughran spend supporting the Sussexes. As Our News Outlet’s Royal Editor Rebecca English previously wrote: ‘Both have been trained in the “royal way”.
‘Even the walkabout undertaken by the couple – just hours after their own team pointedly insisted they wouldn’t do one because they didn’t have the security to manage it, despite the exact timings of their visit being publicly released, presumably in an effort to drum up interest – was royal in all but name.’
In 2016, Ms Herlihy was hired as an events manager at the Royal Foundation, the joint charitable vehicle for the now-Prince and Princess of Wales and the Sussexes.
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Beth Herlihy in a PVC catsuit for a modelling shoot in 2012
Prince Harry and Meghan at the Invictus Games 2023 in Germany with Ms Herlihy
Our News Outlet’s Royal Editor Rebecca English said the walkabout undertaken by the royal couple ‘was royal in all but name’
At the 2023 Invictus Games in Germany, Ms Herlihy was spotted chatting with the prince in the stands as they watched a wheelchair basketball match between Team UK and Ukraine
After the Sussexes split from the foundation in 2018, Ms Herlihy remained with Harry and Meghan, but was laid off by Kensington Palace after the Sussexes stepped down as senior royals and relocated to the US.
She set up Herlihy Loughran in 2020 and has followed the Sussexes across the pond.
In September 2023, she was spotted talking with the Prince at the Invictus Games in Germany. The pair chatted in the stands as they watched a wheelchair basketball match between Team UK and Ukraine in Düsseldorf.
And it would seem that Ms Herlihy has remained loyal to the Sussexes after they decided to return to the UK after six years living in Montecito, California.
Dressed in black trousers, a beige sweater and suede boots, Ms Beth was close at hand as Harry and Meghan carried out a series of charity visits in Nottingham – nine years after their first royal visit to the city.
The scenes looked identical to their walkabout almost a decade ago – although the crowds appeared smaller in 2026.
Around 100 royal fans and well-wishers gathered to greet Harry and Meghan. The duchess beamed as she shook hands and took selfies with fans, including one boy who asked if she lived in a mansion and another who wanted to know whether she had a Bentley.
The visit came after the Sussexes were described as ‘private citizens’ by the King, who was in Wales with the Queen for an official engagement at the same time.
Beth Herlihy attending the second day of the One Year to Go Event before the Invictus Games Vancouver Whistler 2025 at Mountain Square in Whistler, Canada
The pair chatted in the stands as they watched a wheelchair basketball match between Team UK and Ukraine in Dusseldorf
One of the Duchess’ friends said Meghan does not see herself as a working royal and is instead more of a ‘full-time mum and entrepreneur’, adding that public events like this with her husband will be ‘rare’ for her.
The Sussexes were supporting a number of charities, including a community food project established in the wake of the Grenfell Tower tragedy and a recording studio where Meghan took part in an acting workshop.
In keeping with traditional royal engagements, the scores of photographers and journalists gathered outside were kept behind barriers, as were the crowds of well-wishers, some clutching flowers, with one youngster holding a unicorn balloon, while media access inside the event was pooled.
Harry and Meghan are waiting to hear whether they will be granted taxpayer-funded security, with the duke said to fear a delay after Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood announced a review of security measures for the royal family and public figures in the wake of the death of Reform UK’s justice spokeswoman Ann Widdecombe.
The duke and duchess are said to consider themselves ‘public figures’ and were caught off-guard by the letter, authorised by the King, outlining their position.
Meghan is hoping to launch As Ever in the UK by the end of this year.
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