the private secretary to the Prince of Wales from 1993 to 2002 said that Charles will stop writing to ministers were he to be crowned King, and that his letters formed part of his "apprenticeship convention", in which the "cardinal principle" of not commenting on public policy did not apply to him while heir. Lamport believed that if what the Prince "...says or writes to ministers were not to be confidential their exchanges would be 'bland and denuded' of any useful content" and that Charles viewed the "urging of opinions" to government ministers to be part of his role as heir. The Upper Tribunal's decision was subsequently vetoed in October 2012 by the Attorney General for England and Wales, Dominic Grieve, who was supported in his decision by the Cabinet of the United Kingdom. The attorney general's veto placed an absolute block on the publication of the letters, which Grieve described as containing the "particularly frank" and "most deeply held personal views and beliefs" of the Prince of Wales. Grieve detailed the letters as containing "...remarks about public affairs which would in my view, if revealed, have had a material effect upon the willingness of the government to engage in correspondence with the Prince of Wales, and would potentially have undermined his position of political neutrality....my decision is based on my view that the correspondence was undertaken as part of the Prince of Wales's preparation for becoming king. The Prince of Wales engaged in this correspondence with ministers with the expectation that it would be confidential. Disclosure of the correspondence could damage the Prince of Wales's ability to perform his duties when he becomes king." Grieve concluded his justification of his veto by stating that "It is a matter of the highest importance within our constitutional framework that the monarch is a politically neutral figure able to engage in confidence with the government of the day, whatever its political colour." Grieve also said that any perception that Charles had disagreed with Blair's government "would be seriously damaging to his role as future monarch because, if he forfeits his position of political neutrality as heir to the throne, he cannot easily recover it when he is king". The Guardian announced its intention to challenge the attorney general's veto in the High Court of Justice. 2013: The Guardians legal challenge dismissed The Guardians challenge to the attorney general's veto in the High