Prince Andrew's reputation has taken another hammer blow with newspaper front pages revealing an email suggesting that he was in contact with the sex offender Jeffrey Epstein much longer than he previously claimed.

They are intensely damaging allegations for Prince Andrew.

The reported email casts direct doubt on his version of events in his BBC Newsnight interview that he'd cut off ties with Epstein after meeting him in New York in December 2010, where the pair had been photographed together.

The intimate tone of the email Andrew is alleged to have sent - "We are in this together" - also undermines attempts to suggest they were never close.

Scandal hasn't exactly been a stranger to the Duke of York.

The email published by the Sun and Mail on Sunday is reported to be from February 2011 and earlier this year another batch of emails from that same time emerged, also suggesting that Andrew's connections with Epstein had carried on months later than he claimed, which prompted a similar round of scathing headlines.

But what are the consequences? Each scandal is followed by calls for Prince Andrew to face some kind of royal sanction. So what pressure can the King and the Royal Family actually apply? How could they distance themselves?

The next big family get-together for the royals is Christmas in Sandringham. And it seems unlikely that Prince Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson will be invited. He'll be frozen out. And don't expect to see him in video footage shown during the King's Christmas message, as any sightings will be edited out.

The only King that Andrew is likely to see will be if Good King Wenceslas........

© BBC