He may be the future King – but that didn’t stop Prince William being put to work after a cheeky dig about him “escaping chores”.

The eye-raising moment came during William’s ITV documentary on tackling homelessness where he was followed volunteering at a Christmas party at homeless shelter The Passage in London. In the ITV show, the Prince of Wales is seen donning an apron as he chats to chef Claudette, who is running a team preparing a festive meal. As she and her team are hard at work, William suggests he could leave her and the other kitchen staff to it while he goes and has a ‘natter’ with those awaiting the meal. He tells her: “You’ve got enough hands in her anyway, I might just go out there and have a natter…”

But before he can finish his sentence, Claudette chips in: “Oh you’re trying to escape the work, I’m watching you!” But the pair descend into fits of giggles as William says he will hand out the drinks or the ketchup.

Later, William is seen asking Claudette again how we can help out when the dinner service is underway. And he listens intently as she tells him: “William, what you can do, when the clients have finished eating, you can help collect their plates” and the prince immediately gets to work.

The show, which is also now available to watch on Disney+, is called ‘Prince William: We Can End Homelessness’ – and it explores the first year of his Homewards initiative, which aims to develop a blueprint for eradicating homelessness in all its forms, “making it rare, brief and unrepeated”.

During the hour-long show, the prince is also seen convening meetings with homelessness charities and landlords. During one meeting, William is seen addressing those who have been invited to share ideas for his campaign in a tense and emotional moment.

He passionately tells them: “I’m conscious that this is a team game, so please do feel free to pile in when you need to.” One of those there, Lord John Bird, the founder of the Big Issue then responds by saying: “I hope you meant that.” William replies: “I do mean that” before Lord Bird adds: “Sorry to jump in. We need the expertise of everybody.”

He then tells the camera: “We’ve had local authorities working here. We’ve had charities working there. We’ve had government departments working there. We need now to put all of the failed thinking that has gone into homelessness over the last 30 years behind us, and we’ve all got to come together. So when William says he wants to converge it, that’s what I want, and I don’t really want to have any bulls***.”

William then also tells the camera: “John will happily tell me if it’s not going well. He is very direct and quite right. I mean, he’s seen many attempts come and go over the past. So it’s important people like John buy into what we’re doing.”

The Homeswards campaign is a major long-term focus for William, who has told how visiting shelters with his late mother Diana, Princess of Wales as a child left a deep and lasting impression and inspired his work.

Homewards aims to develop a blueprint for eradicating homelessness in all its forms. Six Homewards locations were chosen – Newport, Lambeth, Belfast, Aberdeen, Sheffield and three neighbouring Dorset towns, Poole, Bournemouth and Christchurch – with the aim of delivering bespoke solutions to issues in each area.