Loose Women star Charlene White could be set for an I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here! showdown with Matt Hancock after previously expressing her anger at rule breaking MPs during the pandemic.
The West Suffolk MP has defended his decision to appear on the ITV reality show in Australia, saying it is a ‘powerful tool’ to reach young people.
Yet Mr Hancock – who has arrived in Brisbane ahead of the show's launch on Sunday – has faced criticism over the decision and was yesterday suspended as a Conservative MP.
The newly independent MP may now face a dressing down from the Loose Woman host, who broke down in tears on the ITV panel earlier this year as she opened up about the death of her aunt during the pandemic.
White, who took off for Australia before Mr Hancock, was left devastated in 2020 after her great aunt Dell died at St Thomas' Hospital from the coronavirus.
She detailed her family’s heartbreak at not being able to comfort each other during the funeral and went on to admit that rule breaking MPs had made her rethink her actions that day.
Speaking on the ITV programme at the time, she said: “My family stuck by the rules. We had to bury family members without being able to hug each other. I had to sit in a crematorium where my aunt was buried.
“Because I wasn't living in the same household as my brother and sister and my dad, I was in a pew by myself with my baby daughter on my lap as we're all in floods of tears and we can't hug each other.”
She cried even more as she added: “I stood by the grave side as grave diggers were filling that grave and watching my cousin in floods of tears and not being able to hug her because we were following the rules, because we didn't know what else to do.
“We were told we had to follow the rules so we were following the rules with the understanding that those in charge were also doing the same thing.”
“I just think, should I have just hugged my cousin?” she explained through tears, as she added, “If we weren't all supposed to follow the rules, should have I just hugged my cousin?”
Mr Hancock was forced to quit as Health Secretary last summer after he was found to have broken his own social distancing rules by having an affair in his Whitehall office with aide Gina Coladangelo.
I'm A Celebrity starts on Sunday night on ITV at 9pm
