STOP PRESS: RUMOURS SURFACE OF ILLICIT WILDE-WILSON VOTING PACT

Take a look at the latest voting from the Gardens Illustrated Best TV Presenter poll. Smell anything fishy? Perhaps you wonder how Kim Wilde could have 276 votes... When even Alan Titchmarsh only has a hundred?

An insider at "Gardens Illustrated" let us in on the rumours startling the horticultural world: "Well apparently, Kim Wilde was over at Matthew Wilson's, looking at his roses and talking about mildew. While they enjoyed an innocent day in the garden, her people got chatting to his people."

"Before anyone knew it, the spin doctors had begun to joke about trading votes in the Best TV Presenter poll, for support in the Gardeners' World contest against Joe Swift."

Rumours have now surfaced suggesting that the PR men immediately began secret negotiations to trade blocks of votes, leading to an illicit midnight handshake deal. Meanwhile Wilde and Wilson slept, blithely oblivious to the shenanigans being enacted in their names.

"Obviously, Kim's out of the running for the GW job, and Wilson's camp are happy to sacrifice the Garden's Illustrated title if they can get their hands on Friday night - that's the real prize here."

It's the kind of cynical manipulation of the public which has characterised this whole campaign, with mud-slinging from all sides. Especially when they were digging the allotment in the rain. 

The real loser in all this is, of course, Lord High Sheriff of the Isle of Wight, Baron Alan Titchmarsh: with a century of genuine votes in the GI poll, he comes in well behind the front runner.

As our insider said: "The sad thing is that I'm sure Kim and Matthew have no idea what's being done in their names, and that if they did, they'd be absolutely gutted."