The public has been enjoying making Matt Hancock squirm in the jungle after nominating him for more icky trials in the Australian jungle.
Thursday’s episode of I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here! saw the former health secretary take part in the latest Bushtucker Trial.
For the Tentacles of Terror test, the 44-year-old politician was trapped inside an octopus-shaped cage full of underwater critters as he had to scour for stars in order to secure rations for the camp.
But as well as facing that ordeal, the MP for West Suffolk was also grilled on the ITV show about the affair that cost him his Cabinet job last year.
The former Tory minister quit his health sec role in June 2021 after he was exposed for breaking the social distancing rules he had helped set into law during the Covid pandemic.
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
The affair was exposed after Mr Hancock was caught on CCTV canoodling with his aide Gina Coladangelo.
After the pictures — believed to have been leaked from the Department of Health — were splashed all over the front page of The Sun, the cheating pair left their spouses and have since moved in together.
Who is Gina Coladangelo?
(Image: Getty Images Europe)
Gina Coladangelo is a lobbyist, businesswoman and former aide to the health secretary.
Born in 1977 in Hertfordshire, she grew up in the town of Royston.
She is the niece of Bob Wilson, the former Arsenal goalkeeper and presenter of Football Focus, the BBC’s magazine-style Saturday show.
Ms Coladangelo’s mother was a florist and her Italian father made his millions as CEO of pharmaceutical consultancy Rephine, according to the London Evening Standard.
The 45-year-old has reportedly been married twice.
French celebrity magazine Gala reported that in 2004, she married London real estate lawyer Glynn Gibb.
That relationship ended in divorce, with Ms Coladangelo going on to marry Oliver Tress, the multimillionaire founder of high street chain Oliver Bonas, in 2009.
They have three children together and formerly lived in south-west London, reportedly with a live-in nanny, before they split over her Westminster romance.
Professionally, Gina worked as a senior account manager in the campaigns division at Munro and Forster Communications.
She left to move into public relations, working for lobbying firm Luther Pendragon in 2002 and making her way up to the role of director and shareholder in her 12 years there.
From 2014 to June last year, Gina had been the marketing and communications director at her husband’s Oliver Bonasn retail chain.
In 2019, she joined Hancock’s staff in an unpaid role.
A few months later was given a part-time £15,000 role as a non-executive director at the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC).
The new role meant that she was a member of the board who can scrutinise the department.
During the pandemic, when Hancock was leading the UK government’s response to Covid-19, Coladangelo was one of his closest aides.
How did Gina Coladangelo and Matt Hancock meet?
Gina and Matt might have become romantically involved when they worked together in government, but they had known each other for more than two decades before their affair started.
They first met while studying at Oxford University.
Hancock revealed on Steven Bartlett’s podcast The Diary Of A CEO earlier this year that the pair became close friends when they started presenting a student radio show together.
The businesswoman studied politics, philosophy and economics (PPE) while at the university, alongside the former culture secretary.
According to the Standard, the pair became “inseparable” during their time working on the uni station, with Coladangelo a sports reporter and Hancock reading the news.
Despite their close friendship, they both went on to marry other people, with Matt tying the knot with osteopath Martha Hoyer Millar in 2006.
However, Hancock’s decision to pick his long-term friend as an advisor, first to help informally with his failed Tory leadership bid and then in his role as health secretary, saw their friendship evolve into something far closer.
With the government Covid response centred in No 10 and Mr Hancock’s health department, Ms Coladangelo was reportedly in “every meeting”.
A Tory source told The Sunday Times: “Before Matt does anything big, he’ll speak to Gina. She knows everything.”
The leaked CCTV images showed the world that they were far more than colleagues, leaving their respective marriages in tatters.
Speaking on I’m A Celebrity, Mr Hancock told his fellow contestants that he and Gina are very much still an item.
Asked whether he was still with Ms Coladangelo, he replied: “With Gina? Yeah very much so, yeah, totally.
“That’ll be the best thing about being kicked out, seeing her on the bridge.”
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
