Will Kate’s rogue uncle embarrass the royals on Celebrity Big Brother?

It’s safe to say that at the moment the royals are besieged by controversy and difficulty – partially through bad luck, and partially through problems of their own making. It has not, perhaps, then been the most helpful development that the Princess of Wales’s loud and self-styled ‘flamboyant’ uncle Gary Goldsmith has entered the Celebrity Big Brother house.

Joining the show along with fellow luminaries such as Lauren Simon, Zeze Mills and David Potts, Goldsmith has been described as the ‘tattooed, party-loving brother’ of Kate’s mother Carole Middleton. He announced that he would go into the Big Brother house in order to ‘put the record straight’ on his ‘bad boy’ reputation, as well as – the producers hope – discussing his extended family with far greater candour in public than ever before.

Certainly, Goldsmith is what television executives might refer to as a ‘colourful booking’.