I'm A Celebrity's Matt Hancock confronted by campmates on arriving in jungle

Matt Hancock has been confronted by his I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! campmates about why he has abandoned his job as an MP to take part in the show.

Loose Women’s Charlene White confronted the former health secretary about why he had left his constituents when parliament is still in session, while singer Boy George could not hide his anger over how the government dealt with the coronavirus pandemic.

White asked him: “So why did you do it [come on the show]?”

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Hancock said: “Because there’s, honest truth, is because there’s so few ways in which politicians can show that we’re human beings, so I just thought it would be good to do that. I’ve got a sense of adventure...

“If I can use this to sort of peel myself back a bit and just be me, it’s better.”

White replied: “But I can imagine it would not have gone down well at all at home? You have to expect that. Because parliament is still sitting, we’re not in recess, you know…”

Hancock said: “I genuinely think that because we’ve now got sort of stability that is…”

White observed: “We’ve had stability for all of five minutes Matt.”

Hancock said: “Rishi’s [Sunak, Prime Minister] great, he’ll be fine.”

White said: “But you can understand if people aren’t very happy at home about it?”

Hancock said: “I understand that, of course I get that, right. But I also just think that sometimes you’ve got to do things differently.”

Boy George told TV presenter Scarlette Douglas he was feeling emotional about seeing Hancock after not being allowed to visit his mother in hospital during COVID lockdown.

The Do You Really want To Hurt Me singer: “You know, at the beginning of the pandemic my mum was in hospital. I wasn’t allowed to see her. I thought she was going to die. I was tweeting Greenwich hospital going, ‘Please look after my mum.’ I used my name, I was like ‘Please look after my mum.’ And they did, she was fine…

"I feel like, I don’t want to be sitting here like I’m having fun with him. It’s difficult for me because, you know, I had something happened, if my mum had gone, I wouldn’t be here now. I would have gone when he walked in.”

Boy George told the Bush Telegraph: “If I had lost my mum, I would go. And I feel a little bit selfish, you know, just kind of… everyone’s so nice to him and I was like Jesus, what are we going to do? I don’t want to spoil this experience for myself."

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But he added: "I’m not good at hiding what I feel. Especially when it’s something so strong.”

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