English politician disappears into jungle

One of the biggest news stories of the week has been about the Conservative politician who has decided to appear on a UK reality show.

I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here puts well-known people in a jungle in Australia, sleeping outside, and makes them do "challenges" for food. The challenges include eating insects and nasty bits of kangaroo, or sharing a box with rats.

Nadine Dorries has been a lively member of parliament since she was elected. She is now in trouble because she did not tell anyone in her political party that she was going to be in Australia for the show. She could be in the jungle for a month if she survives the challenges and public votes.
 

Olympic gold medallist in bike accident

Bradley Wiggins, the British cyclist who this year won the Tour de France followed by an Olympic gold medal this summer, is recovering at home after being knocked off his bike on a training ride.

Wiggins and a van collided at the entrance to a petrol station in Lancashire. A witness said that the driver "was very upset, even more upset when the police actually said 'Do you realise who you've hit?'".

Although Wiggins seemed to be seriously injured at first, reports now suggest he has suffered severe bruising.

It is very odd that just hours later the British Cycling team coach, Shane Sutton, was also in an accident on his bike. He appears to be more seriously injured and is being kept in hospital.

Revealed - the UK's biggest-selling songs

It is 60 years since record companies started selling "singles" - records with just one song on them. It was not long before people starting counting how many of each "single" was sold each week and creating a chart of best-sellers.

To celebrate the anniversary, a British company has released the list of every single which sold more than a million copies here. The best-seller was Elton John's special version of Candle In The Wind, which he played at the funeral of Princess Diana in 1997. This sold 4.9m copies.

Second was a charity single, Do They Know It's Christmas (3.69 copies) and third was Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody (2.36m) which surprised people when it came out in 1975 because it was so much longer than a normal pop single.

Odd stories about well-known people

There have been some very peculiar news stories about well known people this week.

Prince Charles is our next King. But the Romanian tourist office says he is also related to the man who inspired Dracula, the vampire. Romania is trying to attract more British visitors and has produced a promotional brochure and a YouTube video which includes Prince Charles.

"Transylvania is in my blood. I am descended from Vlad the Impaler, so I do have a bit of a stake in the country," the Prince joked in an interview first shown last year.

In the second surprising story, we were told about the kindness of Britain's first woman prime minister. Mrs Thatcher was called the Iron Lady because she was such a fierce politician. But her former bodyguard, Barry Strevens, says that when a policeman walked dog poo on to her carpet, she cleaned it up herself. She was also very kind when Mr Strevens had to guard her one Christmas, which meant he was away from his family and staying in a room which was not very nice. He says she tidied up the mess left by previous bodyguards, put up Christmas decorations and left him presents and a card. "It was at that moment I knew I would stand in the way of a bullet for Margaret Thatcher without hesitation," he said.