Now Christine turns to Botox

She is a woman who, it is said, will stop at nothing to get her face on television. Now Christine Hamilton's face itself has become the story.

Mrs Hamilton, 52, self-publicist extraordinaire and wife of the disgraced former Tory cabinet minister Neil, has undergone a course of Botox injections - all for the benefit, she says, of British consumers.

"I like to use my face," she said before the operation. "That's why I'm a bit apprehensive. It's what my husband likes to call my mobile face, and I don't want it disappearing."

The self-confessed battleaxe insists that her decision to appear on this evening's Tonight with Trevor McDonald, the ITV current affairs show, is an altruistic move designed to reassure millions of women of the safety of the injections, now available from high-street shops.

However, she has been responsible for a string of publicity stunts, including an appearance in an episode of When Louis Met. . . with the BBC's Louis Theroux.

"I've have been thinking about having Botox treatment for ages and ages," she says. "Any woman who is my age who doesn't admit to even thinking about having it done is not being entirely accurate . . . it's not fair, when men get older they get more attractive and we don't."

Mrs Hamilton adds: "Every woman should have the right to look as good as she can or as good as she wants to. I'm a perfectly average woman. I'm not vain. If I was, I wouldn't do it."

Mrs Hamilton, attempting to find out if there are hidden dangers in the so-called " five-minute facelift", received the injection from the expert syringe of Nick Percival, consultant plastic surgeon at the Renascence clinic in London. The popular injection is now available over the counter at high street shops for between £180 and £200 a shot.

Boots the pharmacy has defended its decision to sell the treatment, claiming the injections are administered by trained doctors, but this has done nothing to deter the controversy.

Made from a derivative of the botulism toxin, the jab offers a temporary fix for wrinkles and crow's feet without the need for pricey surgery or overnight hospital treatment.

But fears have been expressed that the controversial treatment could trivialise plastic surgery, and medical experts have warned that in the wrong hands, Botox shots can leave consumers with unsightly lumps, or a look of surprise. In addition to this, the shots can be painful, and it can take up to three days for the effects to kick in, but this has not deterred celebrities such as Lulu, Joan Rivers and Cliff Richard from taking the plunge.

? Tonight with Trevor McDonald is on ITV1 at 7.30 this evening

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