Ant McPartlin has declared he is the ‘happiest he has ever been’ after going sober following his ‘tough’ drink-driving ordeal in 2018.
The TV presenter’s career appeared to be in tatters when he was arrested for drink-driving close to his London home.
He was later handed a record £86,000 fine – thought to be the highest fine ever handed out by a British court for the offence.
Ant reflected on his past decade with best pal Declan Donnelly in a new interview amid the controversy over their ‘triggering and insensitive’ podcast promo.
The father-of-one, who welcomed his first child with wife Anne-Marie in 2024, explained: ‘Turning 50 for me was great because my early forties was a really tough time. These last few years, it’s the happiest I’ve been in a long, long time.
‘What changes as you get older, especially being sober as well, for me, is the purpose.’
Ant McPartlin, 50, has declared he is the ‘happiest he has ever been’ after going sober following his ‘tough’ drink-driving ordeal in 2018 (pictured with Declan Donnelly in 2025)
Ant reflected on his past decade with best pal Declan Donnelly in a new interview amid the controversy over their ‘triggering and insensitive’ podcast promo
Dec explained in The Times: ‘What I most admire is that with the challenges he’s faced, especially over the last few years, Ant took responsibility and real action.
‘He worked on himself so much to get back not just to being himself but actually being a much better person than he was before.
At the time of the ordeal, Ant was pictured looking dishevelled and out of sorts after colliding with a BMW after taking his dogs for a walk in nearby Richmond Park.
Dr Audrey Ng was driving the BMW he ploughed into while twice the legal alcohol limit. He also hit another Mini and the four-year-old passenger needed hospital treatment.
Her son – who was in the back seat – later told her the Mini came ’round the corner like a rocket.’
A separate witness to the crash told Daily Mail: ‘There were two cars travelling along Lower Richmond road – a green Mini Cooper and an X5 which was about much further back.
‘A black Mini Cooper shot round the corner but instead of turning left went straight across the road and smashed into the green Mini.
‘It was a bad crash but the black Mini Cooper still travelled on and crashed into the BMW behind which had done an emergency brake. There was a woman and her young son in there.
The TV presenter’s career appeared to be in tatters when he was arrested for drink-driving close to his London home (pictured shortly after the incident)
‘Airbags deployed in the black Mini and a lady came out of the passenger seat. No one came out of the driver seat initially.
‘The lady in the BMW came out but her son stayed in the car. The family in the Mini Cooper also came out and an Asian lady ran and screamed at the driver of the black Mini who was still inside. A passerby was asking her to calm down and checked on everyone to see if everyone was OK.
‘People were checking that everyone was alright. There was a lot of confusion cos the horn remained blaring on the car for ages. Everyone was dazed by it all.
‘When the driver came out, he just shouted intermittently at his mother but didn’t speak to anyone else until the police arrived shortly. There were two dogs in the Mini.’
The star was already in the midst of a troublesome year having sought treatment for an addiction to painkillers and confirmed his separation from wife Lisa Armstrong.
Then ITV cancelled Saturday Night Takeaway so he could enter residential rehabilitation for a second time.
It comes after Ant and Dec were forced to remove a social media post showing feet suspended in the air to plug their new podcast after they were accused of being insensitive to suicide.
The television duo shared a video of them dangling from the line with the opening image – a shot of shoes and trouser legs dangling above the ground -with their 5.9 million followers to boast of their new project, named Hanging Out With Ant and Dec.
The podcast promotion posted on Ant and Dec’s X account that was later removed following backlash
The Geordie duo announced their new venture, Hanging Out With Ant and Dec, on Friday
Alongside the beginning of the clip, they wrote: ‘Our brand-new podcast Hanging Out With Ant and Dec is launching on Thursday 22nd January,’ followed by an old fashioned microphone and starry eyed emojis.
However, they prompted upset and outrage from their followers who insisted that their clip was ‘in poor taste’ and ‘triggering’.
The video was posted on Friday evening but by 11am on Saturday morning had been removed.
Representatives for Ant and Dec, both 50, responded saying: ‘We did not mean to cause any offence with this promo video and we are sorry if it has upset anyone. We have taken on board the comments and have deleted the video.’
But before it was taken down, the duo, who were outspoken on mental health as part of ITV’s 2021 campaign Britain Get Talking, were lambasted on the social media platform.
One said: ‘As someone who has lost a close friend to suicide, I get why this can be seen as triggering and insensitive,’ wrote one user.
Another said: ‘Who in their right mind would think showing legs dangling as a start of an advertisement is a good idea? It’s been triggering.’
Mental health advocate and former The X Factor contestant Katie Waissel was among those to publicly condemn the video on the platform, calling the imagery ‘entirely foreseeable harm’.
Former The X Factor contestant Katie Waissel was among those to publicly condemn the video
They prompted upset and outrage from their followers who insisted that their clip was ‘in poor taste’ and ‘triggering’
She wrote: ‘I’m going to be blunt because this ‘creative direction’ is genuinely sickening and deeply disappointing.
‘This opening visual of feet suspended above the ground is not a harmless ‘play on words’, it immediately reads as someone hanging, and the suicide imagery is impossible to ignore.
‘Whoever signed this off as a marketing concept either didn’t think for a second about the real-world impact, or simply didn’t care.’
Waissel, 39, added that, with a platform of such scale, the presenting duo had a ‘clear duty to act responsibly’.
‘It’s triggering, insensitive, and frankly reckless to push out as ‘entertainment’ when so many families have been devastated by suicide and self-harm,’ she added. ‘You can promote a show without normalising imagery that could genuinely distress people.’
Others echoed her concern.
‘I thought this too, its cinematography to show someone has hanged themselves, without showing the rope,’ wrote one user.
‘Not saying it was on purpose, just saying this was a very ignorant direction from people who should have known a lot better.’
Following the backlash, the clip was removed from all official social media channels. Neither Ant nor Dec has publicly commented.
Just weeks ago, the pair secured their future at ITV with a reported £30million deal that will ensure they remain the broadcaster’s golden boys.
The Geordie duo, are two of British TV’s best-known faces and have fronted the likes of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here!, Britain’s Got Talent and their own gameshow Limitless Win.
Having first found fame as teenagers on Byker Grove, the duo will remain at the helm of ITV’s presenting department until at least 2028.
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