The woman at the centre of Ruth and Eamonn’s split
For 15 years, Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford were Britain’s favourite husband-and-wife team. The pair presented ITV’s flagship magazine show, This Morning, every Friday, as well as various other factual programmes and a teatime quiz. Not all married couples would enjoy working together, but Holmes and Langsford appeared supremely content, on-screen and off.
The news earlier this year, then, that the pair were divorcing came as a huge shock to viewers. Holmes, who now presents the breakfast show on GB News (he and Langsford left This Morning in 2021), thanked fans for their support, and the couple were inundated with good wishes on social media.
When a “friend” was quoted as saying that the split had been instigated by Langsford who had been struggling to care for Holmes ever since he had undergone a double-hip replacement followed by spinal surgery, some of those well-wishers shifted their sympathy to Holmes.
But, now, the presenter is in danger of losing that good will after being pictured on a romantic holiday with a blonde, 22 years his junior. Looking frail, he was seen in Barcelona and Ibiza in an electric wheelchair with his rumoured girlfriend, Katie Alexander, 42, by his side. The holiday has reportedly left Langsford “gobsmacked”.
Now, the Loose Women presenter is said to have hired formidable divorce lawyer Catherine Costley to negotiate her financial settlement from Holmes, who is worth a reported £4 million. The aptly-named Costley was once an apprentice of Fiona Shackleton, Britain’s highest-profile divorce lawyer, who represented the King in his split from Princess Diana in 1996 and famously had water poured over her by Heather Mills during her divorce from Paul McCartney.
Although a spokesperson for Holmes and Langsford said that they were “determined to stay friends and keep things amicable” when they first announced they were separating, that may no longer be the case. Costley has been named one of the top divorce lawyers in the country, described as “progressive, and fierce on behalf of women”.
In her spare time, Costley enjoys a triathlon or two and has even competed in Iron Man races. “Competitive spirit runs deep in my family and I was racing against my twin sister, father and husband,” she said. “Only one of the three got past me but I’ll get her on the next one…” Good luck to anyone who goes into battle against her in court.
So what’s changed for daytime TV’s former golden couple? Alexander, a relationship counsellor from Yorkshire, first struck up a friendship with Holmes on Twitter way back in 2015. In October last year, the news anchor attended a mental health charity fundraising event in Yorkshire, where Alexander works as a therapist, and took on the role of a patron.
They might have a 22-year-age gap, but Alexander’s relationship history suggests she prefers the older man. She dated Michael Devine when she was a 19-year-old shop assistant and he was a 59-year-old coach driver. They had a son Ben, together, who is now 22.
After splitting from Devine, Katie worked at Barca café in Dewsbury and married bar owner George Alexander, nine years her senior. They had a daughter in 2010 and a son in 2011, but by 2022 their marriage was over. Her ex-husband George, 53, revealed that it was social media that brought Eamonn and Katie together.
“She was not swooning over him like he was George Clooney, but she liked being on social media, and one day said she’d had a reply from him,” he told the Daily Mail recently. “She’d commented on one of his posts and Eamonn got in touch. I must admit I laughed it off. I was surprised by it. Katie would go and visit him. It was a regular pattern.”
There is no suggestion that Katie was meeting Holmes while she was still with George, but, in the year before he split with Ruth, Holmes is said to have showered Katie with gifts, including tickets to a Beyoncé concert and a family trip to a safari park. There is no evidence that they were anything other than friends at this point.
But, in recent months, the couple have been away together, not just on their Mediterranean holiday, but also to Holmes’s hometown of Belfast in August. The pair were spotted dining for four consecutive days at Papa Browns in Carrickfergus. They have also reportedly been spending a lot of time together at Holmes’s new flat in Kingston-upon-Thames and want to move in together. The divorced mother-of-three is said to have told friends that she is with Eamonn for the “long haul”.
Holmes was married when he first met Ruth. The pair were introduced by their mutual friend, television presenter Sally Meen, in 1997. They initially kept their relationship under wraps, out of respect for Eamonn’s first wife, Gabrielle Holmes, with whom he had three children. Ruth and Eamonn went public a few years later, and his divorce was finalised in 2005.
“I thought it spoke volumes about the sort of man he was, the sort of father he was and the integrity he had. It made me love him more, not less,” said Ruth at the time about the secrecy. They had a son, Jack, in 2002 and got married in a lavish ceremony at The Elvetham Hotel in Hampshire in 2010. It was covered by Hello! magazine and TV stars including Jeremy Kyle, Gloria Hunniford and Zoe Lucker were in attendance.
Ruth once described her and Holmes as “like Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor – although we bicker and argue, ultimately our love for each other and the bond we share is so strong”. But unlike Burton and Taylor it looks like they won’t be reuniting any time soon.
Back in June, Holmes said “I’m not OK. This is not a good time at all. It’s too early to say but I hope we can still be friends.” Perhaps he has found comfort in counsellor Katie. An endorsement on her therapy profile describes her as: “Friendly, warm, down to earth and empathic”.
In early September, a fan asked Langsford on Instagram why she was still wearing her wedding ring. She shot back “Because I’m still married” with laughing emojis. After these pictures of Holmes on holiday, and the reported recruitment of the tenacious Catherine Costley, that probably won’t be the case for long.