Celebrity Gossip's

Pop princess Britney Spears has been named the most controversial celebrity of the year. The singer, whose wild antics have raised eyebrows in recent weeks since her split with husband Kevin Federline, beat out competition from other potential candidates - including Mel Gibson for his drunken, anti-Jewish rant, comedian Michael Richards for spewing racial epithets, and model Naomi Campbell for abusing her personal staff - to land the title on the Showbiz Tonight programme on CNN Headline News.

In addition to club-hopping while wearing short skirts and no panties, inadvertently flashing paparazzi in the process, Spears hit the headlines earlier in the year for incidents including driving with her infant son on her lap, having social services investigate reports that the boy fell out of this high chair, and posing nude on the cover of Harper's Bazaar while pregnant with her second child.