Churchill claims greatest Briton vote

WAR-TIME British prime minister Winston Churchill has been named the greatest Briton of all time in a nationwide poll that attracted well over one million votes.

Participants in the BBC’s Great Britons survey voted the Second World War leader top of the list of the country’s 100 most significant individuals, gaining 447,423 votes, beating his nearest rival, engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel by more than 56,000 votes.

The result came after a passionate two-hour live debate on BBC2 in which celebrities including former Tory minister Michael Portillo and TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson argued the case for their choices.