Hague avoids banana skin - just

Conservative leader William Hague has become the latest high-profile British politician to have a close encounter with a foodstuff.

After Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott's scuffle with an egg-wielding hunt protester yesterday, Hague today narrowly avoided being splattered by a banana skin.

The Tory supremo had just finished speaking in Peterborough about yesterday's incident in Rhyl, and was just getting onto his battle bus when the fruit was thrown.