TV presenter Anneka Rice is calling for the return of her Eighties gameshow favourite Treasure Hunt to our screens. But she's not suggesting getting back into the jumpsuit, rather getting a new host for the clue-solving show (it briefly reappeared in 2002, too).

Actor Steve McFadden - best known for playing the character Phil Mitchell in the BBC soap opera EastEnders - today accepted undisclosed libel damages in the High Court after a tabloid newspaper suggested that he may have been guilty of harassing a former girlfriend.

EastEnders veteran Pam St Clement is to bow out of Albert Square, more than a quarter of a century after making her debut as no-nonsense Pat.

Fred Dibnah is a towering institution in his native Bolton. A statue of the steam-engine loving steeplejack stands proudly not far from the majestic town hall where he was first discovered at work by a television producer in the 1970s. Going beyond the myth of the down-to-earth Lancashire sage with the greasy flat cap could have been difficult in his own backyard but Aelish Michael's play is ultimately successful in getting to the real person. Colin Connor fully assumes the character of Dibnah, perfectly imitating the accent and mannerisms of one of television's original reality stars. He is by turns passionate and funny, selfish and childlike, needy and driven. Ironically, as he points out early on, Dibnah was most famous in the 1980s and 1990s for demolishing the industrial heritage that he so cherished. He would rather have been a creator but alas – apart from the steam engine he built in his dying days and the aborted mineshaft he sunk into his back garden – it was for the spectacular chimney drops for which he was best known and to which hundreds of spectators would turn up as if attending a hanging.

Singer, actor and 1970s heart throb David Essex is to join the cast of EastEnders, it was revealed today.

Some characters mean too much to be killed off

EastEnders bosses are to bring the controversial baby death plot - which has prompted almost 6,000 complaints from viewers - to an early end.

EastEnders star Samantha Womack has insisted her decision to leave the soap has nothing to do with her controversial cot death storyline.

Historic sex guide the Kama Sutra is to be published as an audio book for the first time.

One of the UK's most famous pubs will go up in flames as EastEnders' Queen Vic is destroyed by fire later this year, TV bosses confirmed today

It is a surprise to learn that in a world where the budget airlines have made nice bits of Europe accessible for £1 and a package holiday to south-east Asia can be enjoyed for a few hundred quid, that the Pontin's holiday camp is still an option.

Final 'douf-douf' for sacrificial Bradley

So Stacey did it...but was Bradley pushed?

It may be the most downbeat soap on television but EastEnders has lasted a quarter of a century on our screens. To understand its longevity, one must consider it in the context of Classical tragedy, writes long-time viewer Michael Bywater