Kate Garraway to return to TV role after husband Derek Draper's funeral

Kate Garraway will return to her TV role next week following the funeral of her husband Derek Draper on Friday, ITV has confirmed.

The presenter will give a live interview to Good Morning Britain on Monday, where she will discuss Draper's final weeks and his funeral ceremony.

She will then return to hosting the show on Thursday, alongside Ben Shephard.

Draper died in January after living with extreme complications from Covid.

Garraway is a regular presenter on the ITV breakfast show and usually presents on Thursdays and Fridays.

But she has been absent from the programme since early December, when Draper suffered a cardiac arrest.

According to The Sun, Garraway is provisionally scheduled to return full-time, but ITV have offered her the option to take time off as and when she needs.

The broadcaster is expected to trail her return tonight.

Draper, an author and former political adviser, suffered long-lasting symptoms from coronavirus after contracting the virus in March 2020.

He required daily care, which Garraway chronicled in ITV documentaries.

When he passed away on 3 January, Garraway paid tribute to her "darling husband Derek" in a statement posted on Instagram.

She was flanked by her children as they arrived at his private funeral service, which was held at a church in North London.

Stars and politicians including Sir Elton John and Sir Tony Blair were also in attendance.

They were joined by Garraway's fellow hosts Ben Shephard, Richard Madeley and Susanna Reid, as well as former presenter Piers Morgan.

Draper, who was from Chorley in Lancashire, was a Labour Party lobbyist for almost a decade.

He left politics in 1998 after being involved in the "lobbygate" scandal in which he was caught on record boasting about his ability to sell access to government ministers.

He retrained as a psychotherapist and wrote regularly in magazines and newspapers on psychotherapy issues. He is the author of two books, Blair's 100 Days and Life Support.

In 2009 he founded the LabourList website, a news website supportive, but independent of, the Labour Party.

Draper and Garraway married in 2005 and they had two children together.