TV star Declan Donnelly has been given the go-ahead by planners to splash out on a pool-side kitchen at his £5million London mansion.

The Saturday Night Takeaway and I'm a Celebrity host, 46, and wife Ali Astall, 43, want to extend their home into a courtyard garden to make way for the proposed development.

The luxury three-storey, six-bedroom west London pad already boasts a basement swimming pool, steam room, gym, cinema, pool room and wine cellar.

But now the couple also want to build out into the basement courtyard garden to create a new internal pool-side kitchen and lounge – just like in the Love Island villa – so they don't have to go upstairs for food.

In a double whammy, the roof of the proposed extension will also give them a bigger external decking area for their young daughter Isla.

In a design statement to the local council, the planning agent said: "The plans seek to create a new internal pool-side kitchen at the lower ground floor level at the rear of the house, by infilling an existing under-utilised external courtyard.

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"The planned extension is purely an infilling of the existing basement structure. The "roof" of the new lower ground floor kitchen will extend the existing deck at upper ground floor level.

"This will provide a more adequate external decking and lounge area which is better connected to the internal dining room and kitchen on the south east corner of the house.

"The proposed pool-side kitchen represents an improvement to the use of the existing lower ground floor courtyard which does not function as required for the owners and their young family."

Last year, Declan's home was targeted by a gang of professional burglars while he slept upstairs. Police rushed to the property shortly before 1am following a 999 call.

The gang struck while the Britain's Got Talent host, his wife and daughter were sleeping and were foiled by the pad's fortress-like security. They fled empty-handed just before police arrived.

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In 2007, Declan was given the green light by planners to demolish his old 1930's-built home and build a new one including a cinema and golf simulator and a gym complete with rowing and step machines. Two years later, he was granted planning permission to add a rear garden shed.

His latest plans include narrower steps from the basement up the external decking area, a glazed walk-on skylight and external lightwell, giving him 26.2m2 in additional internal floorspace.

Officials at the local council gave the go-ahead after there were no objections from neighbours in the street where TV sidekick Ant McPartlin used to live just a few doors away, in a designated conservation area.

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