Well, I'm not sure secret liaisons with a Liberal Democrat are going to help them with this one. Although, you never know. The Cheeky Girls and their mother/manager Margit Semal have reportedly run up debts of around £130,000, and are being chased for cash by a number of producers and promoters who have provided services to the pop duo.
In a report in last weekend's Mail On Sunday, Devon based Vegas Entertainments said that Semal and her daughters owed them £5000 and that payments were still owing despite a court order going in their favour. The company's Graham Stone told the paper: "I've been in the business for 35 years and I've never encountered anything like the trouble I've had with Margit Semal. We've been to court five times and got nowhere". The company's lawyer, Chris Donnison, added: "In August 2005, we got a judgment against Mrs Semal for £5,000, but there has been no payment. We're starting proceedings for her property to be sold".
Music producer Barry Upton also claims he is owed money by the Cheeky corporation, telling the MoS: "I wrote a song with her [Margit]. She's not a musician but she knows what she wants. The result was 'Cheeky Flamenco' and 'Hey Boy'. She wanted to release it independently, so I put her in touch with a video guy and a distributor and a price was agreed. The single went into the Top 40 and there was also a follow-up Christmas record, 'Boys & Girls (Xmas Love)'. But nobody got paid".
But when questioned by the paper, Semal herself denied the debts, saying: "The Cheeky Girls and I do not owe any money. Our company's invoices are all paid on time".
Cheeky boy MP Lembit Opik was unavailable for comment. Actually we didn't ask him for one. Who wants to know what he thinks? Did you know William Hill are offering odds of 66/1 for Mr Opik MP having a number one record with the Cheeky Girls sometime this year? Then again they're offering odds of 33/1 that he will marry one of them (either one I think). And odds of 25/1 that he'll become leader of the Liberal Democrats which seems strange to me - surely the chart topping Cheeky collaboration is much more likely than that?