And the top 10 awards go to...

10. British Airways
Our national airline already topped the lost luggage league before Terminal 5 - built exclusively for BA at a cost of £4.3billion - opened in March. But, just for good measure, they misplaced another 28,000 bags in their new, £250m "state of the art" baggage system, before cancelling almost 250 flights due to the glitch at their Heathrow-based Black Hole. Aptly-named chief executive Willie Walsh admitted the shitstorm was "not our finest hour". Really, Willie?

9. Bread
We're teetering on the edge of the financial cliff - and the humble loaf might just hoof us into the abyss. Fact: an 800g sliced white loaf now costs an average of £1.27, up from just 87p last August. That's a 45 percent increase and almost 10 times the rate of inflation! So now you haven't got any dough in your pocket or on your plate. Shame on you, inaminate foodstuff!

8. Ashley Cole's penis
The sexual organ the Chelsea and England left-back used to cheat on his wife, one of the hottest women in the country. And it's not like he was led astray by Angelina Jolie. Aimee Walton - revealed as his "mistress" of choice in January - is at best, average. And, at worst, the scrubber who let Cashley carry on shagging her right after he'd thrown up, mid-sex. You almost lost Cheryl Tweedy for her? You, sir, are a tit.

7. Summer
By our calculations, we received around four hours of actual sunshine this "summer". The rest of the time: unrelenting rain, a social calendar of cancelled barbecues and hot girls in jumpers. We thought the one upside to global warming was supposed to be a round-the-clock tropical climate?

6. Alistair Darling
As Chancellor, his political head plus mismatching hair and eyebrows, are firmly on the chopping block. Partly caused this financial panic by telling a journalist to prepare for the "worst economic downturn in 60 years". Still, at least he has some solutions: blame the opposition and hint the public can pick up the tab with a rise in income tax. Genius.

5. Joey Barton
A man for whom "second chance" applied about 800 chances ago. Twice charged with acts of violence, Barton was jailed this year for six months, for an assault outside a McDonald's. And the real sadness of it all? Not only is Barton a good player and an England international, but an intelligent and eloquent lad, who should know so much better. It's a very, very long road back...

4. Gary Glitter
The spangly rock nonce spent more time in airports than those poor XL customers this year, as he was shunted from Vietnam to Bangkok and refused refuge by Hong Kong. Now back in Blighty, the cowardly kiddie fiddler's cheekily requested police protection, having binned his series of shoddy disguises. And what's with that beard? Who is he, Sex-Crime Santa?

3. Craig Meehan
When nine-year old Shannon Matthews went missing in February, the police launched Britain's biggest-ever missing person search at a cost of £2.7million. So, when she turned up safe at a relative's house, the authorities were a tad quizzical. Eyebrows were raised further when Craig - the boyfriend of Shannon's weirdo mum Karen - was given a 20-week jail sentence for possessing "indecent images" of kids. Not exactly father of the year material...

2. Steve McClaren
Wanted! For crimes against English football and the English language. While Scotland and Northern Ireland almost made it out of ridiculously tough Euro 2008 qualifying groups, this is the man who ensured England ballsed-up a group that really shouldn't have been that tricky at all. And then buggered off to Holland to manage FC Twente and talk like he appearsch in Dutsch porn filmsch, yessch? All while looking like a goon. Don't even get us started on that umbrella...

1. Heather Mills
The woman Piers Morgan told ZOO was "the most shocking, ghastly, greedy harridan I've ever encountered" hasn't exactly done much to enhance that reputation in the past 12 months. Divorcing one of Britain's greatest ever musicians with all the class you could expect from a money-grabbing former escort was bad enough. Complaining she only got £24.3million when her list of demands had included £186,000 for helicopters, before pretending she had a tape of Sir Paul McCartney being abusive that never materialised... it all just confirmed that she's one of the most shameless women on the planet, let alone in the UK. And as it's nine years since she first got her claws into a then grieving Sir Paul at the Pride of Britain Awards, it seems poetic she should become the inaugural winner of our Shame Of Britain Awards...