And the reality TV star made the headlines again on Saturday when, in scenes similar to those of Princess Diana's funeral, flowers were thrown at the hearse and thousands of people lined the streets to say farewell to Jade.


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Writing in the Radio Times, broadcaster Michael Parkinson said she had died to "an orchestrated chorus of exploitation."

He said: "Her death is as sad as the death of any young person, but it's not the passing of a martyr or a saint or, God help us, Princess Di."

The Evening Telegraph spoke to people in the north of the county to ask whether his comments were fair.

Sylvia Austin, 49, of Earls Barton, said: "It is a shame she died so young, but the fact is people were criticising her so much because she was racist when she was on Big Brother, and now everyone has switched, and if that's not hypocritical, I don't know what is.

"Also, there are plenty of other people with cancer walking around and nothing is being written about them."

Full-time carer Elaine Yates, from Rushden, thought it was good that thousands more women were being tested for cervical cancer after hearing about Jade's illness.

She said:"I think if good comes from bad it is wonderful.

"If she had not highlighted her story, a lot of women would not have the benefits they will have now.

"She was loud and gaudy but she made her mark and I'm sure lives will be saved."

She thought the blame lay with the public rather than the media: "It was the public that made it public. She was very, very brave even if she was gaudy."

A retired television director who worked with Parkinson at Granada Television in the 1960s, John Allen from Irthlingborough, criticised the media's obsession with reality TV celebrities.

He said: "People are set up to be something they are not by reality television.

"They are set up to be something they would never have achieved in real life.

"I worked in television when not everyone was a pop idol. Reality television puts people on a pedestal."

He blamed the media for exploiting people like Jade, and said: "They are used and abused and Jade Goody was in that ball park.

"Having got there, she lived off it. She was made into a celebrity without earning it."

But he also recognised the good that could come from it, and said: "She then turned to look after her children and did all that work for cervical cancer."

A mother from Raunds, Jeannette Mead, said: "I think it's wrong to compare her with Princess Diana, because that's what some people were comparing the funeral to, but I think she just did what she thought was right for her boys.

"As a mum we would all do what we could for our children."

She added: "Some of what Parkinson said is true, but I don't think it's the right time or place to say it."


Parkinson on Jade

"When we clear the media smokescreen from around her death, what we're left with is a woman who came to represent all that's paltry and wretched about Britain today.

"She was brought up on a sink estate, as a child came to know both drugs and crime, was barely educated, ignorant and puerile.

"Then she was projected to celebrity by Big Brother and, from that point on, became a media chattel to be manipulated and exploited until the day she died."