Hi-DE-HI! actor Barry Howard has died aged 78, it has been confirmed.

The star – best known for playing Barry Stuart-Hargreaves in the first seven series of the BBC sitcom – lost his battle with cancer this week.

Barry Howard played Oliver Barnes, a member of the Sliver Cloak gang, in the 2010 story The End of Time.
His agent, Sharry Clark, confirmed the sad news to the BBC and called him “very talented”, adding that she would “miss him more than she could say”.

A statement read: “The much-loved actor Barry Howard, best known for his exquisitely supercilious Barry Stuart-Hargreaves, the champion ballroom dancer in BBC’s hugely popular Hi-de-Hi, passed away today aged 78.”

Barry had been suffering from blood cancer and had been ill for some time.