Gareth Gates has spoken of his daily battle with his stammer and insisted: "I've never let it stand in the way of what I want to do in my life."

The Bradford teenage star provided a fascinating insight into how he copes with the condition for a TV documentary to be shown next week.

In it, he speaks openly about how he often finds it impossible to express himself because of his condition and explains how he only finds his "true voice" when he sings.

The special edition of the Tonight with Trevor MacDonald show followed Gareth for a number of months and the cameras were even rolling when he joined up with a stammerers' support group.

A spokesman for Granada Television said the programme was a follow-up to an earlier report on stammering which had caught Gareth's interest.

It examines how the East Bowling teenager has been helped by the McGuire Programme to improve his speech.

And Gareth, who is currently doing a host of promotional work to highlight his part in this year's Comic Relief extravaganza, admitted he was at a loss to explain the difference between his singing and talking voice.

"It's really strange that I am able to sing, but when it comes to speaking, I do really struggle," he said. "I've never really understood that either really.

"I've had a stammer all my life really, from when I first started to talk I realised I had this problem with my speech but it's something I've never let stand in the way of what I want to do in my life.

"The hardest situations for my speech is obviously when I'm nervous. When I'm in front of the camera, that's always hard, also when I'm speaking to girls, that's hard as well."

But he added he was determined not to let his condition affect his career.

"I've never really let it ever shape the way that I am and I've never let it stand in the way of anything," he said. "Obviously I've not really done some things that I've wanted to do, but the major things in my life it's not really affected.

"In fact it's probably made it better. I was able to express my music more because I wasn't able to speak."

Zahir Islam, who runs courses for the McGuire Programme, said the positive publicity surrounding Gareth had been a big help in building the confidence of young people who suffer from stammering.

"He has achieved the goals that he wanted to and by coming on the programme, it has helped him to go even further."

'Gareth Gates - Singing Through My Stammer - A Tonight Special' will be shown on ITV1 at 8pm on Monday.