Sky News presenter Kay Burley is my kind of girl though many of my colleagues can barely mention her name without a scowl forming across their faces and expletives littering the air.

Gutsy, attractive and totally without self-doubt, she has been a legend on the channel for more than 25 years and is one of its most recognisable faces.

Her claim to fame is to speak her mind regardless of the consequences. I do not watch much TV but if Kay is on I find it is some time before the off button is finally pushed ... not for nothing has she been named Most Desirable Woman on TV three times.

Her latest brush with controversy occurred during the battle for Scotland’s soul when she called a Yes campaigner a rude word. Well, he was trying to beat her cameraman with a stick.

But in a long list of favourites, my all time ‘watch-TV-behind-a-cushion’ moment came during an interview in 2008 when she asked Suffolk serial killer Steve Wright’s wife: “Do you think if you’d had a better sex life he wouldn’t have done this?” Ouch.

For Burley watchers 2008 turned out to be a vintage year with a dramatic photograph taken of her getting over-animated outside Uxbridge Magistrate Court where Naomi Campbell was appearing to face charges of assaulting two police officers at Heathrow Airport.

Unfortunately in the melee Burley was accidentally hit in the face by the photographer Kirsty Wigglesworth’s camera, causing a bruise to her eye.

Burley is not your naturally forgiving type and the incident ended with her hand forcing its way around Kirsty’s neck.

Girls, girls!

Her combative spirit seems to know no limits. She pushed this to the boundaries of acceptable broadcasting behaviour a couple of years later when she took part in a major interview with pop star Peter Andre regarding his complicated private life.

Burley went for the jugular and asked him about the future custody of his children, causing him to well up with tears. More than 800 people complained but the regulator correctly ruled she had not been intimidating.

And when she revealed that police were treating April Jones’ disappearance as murder to local volunteers live on air there was more outrage. Viewers bombarded Twitter with criticism, saying the news anchor was “cruel” and “insensitive”.

A tricky one that but the indefatigable, Teflon-like Burley keeps coming back for more.

Part of her appeal is the twinkle in her eye and asking the questions faint-heart journalists would never dare. Her on-screen chemistry with one of the sports presenters is compelling. Two old hacks who have seen it all before and are loving chewing the cud together.

But like another broadcasting legend Jeremy Paxman, she always knows just how far to go with her abrasive persona.

One of the few areas in her life where she has failed to succeed is in attempting to write fiction. Her book First Ladies left readers somewhat underwhelmed and reminded me of Clint Eastwood’s famous maxim that: “A man should always know his limitations.”

This embarrassing erotic romance left many reviewers squirming with one withering review describing it thus: “The whole novel feels like a slightly stale second-hand anecdote.”

Ouch.

And although Christmas is still a few months away what better way of enjoying the day could there be than snuggling up under the duvet with a mince pie or two and a glass of port while watching Kay’s antics?

Amazingly she has worked more than 16 of them since joining the rolling news network in 1988. A trooper.