Alison Hammond and Dermot O’Leary introduce another new member to the This Morning family after unveiling Cat Deeley and Ben Shephard as new hosts

This morning’s Alison Hammond and Dermot O’Leary have introduced yet another new member to the show’s family after Cat Deeley and Ben Shephard were unveiled as new presenters last week.

During Friday’s show, the couple iWe introduced a new four-legged member to the team as they cooed over their sweet new puppy.

Dermot told viewers: “Time to introduce you to an adorable new member of our This Morning family…”, while Alison added: “He’s an adorable eight-week-old puppy and here he comes!”

As the adorable pooch joined the duo on the sofa, Dermot explained: ‘This is a very important dog – he’s an autism assistance dog.’

The puppy, named Buddy, is a yellow Labrador who will be trained to help both adults and children with autism.

Eight-week-old yellow Labrador Buddy joined the duo on the show as the presenters revealed he will be trained as an autism assistance dog

Jan Kiley, COO of Dogs for Autism, offered further explanation: ‘He was eight weeks old yesterday and today is his first official day as a service dog in training. He is a yellow labrador. We train them for children and adults with autism.

‘Training is all about manners and teaching them what is acceptable and what is not, but also giving them lots of interaction with lots of different people and going to different places, but being very careful not to go too far.

‘Then in the future, about 12-18 months, he will learn to do things specifically for autistic people during training.’

Viewers were then given the chance to name the dog as they sent their suggestions to producers throughout the show.

Towards the end of the show, Alison announced: ‘Thank you everyone who contacted us, we’ve had so many suggestions, thank you so much.

‘But we can now reveal that our new puppy’s official name is… Buddy! Many of you suggested Buddy and that’s what we’re going to call him.”

This morning we will monitor Buddy’s progress during his training and give the pup a treat and a new collar before he starts.

As he hugged the dog, Dermot later said: ‘It’s lovely to have you here. Buddy, and whatever family you go to, it’s going to be very, very lucky.”

Meanwhile, This Morning’s vet Dr Scott explained that two of his children have autism and having a dog in the house really helps them at home.

Jan Kiley, COO of the charity Dogs for Autism, said more about this: ‘Training is all about manners and teaching them what’s acceptable and what’s not, but also giving them lots of interaction with lots of different people and going to different people. places, but be careful not to push them too far’

Viewers were then given the chance to name the dog as they sent their suggestions to producers during the show, with Buddy emerging as the most popular name.

The duo then took their new pup to see Ant and Dec who were rehearsing for the brand new series of Saturday Night Takeaway in the next studio.

Next month, Ben Shephard will make his debut as the new permanent presenter of This Morning, and the presenter made his final appearance on Good Morning Britain on Friday.

It has been confirmed that Ben’s This Morning debut with Cat Deeley, 47, will take place on Monday, March 11 – just two weeks away

He said: “I have two children with autism, Jackson is nine, and he had a speech disorder, meaning he didn’t speak for the first four years of his life.

‘He struggles emotionally at school, and with our dog Ludo we have really seen an improvement in his ability to relax. Having that big dog to cuddle makes a big difference to him.

“Our youngest, Riley, is non-verbal, she can say bits of words, but not too many, and again, the company of dogs makes a big difference, and this is also the first anniversary of my own personal diagnosis.”

Dr. Scott added, “I saw things in it that I could relate to, and one thing that has been consistent for me is around animals.

‘I knew they were there to help and support me, so from the age of seven I knew I wanted to give something back to them.

‘But I didn’t know why… and now, finding a good cause [like this] which supports autism is so important in giving children the opportunity to develop that relationship with animals because it makes such a difference to their lives.”

The duo then took their new pup to meet Ant and Dec who were in the next studio rehearsing for the brand new series of Saturday Night Takeaway.

Ant wanted to be the first to pet him and exclaimed, “He’s beautiful!”

This Morning airs weekdays from 10am on ITV1 and ITVX