Shayne Ward, Leona Lewis and Alexandra Burke will take part in the 'All Stars' version of 'The X Factor'.

Leona Lewis

Leona Lewis

Louis Walsh - who mentored Shayne to victory in the 2005 series - is returning to the programme for its upcoming specials, and though he doesn't know who he'll be working with on the celebrity version of the show, he's confirmed some of the talent show's biggest previous winners will be taking to the stage once again for the best of version.

He said: "I go to Los Angeles on Tuesday, I go to Simon's house in Malibu, it's me Simon [Cowell] and Nicole [Scherzinger] and we're doing the celebrity one.

"We haven't been told who the celebrities are I've just read bits in the papers. They want it to be a surprise to us when they walk out.

"It's going to be great, and then we do the 'best of' all in one week, all the winners are coming back. Leona's coming back, Alexandra, Shayne, they're all coming back."

The 66-year-old music manager thinks the time was right to shake up 'The X Factor' and try something new and he thinks both the celebrity and all star specials will be great viewing and "bigger and better" than anything currently on TV.

He told Mirror Online: "It's been so long as the old 'X Factor' it had to change.

"I don't know what he's planning for next year but this year I think the celebrity version is going to be brilliant and then the best of is like, wow.

"Simon doesn't want us to know who is doing the celebrity version and he doesn't want to know. I'm going on Tuesday and we start on Wednesday.

"It's going to be new and fun, it's going to be Love Island meets everything, it's going to be bigger and better."

Leona won the third series of the show in 2006, while Alexandra triumphed two years later.