An IT expert has invented a new shoe with a rather unusual addition to its heel – a mobile phone.

The shoes have been created by Paul Gardner-Stephen and have a mobile handset fitted in one heel and a Bluetooth headset in the other.

Users can make calls by sliding back each heel to operate the gadgets hidden inside.

Although the inventor thinks that many people immediately disregard the shoe as being impractical, the 34-year old claims it is "actually not that bed".

Mr Gardner-Stephen said: "The phone rings, you slip off the shoe then you open the heel, press the button and youre talking in around the same time it would take to fumble in a bag and pull one out."

In other unusual shoe news, the brown leather sandals worn by Mahatma Gandhi are to be auctioned in New York through Antiquorum Auctioneers.