It must be the oldest celebrity excuse in the book, but Robbie Williams recently insisted that he was forced to pull out of the MTV European Music Awards due to "scheduling conflicts".

But as it turns out, he's just gone all diva about it and pulled out because they just can't meet his demands.

A source at MTV told the Mirror's 3AM girls: "Every star is treated the same and has to work to the same parameters. Robbie is no different but his reps for some reason said nearly everything wasn't up to scratch.

"His no-show is costing us a lot of money. It's a live show and we're having to re-write the script and re-do all the VTs.

We have tried to be as accommodating as we can but we've had to put our feet down. This obviously caused a huge issue and they walked away with a week to go. It has caused utter mayhem in the schedule."

The clearly unhappy insider insisted: "Another great name will be announced soon to more than make up for it."

And in an astonishing moment of honesty, Robbie's people confirmed that their original "scheduling conflicts" excuse was, well... an excuse.

"The truth is MTV and the EMA's are victims of big budget cuts and Robbie's performance was being compromised so it was decided that he would not perform," said his spokesman.

But in true spokesman style, he went on with some massive Robbie plugs, just in case we were all starting to not like him, saying: "Bodies has been number one on radio for the last six weeks in Germany and Robbie really wanted to perform in Berlin.

"It is a real shame that MTV could not make this happen. Fortunately Robbie's performed a surprise free concert for his fans in Berlin last week to 15,000 people and he will perform on Germany's biggest TV show Wetten Das on November 7. Rumour has it Eminem has pulled out too from the EMA's for the same reason."

Too late spokesman... our dislike is growing by the second.

Robbie may have got a bit big for his boots, but he's got nothing on these diva demands...