The couple are still friends and are still devoted to Anais

Gallagher's spokeswoman

"Many things have changed in that time, including themselves it would seem."

The spokeswoman said that for the time being, the couple have agreed to separate amicably.

"The couple are still friends and are still devoted to Anais. At the moment, it's a separation," she added.

Celebrity couple

Mathews, a professional party planner has become a celebrity in her own right alongside her pop star husband.

Patsy and Liam split in July

A fixture of London's celebrity party circuit, she had her own column in the Sunday Times for a short while.

The couple first met in 1994, when Mathews worked at Oasis' then-label, Creation, organising after-show parties.

They married in 1997 and in the same year Mathews left Creation to form her own company, 2 Active, with close friend Fran Cutler.

Last year, the couple sold their north London home for a �2.5m mansion in Chalfont St Giles, Buckinghamshire, where they hoped to bring up a family away from the "madness" of their London social scene.

Drugs worries

Noel admitted recently that he met his wife "through drugs" and spent so much of his married life on them that he worried he would stop loving her when he gave up.

Party animal: Meg Mathews out with Liz Hurley

His spokeswoman said: "Noel gave up drugs because there was too much madness in his life. He wanted to get out of London to get away from that kind of life."

Noel's brother, Oasis frontman Liam Gallagher split from his wife Patsy Kensit in July.

Their relationship had always been stormy while Noel and Meg's had seemed stable by comparison.

In an interview with the BBC's Radio Times magazine in April, Noel said: "I love her to bits and I've been faithful ever since I met her.

"I had seven years of groupies before that which was great, but once you meet that special person, everything else becomes blurred.

"If she left me I'd be destroyed. She's my best friend - I still consider her my girlfriend, not my wife - and I'd never risk what we have for a one-night stand."