Disability bitch hates political gossips

For those of you who’ve been locked in a box for the last week, here’s what’s going on: unproven rumours have been swirling around the darker corners of the internet, rumours which claim the PM is taking anti-depressants and/or prescription painkillers and, as if that wasn't a big enough hot potato, the rumours go on to say that he's losing sight in his one ‘good’ eye. (Gordon is already blind in his left eye as a result of a rugby accident).

As the week progressed, those rumours started to seep into the mainstream media until finally, on Sunday, in a live TV interview coinciding with the start of the Labour Party Conference, the BBC’s Andrew Marr asked the Prime Minister directly if they were true. Gordon said they were untrue. Chaos ensued.

Lets mull a bit on how fit our politicians are. It happens that in America, results of presidential health checks are published regularly to keep the electorate in touch with the commander'-in-chief's ability to govern, but to be quite honest, I don’t care how much the PM can see and I don’t care if he takes medication on a regular basis. When deciding who to vote for, I do care about the economy, the middle east, schools, healthcare, social care, benefit reform, blah, blah, blah.

What's fascinating is how much of a storm has been kicked up over rumours that our leader might be disabled. And not just physically disabled, mental too. Woah there - a double whammy!

Before we go any further, I’d like to confirm that I, Disability Bitch, do take prescription drugs on a regular basis, and I do wear glasses. Does that mean I can’t be PM now?

Anyone who was in any doubt that prejudice against disabled people in the workforce still exists must look at the furore surrounding this episode and realise that actually, it does.

If it doesn’t matter to the world at large whether or not the prime minister is disabled, and the world at large doesn’t think these things affect job performance, why are these rumours taking up so many newspaper inches and so much broadcast airtime? Eh? Answer that!

As it happens, there’s precedent to suggest that being blind or depressed is no impediment to holding office: for a start, no one seemed very bothered that sometime Home Secretary David Blunkett was blind meanwhile, in the 1990s, the Norwegian Prime Minister took sick leave due to depression, and survived to be elected to another term in office. And by the way, if Gordon Brown were experiencing mental health problems, he’d not be the only one amongst his colleagues: a report last year revealed that one in five MPs had personal experience of a mental health problem.

So if we don’t like our parliamentarians mad, we best sack 20% of them immediately.

But it’s obvious people really, really care about this bad health stuff, and not in a good way. Reportedly, the Labour Party PR machine is furious that the question was asked in the first place, citing it as intrusive.

Personally, I wouldn’t be particularly keen to spill the contents of my medical records to a nosey journalist either – my medical history is no one’s business but mine. Still, getting ‘furious’ about it suggests that these people are sufficiently worried that the whispers will damage the Prime Minister’s chances of re-election. And they’re not necessarily wrong: one high profile blogger is currently calling Gordon the ‘Prime Mentalist’. Problem is, what matters to me is whether or not the PM can do his job. I’d wager no one is going to find the answer to that question between the pages of his medical records although, for now, everyone seems to disagree with me. And, if it wasn’t such a bad pun, I’d say that was quite depressing.

Stand by your TV sets, readers! According to reports, Heather will be coming to our screens not once, but twice. First, in some reality show featuring minor celebrities doing word association games on rollercoasters and second - be still my beating heart – as a contestant in ITV’s Torvill and Dean spectacular, Dancing On Ice. As we speak, she’s ‘getting a range of prosthetic legs made up’ in preparation for the show. Allegedly. Jealous? Me? Never before have I hoped so much that a rumour about Heather turns out to be true.

Big news on Facebook this week was that Hollywood actress Charlize Theron has told the world she’s got obsessive compulsive disorder. If you'd like to be first with all the celebrity hidden impairment news, you can sign up join my virtual gang here.