Ouch Talk Show #92 August 2012
bbc.co.uk/ouch

Presented by Rob Crossan and Liz Carr

rob	We’re back, internet radio with a disability angle; the angle being ever so slightly wonky I assume. Season’s greetings! I’m Rob Crossan.	
liz	And I’m Liz Carr. 	
rob	And while I stuff a corporate mince pie into my mouth Liz will tell you what’s in store for show number 92. 	
liz	Yes. Multi minority comedian Maysoon Zayid joins us from New York plus the inventor of a new app for the discerning wheelchair user, Fiona Jarvis, is here in the studio. 	
rob	And can you make a living from busking? Is it safe to stand with a hat full of money in front of you in public if you’re disabled? We’ll be meeting a blind whistler who does just that several times a week on the London underground. 	
liz	The Paralympic Festival of Sport happened just a few days ago; we’ll be summing that up and rounding off the show with the 2012 quiz so more mince pies plus sporting man, Tony Garrett and journalist Paul Carter. 	
rob	From London it’s Ouch, disability talk from the BBC with Liz Carr and Rob Crossan. And here we are from a very small studio in London’s famous broadcasting house, it’s the Ouch Christmas Talk Show and Liz…	
liz	Yeah. 	
rob	…a huge mince in her hand. 	
liz	It’s bigger than my head. 	
rob	It is. Your head is quite small but the pie is rather large. And you are nil by mouth as of 7:00pm tonight. 	
liz	I know. 	
rob	Can I ask why? I know how bashful you are about talking about your disability. 	
liz	You know me I’m always…I either don’t make the podcast because I’m ill or I’ve been really bad with stomach problems so they’re doing all sorts of nasty tests and I’ve got to be nil by mouth with an empty stomach by tomorrow. 	
rob	Such a flake. And so you are now stuffing your face. 	
liz	Yeah but it’s better than what they’ll be stuffing me with tomorrow that’s all I’m saying. 	
rob	Would you rather not talk about it? 	
liz	I’d rather not talk about it, it’s not pleasant and it does involve poo. 	
rob	And I also want to say that this is the first time in seven years I’ve actually seen Liz eat a piece of fruit or vegetable. 	
liz	Really? 	
rob	A banana…	
liz	I don’t think you could call mince pie…	
rob	No, no you’re ruining the good effects of the banana with that. I think we found out there were 250 calories per pie!	
liz	It’s fine. 	
rob	And you may now be on your 4th!	
liz	That’s three times what I normally eat a day. Really in terms of calories. I mean look it takes a lot of work to have a body like mine. 	
rob	I can well imagine. 	
liz	Thank you very much. Thank you. But I mean come on I’m not the only one that’s had medical tests. We’re disabled people let’s be friends here, talk openly. 	
rob	Well yeah. You’re such a hypocrite. No I’m not going to talk opening. You’ve never, ever told anybody what your disability is. Why? I think it’s time when we really had this conversation, Liz. 	
liz	I enjoy that air of mystery. What I’m quite excited about is that when I go on TV in ‘Silent Witness’ they’ll be somebody that will dredge it up and discover it. And then before you know it it’ll be in the Daily Mail, it’ll be everywhere and they’ll be doing, you know, they’ll be features on it so it will be one of the most known impairments.	
rob	Liz, you’re being very, very precious here. 	
liz	Okay. 	
rob	The fact is I don’t think anybody really cares that much. 	
liz	I think they do. 	
rob	I’m just a bit nosey that’s all. 	
liz	But I think people do. 	
rob	I mean what is it are you worried that it’s going to define you in some way.	
liz	No.	
rob	You think people will look at you differently? 	
liz	I think it’s really amusing that one of the first questions that people ask is, “So what’s wrong?” “Have you been burned?” “Have you got that facial thing where your face doesn’t form?” Somebody said that to me the other day. Or, “Is it like arthritis?” and it’s got a very big Latin name that when you tell people they’ll go, “I’ve never heard of it.” It’s like, “Fine, so why did you want to know?” 	
rob	Oh so the fact is it’s so rare. 	
liz	It is. 	
rob	And so arcane and recondite and it wouldn’t actually give me any greater knowledge of you and who you are. 	
liz	To be honest, Robert, I must say that only about three people in a million do have my condition. It is incredibly rare. 	
rob	You seem so proud. 	
liz	But it’s great because the more that it works people up the more that I think I’m not going to tell you. I’m sorry.	
rob	At least now I’m in the situation where at least I know that whatever it is it’s so longwinded and boring it wouldn’t actually make Liz any more interesting…	
liz	You’re saying..	
rob	…even if you did know.	
liz	You’re saying that but you’re dying to know.	
rob	Listeners, albinism has only four syllables. Yours sounds like it has about…	
liz	Has about 27 I think. 	
rob	Boring. 	
liz	Enough chatter, enough chat. It’s our topical bit we can’t really do breaking news on a downloadable radio show so we’re bringing some recent headline grabbers and noteworthies to the table instead. So here with us in the studio we have Fiona Jarvis. Hello. 	
fiona	Hello. 	
liz	And across the pond in a booth, a small booth I believe, at BBC New York is Maysoon Zayid. Hello. 	
maysoon	Hello. 	
rob	Hello Maysoon. Now I know you’ve been on the show before so welcome back. And how are we describing you these days? We have the whole set of minorities you inhabit, can you just take us through the latest hot list please? 	
maysoon	The list of all the minorities…	
rob	Which you…	
maysoon	…of which I am part of? 	
rob	Yeah exactly. 	
maysoon	Well first of all I want to comment on Liz Carr’s disability right now and ruin her whole surprise by telling everyone…	
liz	[Sharp intake of breath]	
maysoon	…what is the deal with Liz; and the deal is she’s not actually disabled. She just fakes it so she can get a radio show. 	
rob	It’s the greatest disability of all – not having a disability. 	
maysoon	That’s why she never… Exactly. And I feel like it’s so funny that everyone keeps trying to figure it out when it’s actually there is nothing wrong. She is the one fully healthy person on God’s green earth. 	
rob	If she’s faking it she’s faking it in the most elaborate way I’ve ever seen. 	
maysoon	It’s almost Truman Show, it’s epic and that’s why when the reveal was supposed to happen it was going to be shocking but I deflated the entire thing by outing her.	
liz	Thank you. 	
rob	But anyway what are your minorities? Tell us which…well let’s tick these off the list then starting with…	
maysoon	Okay. Well I just visit your neck of the woods so I think the number one minority is the fact I’m Muslim, right? 	
rob	Yes.	
maysoon	People don’t like us. And I have cerebral palsy, so I’m one of the shaky disabled. And cerebral palsy, by the way, is like at the top of the disability hierarchy. 	
rob	If you say so. 	
maysoon	We’re like the vibrating bed without the Quarter. people love us. And then I’m a woman, that’s a huge minority. 	
rob	What apart from the fact that you encompass 52% of the world’s population. 	
maysoon 	Yeah but we’re still like raped and pillaged as part of war. 	
rob	Right. 	
liz	So you…	
rob	In Manhattan? 	
liz	You did visit Liverpool recently then? 	
maysoon	I did. I loved Liverpool. Liverpool was far superior to London. I’m a scouse for life. 	
rob	So tell me about your trip around the UK then? You were in Liverpool and what were you doing up there? 	
maysoon	I did a comi show with Alexei Sayles at the Epstein Theatre in Liverpool and I really loved it because it reminded me of Beirut. 	
rob	Liverpool reminds you of Beirut. 	
maysoon	Yes. 	
rob	Sadly I do know what you mean. 	
maysoon	And I actually did hear about Fiona when I went there because her app is like…I don’t have an iPhone because I’m too palsy to work it but I had heard all about her app and tried to go to the hip places. 	
liz	So this is because… What is your app, tell everybody about it, Fiona. 	
fiona	Well it’s a guide for the discerning less-able. So it’s not being elitist, it’s merely giving people information about places that are really stylish or trendy and telling them what the obstacles might be if you go there and you’re disabled. 	
liz	Well it’s obviously had good PR because Maysoon heard about it. 	
fiona	I know that’s amazing. 	
maysoon	I’m doing a sister app of all like the dive, sleazy places that are disabled accessible. 	
liz	I think that’s just your address book, Maysoon, probably. 	
rob	Now this is something that’s interesting for me, Fiona, because I’ve always thought that there’s a bit of a disconnect between cool places and accessible places – rarely do the two meet I find. 	
fiona	I know. 	
rob	Often when you see people with disabilities having a night out I rarely see them in super cool speakeasies in East London, they’re always the people I see in Pizza Express – obviously other pizzerias are available. But is it something that you’ve noticed that the hip places don’t tend to be accessible? 	
fiona	Well some are, some aren’t same as anywhere else. But what I think people find difficult is that when you’re disabled or you’re suddenly disabled in particular, you need a lot of confidence and you don’t necessarily want to go to the places you used to go. All I’m trying to do is say to people look you can do it, I’ve been doing it for 20 years, nothing’s stopped me. And I’ve just got this information and I’ve put it all on an app so people can understand what the obstacles are if they want to go somewhere. 	
liz	And is that what spurred you on, you became disabled is that right? 	
fiona	Oh no I’ve got MS and it’s obviously a progressive disease and I’ve had it for nearly 30 years. But I’ve worked for the last 25 and I had to take clients out entertaining in the City. So I’d have to research places I could go to and I dumped all this information on a website. And then last year UCL Advances offered to make a mobile app for me primarily because I was on one of their courses and they said, “You’re not very good at this programming are you?” I went, “No not really.” And so they took pity on me and they said, “You tick so many of our boxes.” And I wasn’t sure…I didn’t want to ask what the boxes were, to be honest. 	
rob	Yes I would be slightly intrigued as to what they would be. 	
fiona	No I just didn’t want to know…	
rob	Just take the money. 	
fiona	…because I knew one of them…	
rob	Take the cheque. 	
fiona	One of them was like and she’s old. 	
rob	Now, Maysoon, I’m presuming that the app, Fiona’s app, isn’t up and running yet in Palestine but I know that you’ve been… 	
maysoon	No. 	
rob	…in the West Bank quite a lot recently with your organisation ‘Maysoon’s Kids’ so can you tell me how the recent troubles in that part of the world affected those who you’ve been helping over there? 	
maysoon	It affects them the same way that every one of these silly offences affects people in that the number of disabled has gone up again. In the Gaza offensive they say that fourteen hundred people were injured during that. And I always say the reason that I started Maysoon’s Kids in the first place which is…it’s a wellness and education programme for the disabled, so some people think I teach art but I don’t I actually try to mainstream disabled kids into the school systems and work with the parents and families so that they can have a much more mainstream life. And so our biggest challenges are the same challenges that they were the last time I talked to you probably two years ago, which is the fact that like when you’re in a society that’s under oppression, that has limited access to medication and water the first people to suffer are the disabled population whether they’re children or adults. It’s been exaggerated and the time and place for it to end is now. I have a solution to the entire Israel/Palestine fiasco. 	
rob	Is this the policy which involves you training up some of your kids to become stand-up comedians?	
maysoon	My disabled army. Yeah I do comedy workshops with at risk kids and disabled kids and orphan kids and any kids that I can find that have a sense of humour. And we actually followed that in a little documentary called ‘The Cradle of Comedy’ that I hope comes out soon by you guys, we followed me doing workshops with them. But yeah I mean I joke about my disabled army all the time too because I’m one of the very few people that can walk around the Middle East and talk completely uncensored even though other artists are censored I’m completely uncensored because they won’t screw with me because they’re afraid of the disabled army. When you screw with the disabled artist the disabled army shows up on Twitter, on Facebook, in person, you know I have great backup. 	
rob	Believe me, me and Liz are cowering right now.	
maysoon	I just want to say though I definitely like Fiona’s app is something that I totally work on the same thing here, my thing is called ‘Special Chic’ which I’m sick and tired of seeing disabled people dressing frumpy. So my whole thing is wearing like six inch heels and really stylish clothing and I have to sleep in because I can’t get it of off myself. But I agree that we need to stop having disability associated with being sweat pants stuffed into socks. 	
fiona	Yeah all sort of frumpy and wearing really clumpy shoes. 	
maysoon	Yeah and like mismatched and the sweater with the big reindeer on it. 	
fiona	I mean I am really glamorous and someone the other day said, “Why don’t you wear those Velcro slippers?” 	
maysoon	Oh gosh. 	
fiona	I went, “Are you kidding?” 	
maysoon 	I wear Velcro shoes I do. I wear heels…	
rob	I’ve noticed that there’s far too many wheelchairs which are festooned with annoying comedy mascots like Garfield cats and things like that. These are adults doing this – come on! This is sartorially a fashion crime of no’s. 	
maysoon	And that’s like the big thing in America is they always have the able-bodied actors playing the disabled characters and you see the real life disabled person standing next to the Hollywood actor and the Hollywood actor’s wearing like a gown and the disabled actor’s wearing skinny black jeans from 1980 and a red sweatshirt with Santa on it. You know I’m just like so over that. 	
liz	Although personally I’ve been a bit quiet because I’m upset.	
rob	Yeah have you seen what Liz is wearing today? 	
maysoon	Oh no are you wearing like a Christmas themed …	
rob	It’s not Alexander McQueen let’s put it that way. 	
liz	Well we were talking in the production meeting and I was saying that I have just bought Christmas leggings. 	
maysoon	Oh God that’s that’s so funny.	
liz	And I do want a Christmas jumper this year. 	
maysoon	Oh God!	
liz	What’s wrong with that?	
maysoon	I wear Velcro shoes. I got stopped in the Israeli airport and they told me that I couldn’t wear my shoes on the flight because they have like a big rubber sole. And so I told her let me take out my other shoes and you can pick the ones I can wear. And I was like Charlie Brown because I had the same pair of shoes in three different colours. She was like, “Why do you have the same shoes?” I’m like, “Because they hold my feet up.” 	
rob	Can I also point out that Liz admitted on the last show that she’d just bought a tartan blanket as well. 	
liz	Yeah actually I have. 	
maysoon	What is that? 	
rob	Nothing personal, Liz, but you are everything that’s wrong with disability right now. 	
liz	That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me. 	
maysoon	But do you know why she’s everything wrong with disability?	
rob	So many reasons. 	
maysoon	Because she’s faking it so she tries too hard and fits into every stereotype. 	
liz	Anyway I think we’re at the end of this bit now – no, no. Does blue badge style, Fiona, does that extend to clothing as well because that is an important part.	
fiona	Yeah I just did a recent blog which was about there are two specific disabled manufacturers of clothing – you know semi fashionable clothing or elegant clothing. Having said that I wouldn’t buy any of them and I still buy off the high street. There are certain things you can wear and certain things you can’t. Things that have got Lycra in are brilliant. Modern fabrics are just so much better. 	
rob	And don’t you sell fashionable walking sticks as well?	
fiona	No I don’t sell them I just recommend them. 	
rob	You recommend them, I’m sorry. And what defines a stylish stick? 	
fiona	Well it’s up to me I’m the arbiter. 	
rob	Well you tell me then what your definition is. 	
fiona	No. I mean anything that doesn’t look like an NHS walking stick. And, for example, I wouldn’t necessarily use a Swarovski encrusted walking stick but they do exist and people like them so I’ve said you can get them here. 	
rob	That’s a bit bling, that’s a bit Russian oligarchs isn’t it?	
fiona	I know but you know…	
maysoon	I totally would. I would have a purple Swarovski crystal stick, totally. 	
fiona	Yeah they do look nice but I mean it’s just not my… I mean that’s the thing everybody’s style is different, I’m must giving people an option. And just not the option…	
maysoon 	Do you have the kind that have like a weapon inside them? 	
fiona	No. 	
rob	Like a samurai sword?	
fiona	We’re working on it. 	
maysoon	My basic concept of your people is James Bond so I assume that the walking stick had like an umbrella and a machete inside it.	
rob	And a poison dart. 	
maysoon	And a poison dart. And a small worker. 	
liz	Now that you’ve just been over here and spending time here what is your impression of English people now? Do you still think we’re all James Bond…	
rob	Yeah that James Bond thing…	
maysoon	You can’t cook. 	
rob	…must have gone out the window. 	
maysoon	You cannot cook. I almost got killed every single day because I never caught on to looking down the street the right way. And when I finally did catch on to looking down the street the right way I kept tripping over your silly handicap friendly bumpy cross walks. I don’t understand this, they’re so…	
liz	They’re for blind people. 	
maysoon	Okay but what about the rest of us. It’s just for the blind people and they take no consideration for the deaf guy that trips and falls and breaks his head. Like I literally every time I had to cross walk I pitched myself into the middle of the street because I kept tripping over the bumps. 	
rob	I think it’s just a case of sharing the injury load. 	
maysoon	I felt like I really fit in in London because CP is one of those disabilities like Liz’s is that no-one actually knows what’s wrong with me. So the first guess is always that I’m drunk. And pretty much everyone there was drunk so I fit in really well. And I kept being creeped [sic] out by all the Indian folk with British accents, because I grew up watching them play the terrorists in all the movies in Hollywood like all Arab terrorists are played by Indian actors. So any time I saw or heard one I got really scared. 	
rob	Is this the definition of evil then for American TV viewers you must be Indian but with a British accent.	
maysoon	With a British accent and with an Arab name.	
rob	How peculiar. And an Arab name. 	
maysoon	And then I got to see the floods. I hope you guys are doing better. I got to jump on the train and I saw the floods on the way to Liverpool which was so much nicer than London. 	
rob	And you love scouse cooking as well so I’ve heard? 	
maysoon	I loved the food there, I couldn’t believe it. Number one it’s cheap and anything that’s cheap I’m into, let’s be honest. They had really good cheap food, it wasn’t fried. I went to this place called Moon & Peas and it was just excellent, even the pudding, everything was great. 	
liz	Well we were meant to have, I’m so glad that you were here and chatted away like you wouldn’t believe because we were meant to have the Stelios Disabled Entrepreneur winner, David Hawkins, but he’s gone AWOL. I don’t know what’s going on at all. 	
maysoon	Well you know he asked me out a couple of years ago and I said no because I feel like one disabled person per relationship is more than enough. And I think he took it personally and that’s why he’s not here today. 	
rob	That seems very, very valid. I’m going to buy into that. Maybe he’s just so entrepreneurial he had a brainwave and has rushed off to find Alan Sugar on his yacht. 	
maysoon	Is he related to Stephen?	
liz	We can only assume I mean there can’t be that many Hawk--…no I don’t know. That’s it now. 	
maysoon	He probably is related to Hawkins because he’s disabled and so obviously they’re both disabled they have to be related. 	
liz	Of course. 	
maysoon	I mean me and Liz are second sisters twice removed. 	
liz	Yes absolutely. Well we do all know each it’s true. Rob is constantly going, “How do you know every disabled person?” Of course I don’t but he does think that I do. 	
rob	No she does. 	
maysoon	Are we ever going to do that show together? We were supposed to do a show together. I feel like Fiona could find us a really hip disabled accessible club to do it at. 	
liz	So, Fiona, you find a venue…	
fiona	Yeah I know.	
liz	…then we get Maysoon over. 	
fiona	In fact I know exactly where you should go is the Soho Theatre. It’s brilliant, totally accessible.	
liz	And very accessible. 	
fiona	And it’s full of comedy gigs. 	
rob	Well we started off this debate hoping it would be topical we’ve landed up just with Liz and Maysoon talking about their future work projects. 	
liz	There’s nothing more entrepreneurial than that though, Rob, is there? 	
maysoon	And this is exactly the same thing that happened the last time I was on. But I can talk about anything. Do you want to talk about Morsi declaring himself a dictator in the Muslim Brotherhood? 	
rob	Nah we’ve got to go. 	
liz	You see you do all the good stuff now but we’ve got to get rid of you. 	
maysoon	I can do that.	
liz	No we’ve got to get rid of you. 	
maysoon	Oh okay. 	
liz	But I mean thank you for joining us. We’ve got another two years and obviously you’ll be back on Ouch again. 	
maysoon	Okay. Well I hope that I get to do a show with you in Liverpool before then. 	
liz	Likewise it would be fab. Thank you for joining us. 	
maysoon	And remember at the end of your euthanasia trip I have volunteered to bludgeon you to death with a three-legged dog. So I’m always here for you Liz Carr, always. 	
liz	You are the wind beneath my wings, Maysoon, thank you. 	
maysoon	Goodbye guys. 	
rob	We should explain this very briefly that Liz has been travelling the world going to all the places where euthanasia is legal. 	
liz	And I live to tell the tale. 	
rob	Live to tell the tale. No need for just a one-way Easy Jet ticket, you will return. 	
liz	It will be on the World Service soon but what I’d say is that none of the places that I went to would make blue badge style app, Fiona, they were not pleasant. 	
fiona	Oh really? 	
liz	Not pleasant at all. But your app I was on the website and had a look at it yesterday it’s fab, I wish you every success. 	
fiona	Thank you.	
rob	And when Maysoon does club Liz around the head with a three-legged dog that will not be on Ouch, that’s a YouTube moment. 	
liz	Yeah. 
[Jingle: Ouch talking disability. 
The relaxation in here when the mics are off, what we say to one another, is still not broadcastable. I mean it isn't because of the fact that nobody would understand the shorthand language disabled people use and I love to see that get out there. bbc.co.uk/ouch.]
Continuing the theme of self-employed disabled people here’s another. Hello Mark Campbell. 	
mark	Hello. 	
liz	How are you doing today? 	
mark	I’m fine thank you very much. 	
liz	Well thank you for coming in because it’s a different kind of self-employment though that you do because Mark is a busker on the London Underground. So, Mark, what kind of busking do you do and where can we see you? 	
mark	Well I whistle on my licence it’s rather an interesting tag on my licence I’m described as a human whistler. And I can be seen at Green Park, St. Paul’s, Liverpool Street and Canary Wharf are the regular places that people could spot me. 	
rob	Well let’s hear a clip of you right now. 
[Playing clip]	
liz	It’s a bit like name that tune really. Rob, do you know it? 	
rob	Oh that’s ‘While Shepherds Watch The Flocks By Night’ isn’t it? It’s very Tremulous, there’s a lot of melody there it’s actually a little bit of nuance to it because normally I just hear builders whistling tunelessly. There’s something really sort of quite poignant about that isn’t there? 	
liz	Absolutely. 	
mark	Thanks very much. 	
liz	Yeah. But I love it watching you when you were hearing that, you know when people hear themselves or see themselves on TV they’re like oh my goodness that’s me! And you were like oh no that’s me. 	
rob	I’d recognise that whistle anywhere. 	
mark	It was a bit like that actually. 	
rob	Now you come down to London four days a week is that right? 	
mark	Four days a week. 	
rob	But you commute from where? 	
mark	Wolverhampton. 	
rob	From Wolverhampton which for international listeners is what at least 100…	
mark	120 miles. 	
rob	120 miles away from London. So how did you become a busker and why not busk in Wolverhampton, why come here? 	
mark	Well originally I was out of work for a while and I started busking in Shrewsbury actually. And - it’s quite a long story - but I had been on the dole for a long time, for about 14 months. And I just wondered if buskers made any money. And so I asked my friend who I was with at the time and he said well I don’t know I’ve never paid much heed to whether they make anything or not really. And I said I’m going to give it a go. And so I got a straw hat from an old mate of mine from The Salopian pub in Shrewsbury and we set up by Boots on Pride Hill in Shrewsbury and I said to my mate, “Come back for me in an hour and a half and let’s see what kind of results we get from his tomfoolery.”	
liz	And that was how long ago? 	
mark 	That was in ’93, October ’93. 	
liz	Sorry I’m just eating a banana. I’m nil by mouth, I’m sorry. But what were you doing then? You’ve gone from being what, what was your previous career?	
mark	I worked for West Mercia Police in the communications room at Shrewsbury. 	
liz	Okay. Doing…what did that involve?	
mark	That was like telephony and some radio work. 	
rob	I presume this was an analogue job killed by digital? 	
mark	Basically yeah by centralisation and digitalisation really. I mean when the facilities just weren’t available to enable me to do things like the cad logs and so on. 	
rob	And when you did that first hour and a half then in Shrewsbury how much money did you make? 	
mark	Well it was quite amazing because well I can’t say the expletives that my friend said when he arrived back at the pitch. 	
rob	But they had a jubilant tone to them? 	
mark	He was quite amazed. All I’d heard was chink, chink, chink of coins because one can’t tell much, contrary to people’s opinion, you can’t tell what individual coins are being dropped one’s receptacle. So I was just amazed I thought well I’ve had some coins it’s going to be bits of copper, it might get me another pint and then I’ll go back home to Wolverhampton sort of thing. And it turned out to be £36.84. I’ll never forget that figure. 	
rob	Which 20 years ago…	
mark	Was phenomenal. 	
rob	…substantial. Yeah absolutely. 	
mark	I was phenomenal, you know it was quite amazing. 	
rob	Are they even more generous in London then because it sounds like you could have made a perfectly good living doing it at home and not have the travel costs of coming to the capital.	
mark	No it’s a different ballgame it’s all to do with the psychology of busking. I mean in town, you see on the scheme we have organised booked pitches, we have pre-booked pitches and apart from the very odd occasion when we get can rattlers, charity collectors at close proximity to us at the stations, which fortunately doesn’t happen too often, you’ve got that pitch for yourself for two hours. If somebody doesn’t arrive you can stay longer if there’s no relief. Whereas on the streets some form of permits were issued by councils but it was very undisciplined and unstructured. So you could everybody; you could get Big Issue people pitch up right by you and you had no right the pitches weren’t designated as such. 	
liz	So since that time in Shrewsbury has that been it, this has been your career ever since?	
mark	Yeah since November ’93 I officially sort of called myself a busker. 	
rob	And what do you whistle in the non-festive season? Do you try and keep abreast of what’s hot in the charts?	
mark	No, no, no, no because they’re not – this might sound mercenary – but they’re not the kind of people that would pay my wages. I actually…	
rob	It’s hard to whistle Lethal Bizzle by The Killers.	
mark	Well yeah quite, yeah exactly. 	
rob	You’re more into whistling the Beatles or Frank Sinatra? 	
mark	You have to do a cross through Beatles, Frank Sinatra through to lots of hymns and things like that; people love hymns. I’m not a particularly religious man myself but they’re very popular. Standards as you say, the Frank Sinatra type standards. And then you can settle into what I call a little bit of fun and personal enjoyment mode once you’ve established your day and you get the last half hour and you can do like lots of improvisation then and it’s more interesting for me then. But you have to compromise your own music tastes because you’re not there to please yourself, your there for what the public, or what you perceive the public will want to hear and, touch wood, it works. 	
liz	So you now know what songs are going to bring you good money in?	
mark	I’ve got cycles now. There’s the repertoiric [sic] cycles, if there’s such a word as that. 	
rob	You know when to roll out the hits? 	
mark	Yeah. 	
rob	At peak hours. 	
liz	And the time. I love it. 	
rob	Do you do a sort of mega mix where you can seg from one hit into another or do you always pause for breath and a drink of water?	
mark	Oh yes, , I’m not (unknown), I have to have a little break for a drop of the sparkling Scottish water. 	
liz	You couldn’t be whistling for two hours I mean it must be exhausting. 	
rob	You must get through a lot of chap stick. 	
mark	It’s funny, these are quite valid questions that people ask me and to be perfectly honest with you I’m used to it now and I can’t remember how tiring it was when I first started. But you sort of get lifted, it keeps you going when the drops and when you feel the atmosphere of the people around you passing you by. It’s kind of like a little ego thing I suppose but it keeps you going. And then when you’ve finished and not just the fact if you’ve feel you’ve had a good day money-wise, if you feel that people have been happy with what you’ve done and you feel that’s contributed to their…a little bit of their return home or wherever they’re going.	
liz	So how long have you been performing on the underground?	
mark	2006, June 2006 I started. 	
liz	And can anyone rock up there and start to whistle?	
mark	No, no you have to have auditions. You have to contact TFL. 	
liz	Is it like ‘X Factor’?	
rob	The Busk Factor.	
mark	The Busk Factor. Well no, it’s not quite, thank goodness. You apply to TFL for a form, you fill the form in and then when they’re doing auditions they will contact you, you go and audition. And the audition isn’t just to see how good or bad you are with regard to the music you perform, it’s to actually look at your act, what you’ve got, what you need if you’re amplified, if you take space up. And then if you pass the audition then we have to have CRB checks done and we have to sign a contract. We have to provide…you know…	
liz	So like the police checks.	
mark	And like utility bills to prove that we live in a valid address and then you sign your contract and your licence lasts for a year, and you go to renew your licence sort of...well I go to renew mine every October. 	
liz	So look, I mean was there kind of like a Simon Cowell person because I’m thinking…	
mark	No, no, no, no. 	
rob	Who judges?	
mark	Well I don’t know…	
rob	Who says if you’re good enough or not.	
mark	I never knew to this day who’s on the panel of judges that said that I was fit or worthy enough to busk on the London Underground. It was very quick really. I mean I was really quite nervous because I actually thought this could be quite a landmark thing to get onto the Underground scheme. 	
liz	I really want to know this, Mark, so tell me do you play the blind card much to get more money? 	
Mark	No, no, no. My act which you’ve seen I just have Moses, that’s Moses there – my cane, in my bowl and mainly it obviously it indicates that I’m a blind man but for me it’s there more for security. 	
rob	What to whack someone with it?	
mark	No just to feel. Good God no I’m not a violent man. I just if you feel, well you’d feel if someone was actually trying to move the bowl. I mean lots of money gets stolen especially nowadays I don’t think the pitch would go by without some money being taken which you can’t detect. 	
liz	But you said, I remember you saying at the beginning when you began in Shrewsbury you could hear the coins going in but you didn’t know what they were. Are you now such an expert you know what people are throwing in?	
mark	No, no you never can. 	
liz	Really?	
mark	Much contrary to opinion you can’t tell. You really can’t tell.	
rob	And why do you use a washing up bowl rather than a hat?	
mark	Ah right, that’s very interesting because it’s big and it’s easy, it’s very easy for people not to become too involved with doing something that they may feel a little self-conscious about doing. Whereas with a smaller receptacle people would have to make a more direct approach. Even if they didn’t have to speak to you they’d have to make a more direct approach.	
rob	I can absolutely see how that would be the case. Because I could just chuck some money into a washing up bowl…	
mark	You could be ten feet away. 	
rob	…and not really make any eye contact.	
mark	No none at all. 	
rob	...or talk to you. 	
mark	Not at all. You could stroll past, down the escalator - ching - in and you wouldn’t need to have actually had any contact with me. And you would have thought well I like what he was doing but I was in a rush I didn’t want to have to go out of my stride.	
liz	Whereas if it’s a hat or a violin case you’ve got to make a…	
rob	You’ve got to kneel over and…	
mark	And deal with it, it’s a process isn’t it, it’s a secondary process. There’s like a transactional scenario there isn’t there albeit it’s unspoken maybe but it’s more of a process. And I learned that over the years because, as I say, I started with a straw hat in Shrewsbury and then…	
liz	You moved on to a washing up bowl. I like it. 	
mark	To a washing up bowl. 	
liz	Which is big too. So come on does it fill…how much do you make? This is what we want to know. 	
rob	Without wishing to pry too much. Is it a comfortable living?	
liz	No, no I want to pry. 	
rob	Pry away.	
mark	It is. I’m not going to say obviously what I make but all you have to do really is work out the fact that I travel from Wolverhampton to London four days a week. That should be sufficient to say that I don’t just do it to recoup the train fare. 	
rob	And you employ a helper as well? 	
mark	Yeah. 	
rob	Tell me about…we can see him over there in the studio.	
mark	Well there are others it’s not just Dave. 	
rob	Okay you have a variety. 	
mark	There’s my partner, Mandy, helps me. And then there’s a couple of other lads and Dave and it’s just like a rota really. 	
liz	Okay, Mark, so you’re a busker on the London Underground. Here’s a clip that shows some of the interruptions you can get working in a busy station. 
[Playing clip: Whistling going on. 
Station announcement]
Now it’s good that you played that you see because I don’t really know what it’s like on the underground because as a wheelchair user there’s about two stations I can use, but I’m guessing you’re always having interruptions, how do you… Do you carry on whistling like you did there, is that it?	
Mark	Yeah you do. You see I don’t mind that, to me that’s part of the whole ethos. 	
liz	That you carry on regardless. 	
mark	There are some people who feel: gosh I’m performing here how dare they blast announcements. But I think almost the opposite to that. Sometimes it’s a bit of a pain personally not from anything to do with what music I’m performing, it’s sometimes they’re very loud at some places and you think: oh God shut up. But no it doesn’t bother me at all. That is part of being on the underground. The same with the rattle of trains and the same with things that go on. You want it to be…you want what you’re doing to blend in with the whole ambiance of the moment. 	
rob	And let’s not be in any doubt as to whistling for that length of time is actually quite difficult. Me and Liz attempted to whistle Christmas carols in the production meeting and it’s quite hard work isn’t it? 	
liz	Well I was wondering if Mark would lead us in a live carol that we could whistle along with. Mark would you if you start with something like, I don’t know, ‘Silent Night’ and then we join in. 	
mark	How long are we going to do this for?	
liz	Oh just you know just as a little Christmas…	
rob	Until we or you beg for mercy. 	
liz	Until we start throwing money at you. 	
mark	Oh God Almighty!	
liz	And people throw money at us to stop. 	
rob	Or you could throw some money at us for a change. 	
mark	No, no, no, no that’s not part of the deal. No I always give buskers that I like I always give other buskers money when we pass them. 	
rob	I’d like you to rate us anyway see if you think we’ve got what it takes. 	
liz	Okay, so after three if you would begin, Mark, that would be great. 	
mark	Okay. 	
liz	So, one, two, three. 
[Whistling Silent Night]
Mark, if I could clap I would. Thank you so much. 	
rob	I didn’t realise just how bad at whistling I was until I came up against the best. 
[Jingle: Ouch talking disability.
Rob: 	Do you think that your depression would have taken a 	different form if you weren’t someone in the public 	eye? 
Ruby:	You’ve got to stop saying stuff like this you really do.
Rob:	Why?
Ruby:	Because people don’t hang themselves because they 	had a TV show on BBC4, this is really feeding the 	stigma. This is like laughing at somebody with cancer 	and saying, “Come on do some Scottish dancing.” 
	bbc.co.uk/ouch.]	
liz	Joining us we have the doyen of Paralympic knowledge, Tony Garrett, hello.	
tony 	Hello there. 	
liz	And journalist and producer, Paul Carter. 	
paul	Hello. 	
liz	Now you’re about to become the present of Disability Now’s new rival podcast to this one.	
paul	I am. 	
liz	So we’re lucky we’ve got you here a bit nervous.	
rob	What better place to promote it than the Ouch show. 	
paul 	Thanks for the plug, I appreciate it. 	
liz	Keep your friends close and your enemies closer that’s what they say. You’ve also got your own production company, Little Man Media.	
paul	That’s right yeah. 	
liz	Thank you very much for joining us. We’re going to break down the New Year in a clever quiz, yes we’re going to do that. But, Tony, first of all you’ve been at the Paralympic Festival of Sport which took place in Surrey on December 3rd and 4th – what was that, tell us about it. 	
tony	Yes absolutely. It was an initiative by Paralympics GB to sort of remind folks of the Paralympics and to really start looking for talent and looking ahead for the new sort of tranche of youngsters wishing to come into Paralympic sport. Jonnie Peacock who was one of the stars from the Paralympic Games was there along with loads of other Paralympic athletes to say these are the sports, 20 summer sports, three or four winter sports, this is what it’s all about, come and have a go, come and meet some of the Paralympic legends and give you a chance to find out what’s going on. 	
rob	So was this a really serious training session or more of a glorified autograph hunting…signing?	
tony	I suspect it was more of a glorified autograph hunting session. But the reality is there were 800 to 1,000 people that came through the sports fest over a couple of days. So basically anybody that sort of obviously seen the Paralympics, heard about it might be interested, there were lots of youngsters there. I mean there was quite a lot of young, young, youngsters who’d been brought by their mums to perhaps meet with likes of Jonnie Peacock and a few of our Paralympic athletes. But equally there was a lot of youngsters there that actually wanted to see what was going on, wanted to find out a bit about the sports. You could have a go at rowing, you could do some table tennis, a bit of wheelchair basketball, some shooting, there was football, there was swimming so virtually all of the Paralympic sports were represented there. 	
rob	Even Boccia? 	
tony	Even Boccia.	
paul	And I think that’s a really important point actually, it’s about getting people interested and maybe involved in, you know, considering taking up sport. I mean I think Jonnie Peacock went to an event very similar to that four years before the London Games and that was the first time that he’d had any kind of involvement in active sport. 	
liz	We’ve actually, talking about him now we’ve got a clip of him, so let’s have a listen. 
[Playing clip: 
JP		I think that it is important, you know, 		we’ve gained a huge amount of momentum 			from the Games. And I think days like this are 		the things that we need to do. These are the 			things that we actually need to do to keep that 		momentum rolling forward and making sure 			that we’re keeping the sport nice and 				competitive.
Interviewer:	And how exciting is it for you to think that 			there must be a number of people that are 			coming to these sort of taster days that are 			going to be in the team aren’t they Rio, they’ve 		seen what you’ve done and all the other guys 		and have been inspired. 	
JP		Yeah excited and nervous, you know, like I say 		hopefully there’s not going to be no-one that 		tries to come and beat me. That’s my only 			worry that we’re going to have another person 		and hopefully we’ll have that in every other 			event which I’m really looking for to. I think 		that we’ve got a really strong team at the 			moment so we’ve just got to try and make that 		stronger.]
That was Jonnie Peacock on 5 Live at the Paralympic Festival. So good to see people supporting it. 	
tony	Very much. Paralympics GB over the last three years I would say put a lot of time and resources and effort into talent days. There were quite a few people have come through from the Battle Back, the army programme, that’s one area. But I think there’s been a lot of people out there that actually realised up to a few years ago do you know I could compete at Paralympics, they’ve got perhaps an arm amputee or they’ve got cerebral palsy and various things. And actually do you know what the penny’s dropped and obviously the whole profile of the Paralympics has been raised. So a really good idea. I think Tim Hollingsworth and his team were delighted with the way it went. We got some fairly good press coverage. And I think they’ve got the plans to repeat that sort of event up and down the country during 2013. 	
rob	And Tim Hollingsworth is? 	
tony	The chief executive of Paralympics GB. 	
rob	Why didn’t I know that? 	
tony	Or the British Paralympic Association which we now go to. 	
liz	But that’s not just it because what I was going to say is we’ve had our Paralympic year – is that it? Have they done their bit and was this event kind of like their signing off on it? 	
tony	No I mean it wasn’t necessarily the signing off it was like right we’ve done it but now we’ve got to keep the momentum which is a big buzzword which Tim always likes to use, we’ve got to keep the momentum going because next year, 2013, for a lot of sport it’s European Championships; but two big major world championships, world athletics and worlds women are two of the big events for next year so that’s the whole thing to keep the momentum going. And then of course next year we come into winter sports. 	
rob	But hang on, hang on could we at the end of this year have a Paralympian win ‘Sports Personality of the Year’ for the first time? 	
tony	Well this is the big…	
rob	Is this possible?	
tony	This is the big debate, Paul, isn’t it? I mean we’ve got coming up very shortly three Paralympians in the shortlist of 12. 	
paul	Three of them. Yeah I don’t think, if I’m honest, to be controversial realistically we’ll see one of them win it but I think…	
rob	Who have we got? We’ve got Ellie Simmonds…	
paul	David Weir. 	
rob	Jonnie Peacock.	
rob	And David Weir.	
paul	Jonnie Peacock’s not one of them. 	
rob	Oh not Jonnie Peacock. Who… give me the names. 	
tony	Sarah Storey the cyclist. 	
rob	Sarah Storey, Jonnie Peacock. 	
tony 	No no Jonnie Peacock. 	
rob	No Jonnie Peacock. Ellie Simmonds…	
tony	David Weir.	
rob	…and David Weir.	
liz	I still don’t know who any of them are. 	
rob	I noticed you were keeping quiet stuffing your face with pie number seven.	
liz	I’m stuffing my face with pie. Actually before I do I think it is time to delve back. Are you ready? Is everyone in the studio ready?	
paul	Okay I’m ready as I’ll ever be. 	
liz	To delve back into 2012 to see what you can both remember from the last 12 months. So someone described this year as something of a disability frenzy. Is that just to do with the Paralympics do you think? 	
paul	I don’t think so. I think the Paralympics was obviously a major factor but it’s increased awareness and coverage of disability, and lots of disability programming on television, much more than I can remember in years gone by. And I’m talking kind of mainstream programming, not necessarily programming specifically for ‘disabled people’. But I think the Paralympics certainly fuelled that. But with the Welfare Reform and the News Agenda and all of that I think certainly yeah it has been more disability in the media certainly than there has been before. 	
liz	Not just sport, she says through a pie. 	
rob	There’s going to be another disability to add to yours – diabetes or obesity’s coming your… Listeners she’s devouring these pies. Nil by mouth has been the best excuse for a binge you’ve ever had isn’t it? 	
lIz	Rob, I’ve got like 15 minutes left. I’ve got to get as many pies…	
rob	Down you as possible. No, no this is going to be more interesting than the Christmas quiz to see how many pies Liz Carr can eat in a quarter of an hour. 	
tony	And there’s about six left, Rob. 	
rob	Anyway let’s go on with the quiz. So the first person to shout out the answer correctly you guys will of course get the points. So question number one: on Channel 4’s coverage of the Paralympic Games what was the name of their computer which helped viewers understand the world of categories and classifications? 	
paul	LEXI. 	
rob	Point to you. Why was it called LEXI, any idea?	
paul	I can’t remember exactly what it stands for but it was invented by Giles Long who’s a former swimmer and it was invented to explain the classification in a simpler way for people that weren’t aware of disability sport and had the classification. 	
rob	And did it work? Did it make it simpler? 	
paul	Well it’s an incredibly complicated thing to try and make simple. 	
rob	I gave up long ago trying to deduce it, I must be honest.	
paul	And it used kind of colour coded stick men to try and show how different disabilities affect different people and how those people with… Because often with Paralympic sport people with different disabilities compete together and it was designed to try and break that down. 	
tony	It’s confusing. 	
rob	You’ve lost me. 	
liz	Anyway…	
rob	Liz, next question.	
tony 	Wake up! Wake up! 	
liz	Why did Brazilian runner Alan Olveira gain all the wrong headlines after winning the 200m final on the first Sunday of the games? 	
tony	By beating Oscar Pistorius. 	
rob	Point to Tony. So yes this is true. He accused him of swapping his blades for longer ones to increase his stride. 	
liz	Isn’t that a fair thing to do? 	
rob	Sour grapes. 	
tony	Well you know it caused a lot of debate at the time and I’d say listen out for the news stories in the next month or two because that story will be out…rules could be changing. IPC could be concerned so I think there will be a rule change imminent. 	
paul	I think the point to note with that is that he didn’t actually do anything wrong, he didn’t break any rules as they stood, so to speak. But whether he was within the spirit of the games is a different question. 	
liz	Wasn’t that a quite good thing because as far as I’m aware and I didn’t follow the Paralympics particularly – it got massive headlines and it got people talking? 	
tony	I’ve always said one of the great things about Paralympics is sometimes people say what is this Paralympic Now this year we’ve already sensed they’re a little bit different, people got it generally speaking but you need a good story. I always say come on Paralympics we need a bit of sex, we need a bit of a drugs, rock & roll and a good classification story. And we weren’t disappointed. Don’t think we had much sex and rock & roll. 	
liz	You mean behind the scenes. 	
paul 	Speak for yourself, Tony. 	
tony	Yeah behind the scenes I think there was plenty of partying towards the end of the games in the village. 	
liz	But that’s it and I guess at that point Oscar was still one of the, if not the most, famous Paralympian that so many people…so for it to involve him. 	
tony	Yeah. I mean and that whole outburst was it good, was it bad, was it Oscar’s sour grapes…	
paul 	It got people talking.	
tony	It got people talking I don’t have a problem with it.	
rob	Next question then: why did MPs Charles Walker and Kevan Jones make important headlines this year?	
paul 	Well I might be wrong were they the ones that spoke out about having mental health issues?	
rob	Correct. That is true. They went public about having mental health difficulties. And again we’ve had the Paralympics this year but stories like that show that I don’t know would you say that mental health is also becoming more mainstream as well?	
tony	I think it’s a tough topic, rightly so it’s more discussed. And also just on a little sporty angle Liz just to keep in with the theme, next year’s Special Olympics Summer Games next September. So hopefully it’ll switch a little bit to athletes with learning difficulties. 	
rob	But the mainstream media in the past has not gone anywhere near the Special Olympics, it’s beyond niche and why… Do you think that’s likely to change? I mean why is that? Why is it ignored?	
tony	I think the question will be raised rightly so, the athletes don’t get any lottery funding, it’s not deemed competitive sport which is why the media don’t get too close to it, it’s an awkward one to cover, it’s a mass participation event, real important though for…	
rob	Because you’re making it sound like a school sports day.	
tony	Well I think it’s slightly bigger than that. 	
paul	Yeah.	
liz	Just a big one though	
paul	That’s the image that they’re trying to battle that’s exactly the problem. 	
rob	Sorry organisers. 	
liz	But, Paul, how do you think in this last year the media are doing in terms of mental health? 	
paul	I think it’s been a fabulous year for mental health this year in terms of coverage. There have been a lot of really good campaigns as well. There’s a specific campaign called ‘Time to Change’ which have really tried to do a lot of work with the media to try and change the way that they cover mental health stories and mental health subjects. And things like the Mind Media Awards which are growing every year and they’ve tried to shift the focus to the broadcasters and to the journalists to say, this isn’t something to be scared of and I think we’re seeing the results of that now. 	
liz	With more people kind of coming out. 	
paul	Yeah exactly we’re losing the stigma slowly. 	
tony	It’s got a way to go but I think we’re heading in the right direction. 	
liz	Earlier this year Channel 4 aired a much talked about TV show which hooked disabled people up with prospective partners via an agency: what was that programme called? 	
tony	It wasn’t ‘Come Dine With Me’ because that was the cooking programme a bit later on. 	
paul	It was ‘The Undatables’. 	
tony	Of course it was.	
liz	The Undatables. Apparently second series coming. Should it be? What side of the fence were you on on this one? 	
paul	I think this was one that really and genuinely split the community, to use that phrase. I think it split everyone 50:50. 	
liz	Why?	
paul	Well because I think it was one of those a lot of people criticised it before they saw it and then I think a lot of people then changed their mind when they did see it. I was one of them. I thought it was quite a well-made show. 	
rob	What made you change your mind?	
paul	Because I had preconceptions about how it was going to be handled. I understand the debates about whether or not it should have ever have been made. I personally think that it’s good that it got people talking about the issues. 	
rob	And there’s obviously a hell of a lot of single disabled people out there hence the second series I imagine. This one could run and run.	
 tony	Yeah and I think credit to Channel 4 for picking up on that type of programme. Like Paul I watched and I phoned a couple of friends, “You’ll never guess what’s on?” And they went, “Oh no” you know “now we’ve gone too far this is ridiculous.” I watched a couple of them I wouldn’t say I must…I wouldn’t stay in to watch the next series but if I was passing by and it was on certainly it would be a thing I would look out for. 	
rob	Were the disabled people involved, were they conventionally – how can I put it – hot? 	
liz	This is from the man that used to work for a lad’s mag. So…	
rob	I’m just curious.	
liz	I’m just saying. 	
tony	I didn’t see all…	
liz	I think we should move on. 	
rob	Yeah we’ll talk about that later. All right then. So multiple sclerosis is typically diagnosed in people when they’re in their 20s. Which reality TV star and son of internationally famous rock icon was diagnosed this year at the age of 26?  	
paul	Oh I don’t know. Do you know, Tony?	
tony	Pass. 	
rob	Is that a genuine pass?	
tony	Rock star?	
paul	That’s a genuine pass.	
liz	Do you know what?	
rob	Son of internationally famous rock idol. 	
liz	This is the only one that Rob knew. 	
tony	Son of a rock star.	
rob	It is. And the answer is Jack Osborne, son of former X Factor judge Sharon and Black Sabbath rocker Ozzie. He received the diagnosis three weeks after the birth of his daughter Pearl after having trouble with the vision in one eye. Apparently he’s going to be using a combination of daily drug treatments, holistic therapies and lifestyle changes to help him along. And he told Hello that “That after at first feeling angry and upset he has now taken on an attitude of adapt and overcome.” What a mature minded young man.	
tony	So was this as the baby was being born that this all happened.	
rob	Yes I think so, three weeks after the birth. 	
tony	Oh right. Not actually during the birth. 	
rob	No that would be unfortunate.	
tony	I’m just checking, yeah I’m just… Okay. It was getting a bit close to the edge there. 	
rob	So nobody gets a point there. 	
liz	Nil pois. 	
tony	You do, Rob. 	
rob	I get a point I suppose yeah. 	
liz	Have a half-eaten pie, Rob, that’s your prize. 	
rob	Thank you. I hate to deprive you of your eighth pie.	
liz	I’m keeping score.	
rob	Right. Going back to January this year a grass roots paper about benefit changes called Responsible Reform was crowd sourced and funded in a ground-breaking manner by social media and it then trended on Twitter. But what the report popularly known as? 	
paul	Was it ‘The Spartacus Report’? 	
rob	Correct. Followed up with a part two in November. The energy behind it came from campaigners Sue Marsh and Kaliya Franklin and others. And I thought that was the most arcane question of the lot and you steamed in there. So maybe you can tell me a little bit more about this a language I understand. What ultimately is all this going to mean? 	
paul	Well it was a campaign kind of put together by disabled people to kind of drive the agenda and I think a lot of disabled people felt that they were being…swimming upstream a little bit and slightly swamped by government rhetoric and all that kind of thing and the spin that was coming out. And this was designed to try and counter some of that and try and give us a bit of power back I think. And I think it’s been a real kind of refreshing change to actually see disabled people come together and really campaign and push for something on a united front, or a much more united front than we’ve had in a long, long time. The disability community is obviously traditionally very fractious and it’s very difficult to get everyone singing from the same hymn sheet and I think they’ve gone a fantastic job in pushing for that. And obviously the Welfare Reform went through in the end but I think we’ve had a louder voice than we’ve had for a long time before. 	
tony	Definitely.	
rob	And certainly very true what you say there about there’s nothing more difficult on this earth than to get a group of people with disabilities to agree about something. 	
paul	Exactly. 	
rob	Almost impossible. And whose question is it now? 	
liz	I think we’re on the last question. 	
rob	Oh right you ask the last question then, Liz. 	
liz	And then we’ve got the scores which I’m very excited about. How has four year old Seb White contributed to an inclusive Christmas for one chain store? 	
paul	I have absolutely no idea. 	
liz	Really blank faces.	
tony	I know it’s scary. 	
liz	Yeah.	
tony	One could reel off a whole load of chain stores but that would just be purely cheating I guess.	
liz	Shall I tell you? 	
paul	Yes.	
liz	Shall I tell you? So Seb White is a lad from Bath who has Down’s syndrome and he’s in the M&S TV and Christmas catalogue. Basically what happened on Marks and Spencer’s Facebook page his mum Caroline asked why disabled children weren’t represented and this is what happened. 	
tony	That’s sweet.	
paul	Fabulous.	
rob	Heart rendering, poignant. 	
liz	Oh you are bar humbug himself aren’t you?	
roB	I’m hugely bar humbug. 	
liz	The winner is…	
rob	I’m having Chinese on Christmas Day.	
liz	Wow. The winner – I’m doing my drum roll – yes it’s quite obviously Paul. Paul, congratulations. Your prize is either one of my half eaten mince pies.	
paul	Right. 	
liz	Or you get to name your three disabled people of the year 2012 for you.	
paul	Well the thing is I’m probably going to get attacked by everyone that I don’t name if I name one of the three. 	
rob	Sounds good. 	
tony	You’ll be safe.	
liz	The three faces, go on.	
tony	Three faces.	
paul	Okay my three faces of the year, okay. Well they’re going to be largely sport biased I think. But I would have to say Hannah Cockcroft who’s a paralympian wheelchair athlete. And Jonnie Peacock just because I think that they’ve done more than anyone to really change the image of Paralympic sport and to actually give young disabled people role models which is something I don’t think a lot of young disabled have had for a long time. And we talked about her briefly – she’s going to hate me for saying this – but I’m actually going to say Kaliya as well just because she’s worked so hard over this past year often at the detriment of her own wellbeing at points and I think she deserves a bit of recognition for some of the stuff that she’s done.	
liz	So Kaliya Franklin? 	
paul	Yeah. 	
rob	Well, Paul, you are the Ouch Quiz Champion of 2012. 	
paul	Yea me! 	
rob	And festive salutations to you both, Tony and Paul. 	
paul	Thank you. 	
tony	Thank you very much indeed.	
liz	We’ll be back in the second week of January with a slightly jaded post festivities programme and it might be a bit of a struggle to put it together so if you’ve got any ideas then please tweet, Facebook and email us. Find out how via our blog bbc.co.uk/ouch. 	
rob	The producer has been Damon Rose, with thanks and festive cheer also going to studio manager, Phil Hutchinson, Katharine Gogharty and Emma Tracey. 	
liz	We’re going to leave you with another burst of Mark Campbell busking on the tube. This is ‘God Rest You Merry Gentlemen.’	
liz and rob	Happy Christmas to all and to all a good night. 
[Whistling]