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Frequent tweeting doesn't make one a benefit cheat, Nadine Dorries

The Conservative MP's insinuations about a disabled constituent who uses Twitter reveal prejudice and ignorance

• • Lucy Glennon
    
    
  • theguardian.com, Saturday 2 October 2010 01.39 AEST
    
  • Jump to comments (248)
    

Nadine Dorries, MP for Mid Befordshire, urged readers of her blog who knew heavy users of Twitter to email her office 'or, better still, if it's someone you know is on benefits, contact the DWP' Photograph: Adrian Sherratt / Rex Features

Nadine Dorries, the Conservative MP for Mid Bedfordshire, on Thursdayurged her blog readers to report to the Department of Work and Pensions people who tweet more than 50 times a day and claim benefits. She had apparently being told of a tweeter who has posted 34,500 times in a few months. This tweeter is Humphrey Cushion, who is disabled through arthritis, yet does not qualify for disability living allowance. She had to give up work as a home carer, as she is currently on a waiting list for two foot operations. If someone tweeted so frequently, Dorries wrote, then clearly they had nothing wrong with their hands or mind and should therefore be fit for work.
Yesterday, I posted around 70 tweets more than the amount Dorries feels is enough for me to have a compulsive tweeting syndrome. Because of my condition, epidermolysis bullosa, my hands are not in good condition. I cannot really do anything with my left hand at all, as all the fingers are fused together, and the thumb is fused to the palm. I'm having hand surgery soon to correct this and separate the fingers. Yet I still somehow tweet; something which takes seconds to do, and requires little effort. My 70 tweets started at around 5am, where I woke in pain that left me unable to walk properly for the rest of the day. I conversed with friends, and I read and shared useful information. I made social arrangements with a friend who was going to visit me in the evening, and she asked if I needed any food bringing. Twitter is an absolute lifeline for someone like me; it stops any feelings of isolation. Even when I have my left hand operated on, and it is bandaged and in a sling, I will continue to tweet with one hand.
Kaliya Franklin, a disabled blogger and activist, brought Dorries's blog to the attention of her Twitter followers. Many were angry at the ignorance and misunderstanding of disability, which is more prevalent since cuts in welfare benefits were announced. The line between benefit cheats and genuinely disabled claimants has become been blurred, and disabled people are frequently pilloried by newspapers. Similarly, Louise Bolotin is a disabled journalist who frequently tweets as part of her work, as do many other companies who are aware of social media and its uses.
Following the Twitter outcry, Dorries responded with another blogpost, in which she writes that she has no problem with disabled people using the internet to chat to friends, but has an issue with people who:

"... Twitter all day, every day about claiming disability benefit in one tweet whist arranging a night out in the pub in the next. If you tweet about claiming six months rent from the social fund whilst tweeting how bad your hangover is and if you stride into political meetings and shout the odds with energy and enthusiasm with no sign of any physical disability and if you claim to work for the Labour party and write porn at the same time as claiming your disability benefit then don't expect someone like me not to a) inform the authorities and b) tell you to get off your Twitter and get a job."