CHARLOTTE CHURCH: It seems Charlotte Church and I have something in common. We both have the voice of an angel and are married to people who’s surnames are synonymous with The Muppets. No, although that would be fun, we both have daughters with a slightly odd – and occasionally scary – condition.
According to news reports “Little Ruby, two, was diagnosed with Breath Holding Spells (BHS) by doctors, which makes the tot hold her breath and lose consciousness for up to a minute at a time.”
Miss Church was quoted as saying “She will hold her breath until she passes out. The first time it happened it was absolutely horrendous. We've been taught to bring her round by spraying her face with water.
“Each time it's happened she's been fine afterwards but it causes Gavin and me a lot of worry.”
Until I read the press reports I didn’t even know there was a proper medical condition for it. Ever since Seren was about 18 months old, when she gets really cross she blacks out.
And it is quite scary. She goes a funny colour, her lips turn purple, and then eventually – anything up to a minute – she comes spluttering back into life like a car that has just been started using jump leads.
Normally when she comes round she’s no longer cross – I guess it must be a little disorienting. But just recently, as she’s got older, she begun to come round and that fact that she’s feeling a little odd at having blacked out just makes her even more cross. She reaches ‘livid’.
At no point did we ever even consult a doctor. Why you might ask? Because – and regular readers may already know the answer to this – I used to do exactly the same thing as a child. It must be in the blood...
QUESTION TIME: So Question Time featuring the BNP came and went with more than a little furore. To my mind the whole thing was a farce.
Nick Griffin made the mistake of starting on the defensive. Hardly surprising perhaps, when for months if not years he’s been vilified in the national press.
The rest of the panel started the programme very much on the attack.
My main issue was the questions. The programme just became a vehicle for various people to rant about the BNP.
The programme became everything the BNP wanted it to be... they can now turn around and say they put up a candidate who was just attacked.
The questions should not have been about the BNP itself. They should have picked a topic – immigration for example – and allowed Nick Griffin to offer his views on it. Nothing more.
Give him chance and he would probably have committed political suicide on national television.
We, the viewer, are intelligent enough to make our own mind up.
Instead he can just say he was victimised, abused, and never really given the chance to speak properly.
Don’t get me wrong, I have no sympathy whatsoever with the party. But I don’t think in the history of Question Time any party has ever fielded a panellist simply so the rest of the room can hurl insults in their direction.
The whole rationale for inviting the BNP on the show was that they are now an elected party. But they were not treated like it. Nick Griffin was more than capable of making a fool of himself, he didn’t the progamme’s help...