Some people’s postcode wins them the lottery. Mine gets me randomly targeted to do a survey for the Office for National Statistics. I agreed to do it. Facts are precious and ONS data informs every bit of policy shaping our lives, to infinity and beyond.
My survey is the labour force one, providing official measures of employment and unemployment. Next time job figures make the news, one of them’s me. Maybe. During four long phone interviews, often unintentionally hilarious, I have baffled unfortunate staff and frozen their computers. So many questions are genuinely unboxtickable. So many answers unsayable. Such as:
Q: Before we begin, are you driving or doing anything that requires your full attention?
A: I’m driving my mobility scooter up a track. I’ll ring off if I encounter a bear.
Q: How is your general health?
A: Not being funny, but is my starting base a tetraplegic who’s not dead yet or a fit person with a useless body?
Q: Do you have any long-term physical conditions expected to last 12 months or more?
A: 12 months? You kidding? Your insensitivity appals me. I demand compensation.
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Q: Did you receive our £25 e-voucher gift card that entitles you to buy things from many famous retailers? A: Yes, but because I’m actually a flustered old klutz I failed in my attempts to log on to the platform to choose one. So I threw it in the bin.
Q: Do your health conditions reduce your ability to carry out day-to-day activities?
A: My knitting is seriously impaired. Bizarrely, however, I can still do what other fit people can’t, like clean the loo.
Q: Overall, how satisfied are you with your life nowadays (scale of 1-10)?
A: A philosophical conundrum. I’m alive. That’s either a 1. Or a 10. It varies.
Q: To what extent do you feel that things you do are worthwhile?
A: Carrying on working means I can treat the men in my life in the manner to which they’re accustomed. Ask them.
Q: Overall, did you feel happy yesterday? Answer yes or no.
A: At 14.00, I experienced fleeting bliss as I ate a Double Decker and watched some Olympics. Is that a yes?
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Q: On a scale of 0 to 10, how anxious did you feel yesterday?
A: 04.15, rigid with impending doom. 14.00, eating Double Decker.
Q: How much overtime do you work?
A: Haven’t a scooby. Journalism doesn’t work like that. Unfathomable amounts, since everything about me is snail-paced: two-fingered typing, rural broadband, brain.
Q: What hours do you work?
A: About 10-12 hours a day, multiple split shifts, usually finishing at midnight. Normal people would take a third of the time.
Q: What is your main health problem?
A: Good question. There’s a super league.
Q: Is it a) hands and arms, b) legs and feet, c) neck and back, d) difficulty seeing, e) hearing, f) speech impediment, g) skin conditions, h) breathing problems, i) heart, blood pressure, circulation, j) diabetes, k) depression, l) learning difficulties, m) mental illness, phobia, n) progressive illness, o) other.
A: I don’t have diabetes or learning difficulties. Or a speech impediment.
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Q: Is your illness progressive?
A: Not in the way you think it is. Er, can’t you just write “spinal paralysis” in a box?
Q: I’ll try. No. Computer insists you answer all the other questions first. Do you have epilepsy or stomach, liver, kidney or digestive problems?
A: FFS.
Q: Are you physically disfigured?
A: Another cerebral question. And wholly subjective. Haven’t you heard of identity politics, where everyone’s body is considered beautiful?
We did our best. It was amusing. But here, if the ONS would like some advice from the dark side, are the proper questions to ask disabled people about work (though I see the organisation’s officially dropping the “d” word):how severely crocked are you? What wouldn’t you give for a job? How totally lucky does it feel, having one? Does work help you cope? Are you grateful you’re not dead? Does paying tax make you feel less guilty for the hundreds of thousands of NHS budget you’ve gobbled up? Are surveys like this a mordant delight? Score all 1-10.
@Mel_ReidTimes
Melanie Reid is tetraplegic after breaking her neck and back in a riding accident in April 2010
