Four years on an iPhone in bed later, Who Wants Normal? is finally out in the world today. Part memoir, part guide, it features 50+ of Britain’s best known disabled women. I hope it makes you laugh, possibly cry, and feel seen. Order all formats here: https://t.co/X7bzFYc6Ft

Get a copy here or from your preferred book provider:  https://t.co/bZdmNsSPBE

Always a pleasure to be in the Bedside Guardian - our round up of 2025 with “the most revealing interviews, thought-provoking commentary and reporting from the last 12 months.” My bit is July’s column on the welfare reform debate. Other more cheerful topics are available.

Happy International Day of People with Disabilities to all who celebrate by buying a book by a disabled author for everyone on their Christmas list.

“There are moments to celebrate and there are moments to not be complacent. Sometimes, it is both. 8 years of work have at last rid the country of the benefit limit. And yet the backlash it provokes shows starkly how progress is an uphill battle.” My col

“No one can pretend they didn’t know the harm it was causing. Politicians – both those with a blue or a red rosette – let it continue anyway.” My col. on the end of the two child limit (and a climate that means even feeding toddlers get a backlash).

Cheering the two child limit ending isn’t patting Labour on the back or ignoring the rest. It’s acknowledging 8 years of campaigning and ridding the country of a cruel, toxic policy. Half a million children won’t be hungry anymore. Celebrate today. Tomorrow, pick the next fight.

And the two child benefit limit is abolished. An enormous victory for those who have campaigned tirelessly for eight long years through successive governments. At least 450,000 children lifted out of poverty. Fewer kids hungry. No more women forced to disclose their rape.

If you’re eligible for the mobility part of PIP, you can spend *your own money* topping it up for a great accessible car. Critics should ask: Why are you against this? What it is about disabled people that makes you believe it’s wrong to have nice things they paid for themselves?

“The Motability scheme was set up to protect the most vulnerable. Not to subsidise the lease on a Mercedes Benz,” Reeves says. Misleading and nasty in equal measure.

Thank you for all your lovely birthday messages. Back at work for the Budget tomorrow. I’ve remembered I’m still comparatively young compared to Britain’s beloved boomer columnists so don’t worry about that shift to the right!

“Viewers of a certain age may find themselves in a flashback to Tomorrow’s World unveiling an invention called “the cassette player” and feel the fabric of time fold in on itself.” I reviewed @chrismccausland doc on the future of tech (and disability).

I reviewed Chris McCausland: Seeing into the Future - a mind-blowing doc that does a great job of showing how tech can transform disabled people’s lives (but could do more on the tension in how much of it is made by The Worst Men On Earth).

I’m officially no longer a young columnist. Watch out for my new era in the British commentariat with pieces including, “why house prices are very reasonable, actually” and “keep your hands off my pension.”

Worth remembering as this unfolds that it was disabled people and ethnic minorities who disproportionately died. Tens of thousands needlessly lost their lives, many who died alone or with just an iPad. Thousands more were left with life changing Long Covid. A true scandal.

I’m heartbroken to hear of the death of Alice Wong. She was a powerhouse of the disability rights movement and on a personal level, generously gave her time to me over the years. I know she will be missed immensely by those who knew her and those who felt her presence online.

“Policies that favour ordinary people are disregarded as a fantasy, whereas those that push wealth and power towards the rich are seen as a realistic status quo.” My col. on a politics and media that normalises Reform and dismisses the Greens.

“Here’s the bias of politics: leftwing policies are portrayed as unrealistic and childish, while the centre and right’s ideas are framed as sensible and all that’s possible.” My column on a system that welcomes Reform and dismisses the Greens as fantasy.

“It is essentially Game of Thrones if Cersei was a hyena and everyone was competing for some dinner. Watching the opening title sequence, you half expect Sean Bean’s face to pop up on the northern border.” I review David Attenborough’s new doc, Kingdom.

As Kemi Badenoch u-turns on deporting people who have lived here for decades, I wrote today’s column on Britain’s new wave of anti-migrant policy: pesky foreigners are milking the bloated benefits system.

This is a striking example of what I argue in today’s column. Reform and the Tories are out here gleefully saying disabled people on Motability should be forced to drive a 3-wheeler, like a scarlet letter. The stigma is not an accident - it’s the design.