“Stammering is the one disability that is socially and politically acceptable to mock because everyone thinks that we are a joke”

Prominent local Liberal Democrat Chris Nelson has decided to step away from the political arena following a growing amount of abuse

By Sarah Ward

When the general election comes around, the Kettering contest will sadly be without one of its usual faces.

Yesterday Liberal Democrat Chris Nelson - who has stood against Conservative MP Philip Hollobone on two occasions since 2010 - made a public announcement that he has decided not to stand for election due to the growing amount of abuse he is receiving due to his stammer.

The abuse has been both from members of the public and shockingly from within the local political environment. His X (formerly Twitter) post yesterday has made an impact and has now been seen by 176,000 people, with many messages of support, but also more messages of abuse. 

We spoke to Chris about what it feels like to be a stammerer and why he wants the ‘silent majority’ to stand with him and the country’s one million fellow stammers to call out abuse.

“One of my first memories is going to speech therapy when I was three,” said Chris, who has had his stammer since as long as he can remember.

A form of neurodiversity, around one in 50 people have a stammer, with men three times more likely than women to be affected. Chris, 37, has long been involved in local politics and is an active member of the Liberal Democrats, seen at many an election hustings or out on the doorsteps, but after a growing amount of abuse directed at his disability he says he can take no more.

“You can take it and put on a brave face but it just accumulates,” he said. “And I’ve now decided that I can’t put up with this. The situation is becoming worse and worse, particularly within politics.

“I feel that stammering is the disability that is socially and politically acceptable to mock because everyone thinks we are a joke, people without thoughts or feelings.

“But we need to challenge this and people need to realise the effect it has. I feel like the only thing I can do now is to get out of the system and complain about it.

“I have tried before, but everyone has ignored me - this is the first time anyone has noticed.”

Chris, who is a teacher, says the abuse he receives, which can take the form of mimicking or ridicule, is not constant, but consistent. It reaches into every corner of his life, on one occasion his own bank hung up on him after it called and he was stammering.

In the summer he had an incident with a local politician (who he does not want to name) who abused him in the street. He reported the summer incident to the police, but says he had to insist on the police acting and it was logged as a hate incident, with the person just receiving a letter.

He says:

“Each individual instance may not be that serious, but when you add that up over a lifetime it is incredibly hurtful.

“These things have an accumulative impact - what may seem like a bit of a laugh to one person, is not, as this will not have been the first time the person has heard that, it may have been the 500th time.

“It feels like we are treated like dirt and that is the social problem that we need to address.

“Why can’t we be treated with the same respect as everyone else?”

After he posted his public statement yesterday on X, he even had people mock his statement. He reported the incident to X, but within two hours he had received a response that the tweet had not been judged as offensive. He has now made a police complaint.

He said:

“Of course the vast majority of people are decent, but the minority who are not, are not facing consequences.

“I don’t know whether that is due to lack of resources, or lack of political will.”

He says there needs to be a shift in society about what is acceptable.

“I think the biggest thing that could be done, is that people call it out when they see it. It is down to the silent majority. As a culture we need to stop tolerating it.”

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Chris’s statement in full:

“It is with great regret that I must now announce and explain my withdrawal from consideration as a parliamentary candidate for Kettering constituency, which is a direct result of the accumulation of abuse that I have received both towards both my stammer and my personal safety from members of our local community.

“Having been the most recent Lib Dem parliamentary candidate in my hometown of Kettering, and convinced that candidates are important to give the voters a choice, my personal wellbeing has nonetheless caused me to decline offers to be renominated. This reflects a growing national trend of abuse towards politicians, as reported in the national press, causing a shortage of parliamentary candidates in all parties. I am sure that there will be a Liberal Democrat candidate for Kettering, who I look forward to supporting, but I understand the difficulties that this will cause my colleagues.

“When I was first selected as Lib Dem candidate for Kettering in 2010, as possibly the youngest person to do so, I was deeply honoured to stand as one of only a handful of people with an openly audible stammer to have stood for Parliament in the modern era. I stood knowing that, despite over half a million audibly stammering adults in the UK, jokes about and discrimination against stammering remains socially acceptable for many in both society and the media. 

“I expected to weather robust and sometimes emotional political debate, as a necessary part of the political process. I was not, however, prepared for the deeply personal abuse that would follow, the extent to which a minority of voters and fellow politicians would abuse me, and the extent to which the police and other authorities would be institutionally reluctant to assist.

“The abuse that I have endured has proved intolerable - even if I must acknowledge it to be but a fraction of that weathered by women and ethnic minority candidates. Whether aimed directly at my stammer, or the simple abuse of the playground bully, I have been physically squared up to on the doorstep, verbally abused and physically chased on the street, had audio recordings of radio broadcasts used to mock my speech online, witnessed ordinary voters fantasise about hanging me from a lamppost, as well as writing to my employer to demand that I be sacked. From other politicians, too, I have either witnessed or been informed of cruel personal jokes, mocking of my speech, seen my disability described as “an embarrassment” , and was notably informed of one politician who used an election count to gleefully ask a colleague “How’s C-C-C-C-C-Chris doing?”. Such abuse is not only puerile, it is made with impunity.

“Having endured all of the above with grace, the final straw for me came in August 2023 where one of those politicians - who I had come to forgive and began to regard as a friend - abused my stammer in a public street not far from my own home. This incident was recorded as a disability-related hate incident by Northamptonshire Police, who I nonetheless had to beg through tears even to agree to interview the sitting councillor who had witnessed the incident. The Police decided not to even interview the perpetrator, sending merely a warning letter. I continue to receive counselling. They remain an active member of the local political community.

“When I have stood as a parliamentary candidate on four separate occasions I did so not with any high hopes of victory but as a service to our political life. Whilst I am proud of all four campaigns, I did so like so many others do: to fly the flag for a strand of political thought that deserves a representative, and to give the voters a choice. Thousands of others do exactly the same in every general election: they are the lifeblood of our democracy, yet as this week's report on abuse against politicians relates, the growing levels of abuse means more and more people like me are being driven out of the political process.

“As a stammerer, with the abuse that I have suffered, it is difficult to believe that this is getting any better. When Ed Balls stammered in response to the 2012 Budget, he was abused mercilessly. In the last General Election, a national newspaper group praised as “absolutely perfect” a YouTube video which shamefully put together a compilation of a politician's stammering under the jaunty title of “It’s Stammer Time”. Even this year, as Donald Trump has openly mocked and mimicked Joe Biden's stammer, British media outlets have continued to report his abuse without criticism.

“Whilst abuse is only ever done by a minority, the decent majority continues to fail in challenging and calling it out. Stammering remains the disability that it is politically acceptable to mock and belittle, and I refuse to be a part of it.

“This June my family will commemorate the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Normandy, where my grandfather Arthur Nelson fought bravely, and was scarred for life by this experience. When thinking of him I am forced to notice he was sent there by a stammering Prime Minister, appointed by a stammering King, commanded by a general appointed by a physically disabled US President. 80 years later, such tolerance and respect seems almost unthinkable.

“I remain grateful for the support of my political party and call on all political parties - and all members of society - to do more to challenge the torrent of abuse we are tolerating in our body politic. If we do not do more to protect the people that make our political process work, it is democracy that will pay the price.”

Apologies for the lateness of today’s post. (Half term logistics). Things will be back to normal service for tomorrow’s Friday brief.