Harvey gets a rare break in a harsh world

THE overwhelming response to Harvey And Me, the BBC documentary about Katie Price and her severely disabled son Harvey as he reached his 18th birthday, did not just redeem the model’s reckless image but culminated in a tantalising opportunity for her train-obsessed son.

Impressed by Harvey’s potential as a train announcer, which he readily displayed during the documentary’s visit to Waterloo station in London, a British rail company has invited him to do a stint as an announcer.

Youngsters like Harvey, who has complex needs, almost never get job offers because hiring someone who suffers from severe autism, or in his case Prader-Willi syndrome and blindness, involves risk and may slow down the model of ruthless efficiency that has become the driving force in business.

For that reason, for families of youngsters like

Harvey, terms like inclusion and diversity must seem little more than empty buzz words, part of the currency of discourse around special needs which pretends that society is adapting to accommodate disabled people, when in fact the onus is still on disabled people to learn the tools and rules of engagement.

But even this State’s minimal part of the bargain has come to a grinding halt with the failure of special needs schools to open this month. Some youngsters may catch up but others will regress irreversibly and simply run out of time. They may never get the opportunity that Harvey has of realising their potential and being entrusted with a task that previously was considered out of their league.