Carol Vorderman discusses her son Cameron’s special education needs

Carol Vorderman, 60, appeared alongside her son Cameron King, 24, on Wednesday’s This Morning, with the mother-son duo speaking candidly about Cameron’s special education needs.

Former Countdown host Carol – whose son has high spectrum autism, ADD, dyslexia and ADHD – was visibly emotional when she revealed that when Cameron was ‘four or five’ she moved him to a new London school, however was told by teachers ‘we can’t have him here’ as ‘we can’t teach him’.

Touching upon being labelled ‘disruptive’ in school, Cameron explained: ‘That was the whole thing. Being disruptive… it was in a maths lesson. You’re panicking so much on keeping the rhythm with everyone else. When I can’t answer it quickly enough, you’d be disruptive because you couldn’t answer.’

Sharing just how protective she felt of her son in his younger years, Carol said: ‘As a mother, a single parent [you want to] protect, protect, protect. Like a lioness.’

She added: ‘I didn’t want him to grow up with labels,’ before saying that there were ‘early signs’ of her son’s learning difficulties, explaining that while her eldest child Katie King, 30, was able to ‘learn the alphabet easily’ Cameron ‘couldn’t retain information’.

Carol explained Cameron needed ‘an enormous amount of assistance’ and ‘went through bullying as a kid’.

She elaborated: ‘It’s a long road. Your heart, your world is unhappy. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t give up telly – not that I wouldn’t give up telly. I didn’t know how to teach him.’

Of his own experience, Cameron said: ‘If I had the option to go back in time and change my school life – there wasn’t a single day above neutral in terms of enjoyment because of the bullying – I wouldn’t change that, because it’s taught me how to deal with life.’

Cameron recently achieved a first class Animation and Video Effects Master’s degree from the University of Dundee and of the accomplishment said: ‘I never thought I’d get this far.’

It comes after Cameron, who also revealed that he is starting ‘his first job next week’, drew the support of thousands after sharing his experience of growing up with special educational needs last week.

Carol and Cameron are hoping that by raising awareness of his struggle, others will be inspired to support a campaign spearheaded by The Sun that seeks to ‘close the £434million shortfall in funding for children with physical and learning disabilities’.

Carol said: ‘Once you told your story a week ago, Cam, we had a massive response from thousands of parents.

‘I was brought up poor so I really understand that. I want to do something, start a campaign, start a conversation.’

Carol shares both Cameron and Katie with her ex-husband Patrick King.