JAMIE CULLUM - DAHL HITS BACK AT CULLUM HEIGHT JIBES

Diminutive singer JAMIE CULLUM has been unfairly subjected to a media smear campaign over his height, according to his "horrified" girlfriend SOPHIE DAHL. The couple has been the subject of much press scrutiny since they unveiled their relationship last year (07) with many focusing on the 15-centimetre (six-inch) difference between the pair. But 1.8-metre (six-foot) Dahl is furious and compares the taunts to racial discrimination, insisting people should be ashamed to criticise 1.65-metre (five-foot six-inch) Cullum over of his short stature. She says, "I have watched with a mixture of bewildered horror and amusement the super-strange reaction to the fact that I'm quite a bit taller than my boyfriend. "Height is one of those things that you can't do a whole lot about. It's a bit like colour. I doubt very much there would have been such a vocal response to our coupling because that's out of bounds. "Yet the image of us together has been treated like a carnival show. It's sad because what is lost in the sniggering is that we happen to be two people who met, fell in love and will probably produce fairly average-sized children."