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Guardian columnist leaped to the defence of redbrick graduates now supposedly dominating Jeremy Corbyn¡¯s shadow cabinet. The journalist objected to a recent article on Labour¡¯s ¡°brain transplant¡± under its new leader in The Spectator and to Tristram Hunt¡¯s appeal to University of Cambridge students ¨C whom he called the ¡°top 1 per cent¡± ¨C to recapture the Labour Party. Mr Jones, a University of Oxford graduate, said the dominance of Oxbridge in politics was not good for democracy. ¡°We need far more balance ¨C including from redbrick universities¡­and those who haven¡¯t been to university in the first place,¡± he added. That message has not permeated The Guardian itself, where, Mr Jones said, many staff are drawn from the two institutions.

¡°Would you send your children to one of these colleges?¡± That was the question from James O¡¯Brien, host of BBC Two¡¯s Newsnight, to Jo Johnson, the universities and science minister, on 6 November as he highlighted recent scandals about for-profit institutions of dubious quality benefiting from public funding, and questioned the minister about the higher education Green Paper. It brought an uncomfortable three-second silence from Mr Johnson as he worked out how best to answer. ¡°Where there¡¯s high-quality education, we should be encouraging people to go to university,¡± was what he eventually managed. ¡°I can¡¯t work out whether that¡¯s a ¡®yes¡¯ or a ¡®no¡¯, Jo,¡± responded Mr O¡¯Brien. ¡°There are lots of routes in life,¡± countered the minister. The Huffington Post as ¡°cringe-worthy¡±.

More awkward questions elsewhere ¨C specifically for the Higher Education Funding Council for England and the Office for Fair Access on how to comment on a Green Paper that spells the end of their existence. Madeleine Atkins, Hefce¡¯s chief executive, went for euphemism in saying the organisation would ¡°look forward to contributing to the debates and developments it will foster¡±. Les Ebdon welcomed the Green Paper¡¯s ¡°proposal that the director of fair access should play a specific and strengthened role within the proposed new Office for Students¡±. Given that Professor Ebdon is the director of fair access, it¡¯s no surprise that he welcomed the prospect of his continued employment. Other staff in the two bodies will also be hoping to keep their jobs if the OfS is born, a hope that will be shared by many in the sector.

A students¡¯ union officer accused of tweeting ¡°#killallwhitemen¡± will not face prosecution, on 4 November. Bahar Mustafa, a diversity officer at Goldsmiths, University of London, was charged with sending a grossly offensive message via a public communication network, but the case was dropped shortly before she was due in court. The allegations against Ms Mustafa, which she denied, surfaced after she said in a Facebook posting that white people and men of any ethnicity should not attend a students¡¯ union event intended for ethnic minority women. She had claimed that as an ethnic minority woman, she ¡°cannot be racist or sexist towards white men, because racism and sexism describe structures of privilege based on race or gender¡±. Mike Schwarz, her solicitor, told The Guardian that the Crown Prosecution Service¡¯s handling of the case ¡°calls into question their ability to make sensible judgments on delicate issues¡± around free speech.

Rather more damagingly for Oxford, it was also under the microscope after it was urged to review its decision to accept a ?75 million donation from Russian ¡°oligarch¡± Len Blavatnik, Britain¡¯s richest man, to create the Blavatnik School of Government. Signatories to a on 3 November urged Oxford to ¡°stop selling its reputation and prestige to Putin¡¯s associates¡±, arguing that in 2008 and 2009 a large number of BP¡¯s workforce in Russia was ¡°forced out¡± in a dispute between the company and a group of Russian billionaires, among them Mr Blavatnik. The letter attracted widespread media coverage and prompted Observer columnist Nick Cohen on 8 November that ¡°when universities take millions from Russian oligarchs or Saudi theocrats they are doing what the Conservatives want them to do: relieving the burden on the taxpayer by establishing a public-private partnership¡±.