Badly educated
Sir: Proof positive that the metropolitan chattering class knows (and cares) more about South Africa than it does about Scot- land was provided by Alice Miles last week when she made the ridiculous claim that 'of the 22 members of the [Blair] Cabinet, 18 studied at redbrick universities' (131air's Blues vs the redbrick Reds').
The lady clearly knows nothing about the ancient lineage of Scotland's grandest uni- versities. Her 18 'redbrick' Cabinet mem- bers include, for example, the Scottish Sec- retary who graduated from the University of Glasgow, which was founded in 1451, making it older than most Oxbridge col- leges, and the Chief Secretary, Alastair Darling, who went to the University of Aberdeen (founded in 1480). It also includes Gordon Brown, Robin Cook and Gavin Strang who graduated from the Uni- versity of Edinburgh. It is true that, as a late-16th-century foundation, Edinburgh is relatively nouveau by Scottish standards, compared with Glasgow, St Andrews or Aberdeen, but it is hardly redbrick.
So much for Ms Miles's ignorance of higher education in Scotland. She does not appear to know much about English univer-
LETTERS
sities either. Her 'redbrick' list includes Durham (Jack Cunningham and Mo Mowlam), the LSE (Frank Dobson) and York (Harriet Harman). None is, in fact, a redbrick.
It is true that Tony Blair's government is the least Oxbridge of modern times — and none the worse for that. But only seven of its 22 Cabinet ministers graduated from redbricks, which is hardly the dominance Ms Miles implies. Perhaps when it is over 50 per cent we'll be a real meritocracy.
It could be, of course, that people like Ms Miles think that all non-Oxbridge uni- versities are redbrick. If so, that merely confirms the point made in the first sen- tence of this letter.
Andrew Neil
The Scotsman Publications Limited, 20 North Bridge, Edinburgh
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