Wednesday 16th July 2025
Blog Page 937

Reintroducing grammar schools will solve nothing

Charlotte Tosti
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Reintroducing grammar schools will solve nothing

One morning at home during the Christmas holidays, I found my mother gazing at a message on her phone, looking slightly confused and agitated. She looked up and asked me whether she should send my eight-year old sister to a local prep school. “Obviously not. She’s happy where she is.”

Yet my mother didn’t seem to take my abrupt “no” for an answer. She explained that one of her friends had decided to send her daughter to a prep school, in order to maximise her chances of passing the eleven-plus, and getting into a grammar school. “I just want the best for your sister”, she said.

My sister was in the other room, drawing. Very soon, her colouring-in book would have to be replaced by dreary eleven-plus practice books, for at least a year. Many aspiring, bright children at her school won’t ever set eyes on one.

I come from Buckinghamshire, a county that has maintained the same school system since 1944. Comprehensives don’t exist, and all children are made to sit the eleven-plus in their last year of primary school.

They are then divided between secondary moderns and grammar schools accordingly. I went to a local all-girls grammar school. I enjoyed my time there (as much as it sometimes felt like Hillford in Ja’mie: Private School Girl) and am grateful for all the opportunities that were given to me during my time at school.

Equally, however, I disagree with Theresa May’s plans to lift the 1998 ban on opening new grammar schools. May believes grammar schools tackle inequality but she is wrong.

Most children from low income families, even if they perform well at primary school, do not enter grammar schools. In local authorities with grammar schools, 26 per cent more children who achieve level 5 in both English and Maths at Key Stage 2 and cannot receive free school meals go to a grammar school than similarly high achieving children who are eligible for free school meals.

The day I sat the eleven-plus remains one of my most vivid memories. In the exam, I glued my eyes to this ‘life-changing’ paper and vigorously rehearsed collective noun phrases in my head. A gaggle of geese, a shiver of sharks, a mischief of mice…

Every now and then I scanned across the room for my best friend. As she had warned me, she was absently resting her head on her desk, not touching the paper. I was desperate for her to join me in my quest to get into grammar school. But her family couldn’t afford to give her tuition, and she adamantly refused my many attempts to tutor her myself her in the playground with my eleven-plus practice book.

Most of the few who eventually got into grammars from my school had received the pricey eleven-plus tuition (around 1,800 pounds), or like me, had a parent who had passed the eleven-plus and could ‘show them the ropes’.

The lack of true social mobility encouraged by the grammar school system became even more visible when I started school. Unlike my primary school among others in town, rural primary schools (catering for areas with high house prices) provided regular eleven-plus tuition sessions.

Indeed, most students lived outside of town. I would often have to convince my parents to give me lifts down poorly lit country roads to visit my friends, some of whom didn’t even live in the same county.

Recent data shows that under one per cent of the total pupil intake in grammar schools receives free school meals, and almost 13 per cent of entrants come from fee-paying preparatory schools. Yet there were a few ‘success stories’ at my school.

A girl who had recently migrated from Sri Lanka, and whose mother worked as a cleaner in the school managed to get a place. One of my closest friends, whose parents’ did not go to grammar schools or university, went to the boys’ grammar school opposite mine, became Head Boy and now studies at Oxford too. But these examples are few in number.

In Buckinghamshire, those who go to secondary moderns are, in terms of funding per pupil, at a distinct disadvantage. Most grammars have now become academies, free from the ‘shackles’ of local authority regulation, and even before then pocketed far more funding from LEAs than secondary moderns despite the fact that the needs of pupils at secondary moderns, which had the vast proportion of low income children, were far greater.

During my time at secondary school, two of the three secondary moderns in my town were placed on ‘special measures’, and one was eventually shut down. The fact that this is the only alternative for most children who fail the eleven-plus represents how the grammar school system excludes able children from low income backgrounds to the benefit of more privileged students, and denies them the right even to a comprehensive education that can attend to their academic needs.

In truth, it appears as though Theresa May’s projects to revive the grammar school system are part of a nostalgic plight to resurrect the ‘romance’ of 1950s Britain, as if the reintroduction of grammar schools were the Saveloy to the increased amount of British fish we’ll get when we leave the EU.

If the government really wanted to induce greater social mobility during an uncertain economic climate, it doesn’t even need to bother with grammar schools, which already enjoy a great advantage.

It should place its ‘scarce’ funds where they are most needed. And they are needed in secondary moderns, and under-performing comprehensives. Whenever I come back home from university, I try to take my little sister out for a Chinese meal, since she is an avid lover of noodles. This time, she wasn’t demanding a tutorial in how to use chopsticks, but seemed anxious about something else. “Charlotte, how did you pass the eleven-plus?”.

The beginnings of anxiety about my future when I was approaching the eleven-plus were staring right back at me. The fear and agitation seen in young children around the transition from primary school to secondary in Buckinghamshire is deeply saddening. No eleven-year-old should have to feel that they have no future if they don’t pass a test that only money can buy.

Audience walk out on Anna Fendi’s translated Union talk

Lowri Howard
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Audience walk out on Anna Fendi’s translated Union talk

A large proportion of the crowd walked out during Anna Fendi’s talk at the Oxford Union last Friday due to the event over-running, and the Union not publicising that she would be speaking Italian with a translator.

One student also told Cherwell that she was invited to meet Fendi before the event but could not ask any questions as her translator was not there.

Many students attended Fendi’s talk, hoping to hear her speak about her rise to fame as an Italian fashion designer and entrepreneur. Fendi created the luxury fashion house Fendi with her sisters and was the first Italian woman to win the IWF Hall of Fame Award.

A large proportion of the crowd walked out towards the end, after Fendi’s speech overran by 20 minutes. Her translator told her to conclude her speech when the event was supposed to end.

This meant that many of the crowd left before the Union President asked if anyone had any further questions. Speaking to Cherwell, students said that it was “unfair” that no one told her to stop her speech sooner.

Students leaving the event early were also angered that Fendi spoke entirely in Italian. The Union did not publicise this fact beforehand on their event or on their term card. Although there was a translator, there were short intervals of silence in order for her translator to translate her speech.

One student who attended the event told Cherwell that the use of a translator, “made it harder to focus. I wouldn’t have gone if I had known, because it wasn’t particularly a relaxing break!”

The Oxford Union has been contacted for comment.

Review: ‘A Monster Calls’

Jonnie Barrow
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Review: ‘A Monster Calls’

There are some directors in Hollywood who consistently churn out great films without getting the recognition that they perhaps should—look, for instance, at the consistency of hits in the filmographies of directors like Phil Lord & Chris Miller, Edgar Wright, or Brad Bird.

This review is dedicated to another consistently brilliant director who some how manages to slip even further under the radar: J.A. Bayona.

His two biggest hits until now have been The Orphanage (2007), a generically-titled but surprisingly effective horror, and The Impossible (2012), a heart-wrenching drama about the 2006 Boxing Day tsunami. Both have gone on to be criminally under-seen and underrated by audiences, and it looks as if A Monster Calls may, undeservedly, head that way too.

Based on the 2011 novel of the same name, the film follows Conor, a young boy struggling to come to terms with his mother’s terminal illness and his unhappy school-life. He retreats into his imagination, and loses himself in the unconventional stories told to him by the story’s eponymous “monster”, a giant Liam Neeson-esque anthropomorphic yew tree.

If there’s one thing that can be gleaned from such a brief synopsis, it’s that this film isn’t afraid to go to some pretty dark places for a family film. What Bayona does beautifully, is draw out the darkness with some really smart creative decisions.

Liam Neeson voices the Monster with characteristic warmth, but Bayona taps into his horror-film roots to create some truly mesmerising images by juxtaposing this warmth against horror-film-inflected iconography to increase the threat the Monster imposes.

Here’s another tiny example: the film’s setup gives the audience a glimpse of Conor’s life, and how trapped he feels within his circumstances. How does Bayona communicate this claustrophobia? With spectacular use of close-to-medium-length shots that leave Conor isolated in the frame. The film is almost saturated with these kinds of subtle yet powerful cinematic tricks that cumulatively prove really effective.

The stories the Monster tells are accompanied by stunning watercolour-style animation which both ground and elevate these sections of the story. The stories themselves are intriguingly ambiguous, which is central to both the film’s thematic core and Conor’s character arc.

The story itself could have done with a little more of this complexity, however. Lewis Macdougal, as Conor, is absolutely brilliant, delivering one of the best performances by a young actor I can remember seeing in a very long time. Yet the other cast members, as good as they are, aren’t given much to do with their characters.

Even the film’s handling of its own story structure is a bit on-the-nose; it is literally spelled out to the audience in the first 20 minutes, before being pieced out in uniform chunks over the next 80. The story’s big ideas about grief and family could also perhaps have benefitted from some more nuanced treatment.

Yet this simplicity could easily be read as a strength. The third act is quietly devastating, and the film’s central ideas really connect with the audience. I was worried this was due to my personal identification with the theme of terminal illness—yet I can honestly say I’ve never before been in a screening where every single audience member was sniffling when the lights came up.

One more thing to note before I close out this review. Bayona may have been generally overlooked until now, but, like the directors mentioned above, it looks as if he’s moving onto bigger and better things: his next project is next year’s sequel to 2015’s box office-smash, Jurassic World. 2018 can’t come soon enough.

Courting Controversy: lives matter more than lies

Daniel Kodsi
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Courting Controversy: lives matter more than lies

I would like to suggest that the worst thing about Donald Trump is not, in fact, that he lies.

This might seem obvious—after all, the man has committed sexual assault—but I suspect that if someone were to wake from a coma and check the news, their first reaction would be: ‘Wait, so what is all this about “Alternative Facts”?’ Consider the New York Times’ simply incisive Wednesday news analysis. It begins with the claim that ‘Words matter’. It continues for some 1,300 words discussing the merits of the Times’ decision to call something Trump said an outright lie (spoiler: it was the right decision!) before concluding, again, that ‘words matter’.

Now, taken alone, some self-congratulatory puff from the so-called paper of record might be relatively innocuous. But this is not an isolated incident. Both on social media and in print, the cumulative word count dedicated to pointing out The Donald and his administration’s various untruths is threatening to overwhelm at the very least my ability to process everything else that has been unfolding over the last week. And it seems that people (pardon the generality) have come to the conclusion that pointing out Donald’s lies is in some way a substitute for actually objecting to his policies.

Very often, even, defending ‘the truth’ is posited as the overriding mandate of the press. Charles Blow—who is funnily enough one of the least offensive of the Times’ tenured columnists—asked us Thursday ‘without truth, what’s left?’ Oh! I know this one! How about… our lives, happiness, prosperity, comfort, families, jobs, and homes? All of which, for people across the world, are in actual danger as the Republican Party plumbs new depths of extremism and callousness.

Of course, truth is important. It is important in itself, for all sorts of reasons which I have neither the space nor ability to cash out in this column. But defending the truth does not consist solely in the exercise of pointing out when the other guy lies. It is more than explaining in excruciating details that alternative facts are not facts and what the real facts are. It also includes reporting that which isn’t known. The pursuit of knowledge would be a poor enterprise if all that it meant was defending that which is clearly true—which is why that’s not what it is. It is also reporting those truths which are not readily accessible or immediately clear. And it means spreading knowledge, educating those who wish to know. In other words, there is more to honest journalism than pointing out that some of the things Donald Trump says are false. Very often, the true things he says are more important—and defending the truth means bringing attention to those as well, even if that’s not quite as fun.

Because there are some prior questions to consider as well. Such as: who cares about the size of Donald Trump’s inauguration? I don’t. I don’t even think a small crowd means he’s unpopular: it remains, however upsettingly, true that 63 million people voted for him, the great majority of who continue to be over the moon about his election. I don’t care that Trump keeps insisting upon voter fraud, or even that he hasn’t released his tax returns. He is President. None of that matters.

Instead, what matters is that his administration has reinstated the global gag rule on abortion. That it has announced planned funding cuts to the Violence Against Women Act, National Endowments for the Humanities and Arts, Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, and UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. That Betsy DeVos, the Education Secretary appointee who doesn’t believe in public education, Scott Pruitt, the would-be EPA Director who denies man-made climate change, and Rick Perry, the Energy Secretary candidate who once wanted to abolish the Department of Energy, are literally days away from receiving Senate approval. That Donald Trump has signed executive orders approving the Keystone and Dakota Access pipelines and restricting immigration from several Muslim-majority countries.

I understand the satisfaction of pointing out obvious lies—and also how annoying it is for someone who is wrong to keep insisting he is right. Obvious lies are also easy to prove false, which is my guess for why the ever-sensationalist and lazy media keeps harping on them. But obvious lies, because they are obvious, are not worth our—liberals and progressives—time and energy. Let Donald have his million-strong crowd size and popular vote election victory. There are more pernicious forces afoot. If we are to successfully defend the progress of the Obama Presidency, we’ll have to start emphasising the truths that really matter.

Pembroke JCR votes to recognise suspended students

Jordan Bernstein
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Pembroke JCR votes to recognise suspended students

This week Pembroke students unanimously voted to pass a motion to give suspended students full membership of the Junior Common Room.

The motion, proposed by Welfare Reps Joe Morton and Immie Hobby, recognised that “there is currently nothing in the constitution with regards to the status of suspended students as members of the JCR” and that this “not only makes it unclear if they are actually members of the JCR, but also if they are entitled to the same rights as members still studying”.

The motion received no opposition from students at the meeting.

Until a few years ago, students who had suspended their studies could not access faculty resources and libraries, nor could they log onto their email, or the University‘s intranet.

Reports from the time uncovered stories of students being forced out of colleges without warning, and an overriding concern for academic matters rather than for the welfare of the student.

The University Statutes and Regulations currently refer to suspension and rustication as a withdrawal of “the right of access” to University facilities, with colleges largely able to develop their own policy beyond that.

The Pembroke motion noted that most of the concerned students “have needed to suspend studies for reasons beyond their control and should therefore not be penalised or feel isolated from the JCR  because of it.”

It states: “This JCR also believes that many students suspending their studies for health reasons are among those that JCR initiatives, such as the prescription fund, benefit the most.” These sentiments come at a time of expanding pastoral care provided by both the Student Welfare Support Office and the Oxford University Students’ Union.

Joe Morton, speaking exclusively to Cherwell, said: “We are certainly not the only JCR that is open and welcoming to students currently suspending their studies and, at a time where the University is seeking to improve its policy and terminology on this matter, we felt the formalisation of our stance important.

“This JCR wholeheartedly supports all students, regardless of the current status of studies, and we hope to work with college, SUScam [the campaign for suspended students in Oxford] and OUSU to ensure that any changes implemented work to make what is often a difficult process for students a little easier.”

A spokesperson for the University of Oxford said: “Guidance for students who undergo a change in status, such as suspension of studies, is available on the University website. The guidance makes clear that in most circumstances, students who suspend their studies will retain access to facilities including email, University libraries, the Counselling Service, and advice from the Disability Advisory Service.”

Current University policy dictates that colleges may decide their own student suspension policies, but not all are taking the same approach as Pembroke. As recently as October last year, Wadham college English graduate Nathalie Wright wrote in The Guardian about how her college policies were when she suspended her degree during finals.

She claimed that she was allowed into college grounds, having to sit six hours of exams at the end of her year off, achieving a 2:1 before she could join the course again. Whilst she “Eventually… bargained the college down to one three-hour exam”, achieving a first for her degree overall.

Speaking in the same article, an Oxford University spokesperson concluded: “The colleges are working in consultation with Oxford University student union on a common approach and discussing both access to college facilities during suspension and academic conditions for return to study.”

Oxford University Students Union and Student Welfare Support have been contacted by Cherwell for comment.

Lord Patten condemns Brexit immigration plans

Katherine Pye
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Lord Patten condemns Brexit immigration plans

The Chancellor of Oxford University, Lord Patten, has urged the government to stop treating international students as “economic migrants”.

Patten blamed the government’s “obsession” with immigration number targets, which, he argued, it had failed to meet multiple times. Although this claim has been rejected by the Prime Minister, who has insisted on counting students in official immigration figures, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has backed excluding overseas students from the government’s target to get net migration down to the tens of thousands.

Immigration targets have previously helped the government crack down on bogus colleges used as a back route to work in Britain illegally.

However, Lord Patten warned about the detrimental impact of classing students in the same category as economic migrants.

Patten, who backed the UK remaining in the EU, referred to Theresa May’s speech outlining Brexit plans to build a “global Britain”.

He commented: “It would be extraordinary if having become global Britain we were to prevent the huge numbers of international students coming to study.

“Why do we deny ourselves, our universities, the benefits of educating more young people from around the world?”

He insisted that people understood the difference between a student and an immigrant and the contribution they made to the economy.

“So why do we behave so foolishly? Because of our fixation with an immigration target.

“We put higher education in a more difficult position, we cut ourselves from a great deal of economic benefits because of that obsession with an immigration target, which we fail to reach, very often because we are growing so rapidly, year after year.”

Patten emphasised growing demand in Asia for western higher education. He said: “We have made the choice, global Britain, to cut ourselves off from that. It’s completely crazy.”

This news comes amid comments from Oxford’s incoming Head of Brexit Strategy, Professor Alastair Buchan, speaking to the Education Select Committee held in Pembroke college, Oxford, two weeks ago, that a hard Brexit would be “giving up 500 to 950 years of exchange—I think we need to be very cautious.”

Carl Gergs, a third year at Pembroke and a German citizen, told Cherwell: “subjecting all international students to a blanket immigration rule in order to ‘clamp down’ on a misusing minority doesn’t seem very efficient at all. Most students are net economic contributors and enrich UK university life – some of them will be excluded or deterred by this system. I can only agree with Lord Patten that this approach is at odds with the vision of a ‘global Britain.’”

Steve Sangbeom Heo, international students’ rep at Brasenose college JCR told Cherwell: “I think it’s very unfortunate that the national mood’s becoming more and more insular. To be honest I can’t really think of a good reason why students should count as economic migrants nor understand what  motivated May to argue for this other than political bluff to show that she’s ‘hard on immigration’. But I also think this is hardly surprising given that Theresa May’s currently trying so hard to pander to Brexiteers.”

Somerville JCR debates merits of women-only principals

Christine Jiang
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Somerville JCR debates merits of women-only principals

Somerville College JCR is discussing whether gender should be taken into account in the selection of the next principal.

Dr Alice Prochaska, Somerville’s current principal, announced in October 2016 that she will be stepping down after a seven-year term at the end of the academic year. The college is due to announce her successor some time this year.

Alex Crichton-Miller, president of the Somerville JCR, told Cherwell: “Given that there are several colleges in Oxford that have only ever been led by men, there were some mem- bers of the Common Room who felt strongly that Somerville ought to continue to have a female principal.

“This point was made, clearly, on the basis that the proposed female candidate possesses all other required qualities for the leadership role.

“Others held the view that it would be unjustified to discriminate on the basis of the candidate’s gender, even in the case of positive action.”

Of the 38 Oxford colleges, only nine of them (or 24 per cent)—Green Templeton, Mansfield, Oriel, Pembroke, St Anthony’s, St Hugh’s, St John’s, Somerville, and Wolfson—currently have female heads of colleges.

Somerville, a women’s college until 1994, became the only college in Oxford that has only had female leadership when St Hilda’s appointed its first male principal in 2014.

It is unclear what role the JCR discussion will play in the formal selection of the next principal.

Sarah Hughes, communications officer at Somerville, said: “A college with a history such as ours is very alive to gender issues, and it is appropriate that students also seriously reflect on them.Their views will be reported and taken into account by the Governing Body, in whose hands the final decision entirely lies.”

Whilst positive action is lawful under the Equality Act, Somerville’s Equality and Diversity Policy states: “In respect of staff, ensure that entry into employment and progression within employment are determined solely by criteria which are related to the duties of a particular post.”

In December 2016, released National Archive files revealed Margaret Thatcher’s attempt to fight the admission of male fellows at her alma mater, Somerville. This resistance came at odds with directives of the European Commission’s equality legislation.

Dr Prochaska is also a vocal critic of sexual harassment and rape culture at Oxford. She has penned a column in The Guardian on fighting “sexist laddism and abuse” at Somer- ville, and has prompted a JCR resolution to condemn aggressive behaviour in college.

The JCR’s motion to hold an open discussion was passed. No vote was conducted at the end of the meeting to indicate the JCR’s stance on the appointment of a candidate on the basis of gender.

Drunk students buy from Hassan, but cashew Hussein

Felix Pope
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Drunk students buy from Hassan, but cashew Hussein

Students have been accidentally paying Hussein through the Cashew payments app for post-club kebabs bought from Hassan, it has emerged.

Earlier this week, Hassan discovered that his intoxicated clientele had been misspelling, or simply mistaking, his name for that of rival kebab van owner Hussein.

He told Cherwell that he didn’t know how much money he had lost but that, “mistakes happen,” and despite the loss of income he bore no ill will.

Hassan has been trading from his van—ranked 68th out of 460 Oxford restaurants on Trip Advisor—on Broad Street since 1995, before which he worked in a French bakery.

In a 2016 interview with Cherwell he revealed: “My favourite item on the menu? Well, I love my chicken wrap, with cheese and chips, chilli sauce and garlic mayonnaise… just a little bit of chicken and just a little bit of chips and I’m done for the whole night.

“The most ordered item has got to be chips and cheese, and then chips and cheese and meat – chicken or lamb.”

Cashew is an app based payment system created last year by Oxford students. Hassan’s, Hussein’s and Ahmed’s kebab vans, as well as several other cafes, restaurants and venues, now all accept payments made through it.

Hassan’s name on Cashew has now been changed to ‘Hass Kebabs’. He requests that students use it.

College denies telling students to use gender-neutral pronouns for God

Jack Hunter
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College denies telling students to use gender-neutral pronouns for God

The theological college Wycliffe Hall has denied claims it asked students to refer to God using gender neutral pronouns in an attempt to tackle gender bias.

A report by The Sunday Times claimed the college’s Inclusive Language Policy told students and staff to refer to God using “the one who” instead of “He”.

It claimed that the policy intended to change phrases such as “mankind” to “humankind” in its preachings.

However the college, a Permanent Private Hall training Church of England priests, has strongly dismissed the claims, saying the college “does no such thing”.

The college’s principal, the Revd Michael Lloyd, said the policy contains “no suggestion that the traditional gender pronouns concerning God should be altered in any way. Indeed the Hall’s policy reaffirms that we should continue to speak of God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, as Christians have always done”.

The Sunday Times had drawn comparisons with guidelines at two top US divinity schools which reportedly recommend professors use “inclusive” gender-neutral language when speaking about God.

Yet Lloyd said: “Inclusive language is encouraged at Wycliffe Hall in our preaching and our writing when describing people – not ‘man’, ‘mankind’, ‘every man’, but ‘human’, ‘humanity’, ‘everyone’. Therefore careful thought is required when using older liturgy, hymnody, or Bible translations, in order to include the whole people of God. This is common sense and is common practice throughout the churches.”

The article received angered responses, with comments saying: “Didn’t God create Adam in his own image? Last time I checked, Adam was a masculine name.”

But others expressed positivity for the initiative. Mark Woods, writing in Christian Today, wrote: “Wycliffe’s inclusive language policy, in fact, looks eminently sensible. It notes that language changes and that while once it was common to talk about mankind, man, every man, we don’t do that any more.”

The college’s Inclusive Language Policy states: “The patriarchal masculine has become a form of alienation for many women and indeed many men. It reduces women to Other by normalizing the masculine.”

It encourages a use of inclusive language in the Hall “not because we have to but rather as a sign of our love for each other in Christ”.

While acknowledging that older hymns and the Book of Common Prayer are “by definition written in the language of patriarchy”, the policy says that services and preachings will continue to use them in order to respect “integrity”.

It states that the college expects teachers and visiting lecturers to reflect a “gender balance” in their topics and language, for example by using biblical passages which involve women.

The Sunday Times report, which has since been removed from the paper’s website, is the latest in a series of articles concerning the use of pronouns at Oxford which have faced claims of misreporting.

In December, following a Cherwell investigation, a claim published by The Sunday Times that OUSU had instructed students to use the ‘ze’ pronoun was revealed to be fake. The paper published an apology in January.

Christ Church votes to create controversial new Staff Liaison Officer

Cherwell News Team
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Christ Church votes to create controversial new Staff Liaison Officer

In its first general meeting of Hilary term, Christ Church College has voted to attach the duties of a Staff Liaison Officer to a member of the JCR committee.

The motion, which will create a role for the JCR committee primarily involving issues concerning scouts, mandates that committee member to survey the JCR to ask them about any issues concerning housekeeping and to ask for anonymous feedback.

It will also allow JCR members to report any suspected issues between the college and scouts, after students in the meeting expressed concerns that some scouts were asked to take an English test.

The motion has provoked considerable controversy in Oxford, with ex-Wadham Student Union President Taisie Tsikas writing on Twitter that it was “so incredibly disrespectful” to scouts and that “Staff Liaison Officer in other colleges means working for living wage accreditation and helping make sure students aren’t taking advantage”.

JCR Vice President Stuti Sarin told Cherwell: “At the last Christ Church GM, we voted to create a Staff Liaison remit for our ABE rep’s responsibility of carrying out an annual survey regarding JCR views on housekeeping issues.

“This does not entail “rating” scouts, as has been made out, and, as a result of an amendment in the GM, individual complaints against particular scouts actually don’t come under the survey’s remit. The main point is that there needs to be a centralised position in order for the JCR to be able to direct questions about housekeeping.

“It’s truly unfair that simply because the words ‘scouts’, ‘surveys’ and ‘Christ Church’ have been used in the same sentence, a few people have decided that members of the Christ Church JCR are entitled and disregard issues important to our scouts’ welfare. That’s not the case—this is a positive motion for dealing with the JCR’s housekeeping questions.”

Louis McEvoy, a student at Christ Church said: “One individual has taken a motion designed to help scouts enormously out of context. Whatever her intentions—she seems to have something of a vendetta against Christ Church—it’s an unfair and egregious misrepresentation.

Oxford graduate Niamh Mcintyre commented: “Scouts do a difficult, tiring job for very little money. Although the Living Wage campaign has made strides in recent years, many colleges still refuse to pay their staff enough to live on, in one of the most expensive cities in the country.

“If certain members of Christ Church JCR are unhappy with the state of their rooms, maybe they could try picking up after themselves, instead of harassing some of the lowest-paid staff at this University.”

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