Editorial
The storm of media attention that was focussed on the Oxford admissions system on Friday was an example of the most cynical and obvious gesture politics imaginable. Gordon Brown's seemingly out-of-the blue comments to the TUC was a clear signal that the Labour Party are, in this respect, plunging to new lows in their estimation of the public's intelligence. At the end of last week many Oxford students were struggling to understand why the government, and, in suspiciously rapid succession, the newspapers were becoming so obsessed with the failure of one admittedly bright candidate to make it into our hallowed institution....
Editorial: Oxford not keen on fees
No one in Oxford will be surprised at the results of the recent OUSU special council. The issue of tuition fees, as key members of the anti-fees movement have pointed out, has been pretty much dead or dying for some time. There is a consensus among most students that being charged an extra £1000 or so a year more than people getting degrees five years ago is a bad thing. However, consensus does not make for good political action. With such a widely held opposition to the idea of tuition fees has come and equally widely held view that although they are bad, there is actually nothing that can be done to get rid of them. Although obviously any attempt on the government's part to introduce top-up fees would ignite a whole new level of opposition in Oxford, it is hard to come to any conclusion other than that unless something radical happens to current government policy, the Oxford anti-tuition fees movement is in a moribund state....