To be pleased most of the cabinet are Oxbridge graduates?

[sagerosemaryandthyme]

That's it really. Surely we want the brightest and best in the cabinet.

Gah - I vowed not to come back on this thread, but after the comprehensive bashing that Oxford tutors (of whom I was one, in Zoology) have received, I am starting to get a bit .

Of course tutors/lecturers vary, there are good ones and bad ones in ANY University. Not one person who has ever been to any school or college could honestly say that all of the lecturers in all of their subjects were equally good (or bad) at teaching.

The majority of the lecturers and tutors that I knew took their tutoring very seriously, knew the subjects that they were tutoring inside out, and were genuinely concerned about communicating their knowledge to their students.

Blanket statements like "Oxford tutors are undertrained, and far too arrogant and uninterested to make good teachers" are not only stupid, they're just damned rude.

Jumping in, but I thourght our MPs were suppossed to give a representation of our whole country and the areas of the country they represent.

How can you feel that the cabinet is going to do the best for the country if they are mainly Oxbridge graduates.

Life experiences and fighting for change, mean more to me than a degree from a posh uni. I dont know how these people can ever understand how things matter on the street.

How are they going to fight for fair education for everybody or Sure Start or the NHS when have never been dependant on them.

No wonder you weren't following what with me derailing the convo I'm on too many threads - jack of all trades and master of none. I need to downsize

YANBU - we want people with wisdom and intelligence in the Cabinet.

Some of the posts on this thread are truely depressing. I was at Oxford at the same time as David Cameron and David Milliband. At that time (and right now) there were huge numbers of students there with incredibly ordinary backgrounds.

Getting into Oxford or Cambridge is not about privellege. Neither is just about intelligence. It is about having something more than that. Drive, determination, having something to offer more than just being good at passing exams.

That is why people who go there often end up being at the top of their professions.

Sorry if this sounds arrogant but if you didn't go there you really don't know what it is really like or what it is really about.

Tolalola - I agree. I had some truly awful tutors and some truly wonderful ones - and when I look back now I am at how young most of them were and how hard they worked with us.

I don't see why people who went to Oxford or Cambridge can't acknowledge that they are privileged; both to have had that experience in itself and for the doors it will open for them.

Recognising that isn't have a'chip'. You don't have to have been there yourself to make the observation that the cabinet doesn't reflect society at all.

I accept that there is always going to be a top layer of society which is more intelligent, wealthier, more dynamic and ambitious than the average person... most people get that. It's a fact of life.

But the small homogenous group of people voted in to run the country should actually represent it a bit better than they currently do.

As well as wisdom and intelligence, I would like to see politicians who were perhaps a little less ruthless and possessed a bit more empathy.

Totally agree Magaly

I'm just flabbergasted that there are so many old boys in the cabinet - I've nothing against bright people - but surely some of the women elected are bright?

Does anybody know what has happened? Why were there so many white men appointed, and what are we going to do about this glaring inequality!

"don't mummy and daddy usually have more sway in getting Timothy/Arabella into Oxbridge than Timothy/Arabella's academic prowess?"

Actually, no, not these days.

Do the people who went to Oxford and Cambridge tend to end up at the top of their professions, or is it that the people at the top of the various professions tended to go to Oxford and Cambridge - along with some also-rans?

Teamcullen: "How are they going to fight for fair education for everybody or Sure Start or the NHS when have never been dependant on them"

How do you know cabinet members/Oxbridge graduates AREN'T or haven't been dependent on the NHS/surestart??

I'm an Oxford graduate - and will use both NHS and Surestart....I may also choose to be a politician...?

if they are good enough for the job, it doesn't matter which uni they have come from, Personally i prefer to see an MP who has come from a modest background, but through hard work, natural talent, ambition and determination has got to the top of their profession, and then into the cabinet. The public can relate more to them.

As usual, an awful lot of crap is being spouted on here about Oxbridge by people who didn't go there. What a surprise. I have spent my entire adult life rebutting this kind of thing (as a state school boy with a 2.1 from Oxford).

Josephine Claire, I agree.

I take Teamcullen's point re the cabinet not being 'representative' of the people, but surely thats more because of their generally privileged backgrounds than the fact they went to Oxbridge?

I am an Oxbridge graduate. However I was brought up in a council house, part of that time on benefits when my dad was unemployed, went to a comp, have been in an abusive relationship and am now a single parent. Lots of varied life experiences there

I might be unusual in Oxbridge terms, however I'm not unique

It's not the oxbridge factor - it's the privileged background that preceded (and supercedes) the oxbridge education. Imvho.

What privileged background? I don't have a privileged background. I grew up in a normal suburban 3-bed semi, my parents worked in ordinary middle-class jobs and I went to a state school. Am I missing something?

But you're not in the cabinet.

Yes - the OP is about the cabinet ministers, of whom few (if any) were state school educated.

'I don't see why people who went to Oxford or Cambridge can't acknowledge that they are privileged; both to have had that experience in itself and for the doors it will open for them.'

Oh, I'm sorry: should I be so happy I was rejected from the other places I applied to?

But it has been extended to generalise hugely and make assumptions about Oxbridge people.

(And 13 out of the 29 new cabinet ministers went to state school, to correct the above.)

Really? That figure is indeed higher than I thought.

May, Hague, Pickles, Cable, Warsi, Fox, Gove, Spelman, Clarke, Alexander, Hammond... haven't got them all yet, come back in a bit

(Gove went to both, for the sake of accuracy)

If the politicians are bright and competent at the job, I don't care what their background is.

Yes I read that he was sent to a private school at a very young age