David Willetts: The University’s next chancellor?

Former Conservative Universities and Science Minister David Willetts has announced his candidacy in the race to be elected the next Chancellor of Oxford University. After the resignation of Chris Patten in July this year, Willetts is facing the competition of former Labour spin doctor and current Lord Peter Mandelson, as well as the former leader of the Conservative Party and Foreign Secretary William Hague.

Willetts claims that his extensive experience in academia and as a policymaker in the field of higher education allows him to stand out from the other candidates, though he does not yet have the backing of any student groups enjoyed by Mandelson and Hague, nor the international attention that has greeted the candidacy of Pakistan’s imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan.

Willetts was a PPE student at Christ Church in the 1970s, and has been the Chancellor of Leicester University and is currently a Visiting Professor at King’s College London, where he has led a review into the UK’s research and development policy. In an interview at New College on Friday morning last week, Willetts made clear his ambitions for the University, with increased outreach activities and more state schools pupils getting places.

Willetts was a Minister of State during a controversial period of government for higher education, with the Coalition government rolling out the rise in the cap on tuition fees to £9,250. Known colloquially as ‘Two Brains Willetts’ for his work in forming what has been called ‘civic conservatism’, he has increasingly differed from Conservative Party policy in his support for a second referendum on Brexit and for an increase in financial support for the universities sector. Willetts has also used a recent report to suggest changes to the UK’s policy on research and development.

Having come to Oxford as a PPE student at Christ Church in the late 1970s, Willetts says that the University has changed for the better since his own time: it has become ‘more diverse, more open’. Despite holding up several traditions and the collegiate tutorial system – which Willetts highlights as a centrally important factor in its success – Oxford has stayed with the times in order to claim its top spot in world ranking, Willett says. His campaign will seek to emphasise that blend of tradition and innovation.

Willetts’ opponents in this race include former Labour minister and Director of Communications Peter Mandelson and former Conservative Party leader William Hague, as well as the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, Imran Khan. Khan, whose former wife Jemima Goldsmith lives near Oxford, is competing from his prison cell in Pakistan due to a conviction at home for corruption.