Chums

I am not as a rule greatly taken with Niall Ferguson. That said though, there are more of his books than I would have imagined on the shelves that surround me.

I was astounded though to hear him, on the latest episode of the Hoover Institute's GoodFellows show, rip into Oxford University's PPE degree and its entirely deleterious effect on the UK's government, ruled - as we are - by know-nothing nonentities 'qualified' with it. It sounds almost as if he might have been sitting at an adjacent table in a pub one night listening to me rant and rave along the same lines.

I have cued it up above. It starts about two and a half minutes into the show, and will only take up five minutes of your time.

He also gives a shout-out in it to a book called Chums: How a Tiny Caste of Oxford Tories Took Over the UK by Simon Kuper. That came out on Audible two days ago at the same time my latest credit appeared, so that is where the credit has gone.