RICHARD EDEN: Earl of Balfour condemns 'woke' Cambridge University over ... trends now
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Until now, it's perhaps been most popularly associated with one of the opening scenes from Chariots Of Fire, the 1981 Oscar-winning film starring Nigel Havers and Ben Cross as two undergraduate athletes – one an aristocrat; the other, the son of a Jewish immigrant – who belt 371 yards around its Great Court while the clock strikes 12.
But no amount of cinematic lustre can disguise the moral failure which seemingly now characterises Trinity College, Cambridge – according to the Earl of Balfour, who watched in disgust and disbelief last week as Trinity's portrait of his great-great uncle, Arthur Balfour, the former prime minister, was repeatedly slashed and sprayed with paint by a 'pro-Palestine protester'.
Condemning the attack as 'wanton vandalism', the Earl is even more revolted by what he describes as the 'supine' and 'woke' response by Trinity.
'The college said it was offering support to anyone 'affected' – but shouldn't the priority be to leave no stone unturned to find the perpetrators?' asks Balfour, 75.
He's similarly dumbfounded by what he calls the 'plain ignorance of the history of the Middle East
