Status Anxiety: The Etonian difference

Next Friday, Boris Johnson will officially open the West London Free School. I’m particularly pleased that the ribbon is being cut by a former editor of this magazine.

Next Friday, Boris Johnson will officially open the West London Free School. I’m particularly pleased that the ribbon is being cut by a former editor of this magazine. Not only is The Spectator my longest-standing employer and my spiritual home — I’ve been a columnist for 13 years — but many of the ideas that have informed the set-up of the school were first rehearsed in these pages. It’s also appropriate in another respect, because it was encountering Boris at Oxford that first made me aware of the huge gulf between the private and state education sector.
When I first arrived at the university from a north London grammar school in 1983, I considered myself quite advanced. Not only had I seen something of the world, having travelled in the Middle East, I had started a school magazine.