A letter to the Daily Telegraph which was published on 27th January 2004.

It was written by the Rev Lord Pilkington, Prof Stephen Bush, Antony Flew, Prof Anthony O’Hear, Dr Ruth Lea, Chris Woodhead and 11 others.

We are very concerned by the potential effect of some of the Government’s proposals for higher education on the fairness of admissions to university.  The funding mechanisms put in place, the creation of the Office of Fair Access and ministerial rhetoric about factors relating to student background all put pressure on universities to take into account factors other than academic ability when making decisions on admissions.

At the very least, a climate is being created where university applicants from certain schools and backgrounds may be left with the feeling that they are being judged other than on their merits.

We believe that fairness and high standards are best upheld if individual academic merit is the cornerstone of the university admissions system and that judging academic merit is best left to the universities, independent of financial pressure from the Government or its agencies.