A conservative MP and government whip has written to all of the universities in the UK demanding that all the academics and experts in the UK wear armbands with an EU logo on them.
Chris Heaton-Harris, who is by his own admission a “bit brexity” wrote to university vice chancellors around the country asking them to make sure that all professors and lecturers wear the armbands and carry their identification papers with them at all times “just in case”.
In the letter, he also requested a list of “subversives” who might be “involved in the teaching of European affairs, with particular reference to Brexit.” The Daventry MP also asked for a version of all of the universities “sylabussusssses”, though to be fair to him it is a very difficult word to stop spelling.
He said that he “sincerely hopes” universities will “turn in” academics who might be “teaching students” about Europe. In particularly he wants “experts” to stop telling them “what a bloody stupid idea Brexit is.”
Professor David Green, vice chancellor of Worcester University, told The Rochdale Herald “Yes we bloody well are a university you cheeky bastard, we’ve been a university since 2005. Yes proper degrees.”
He then hung up on us and went on to tell an actual journalist at the Independent:
“When I read this extraordinary letter on parliamentary paper from a serving MP, I felt a chill down my spine. Was this the beginnings of a very British McCarthyism? I had never heard of Mr. Heaton Harris MP, so I looked up his website where I found him proclaiming that: ‘There must be no attempts to remain inside the EU, no attempts to re-join it through the back door and no second referendum’.
Mr Heaton-Harris explained to the Herald “that it’s better to have a list of people you might want to round up and have shot and not need it, than need a list of people you might want to round up and have shot and not have it.”
Nothing sinister about that all.
