Sir Nicholas Soames has argued that there is a “current vogue for the denigration in general of British history and of Sir Winston Churchill’s memory in particular”. The former Conservative minister made his comments after Churchill College hosted an event called, “The Racial Consequences of Churchill”. One of the panellists at the talk said that former Prime Minister Winston Churchill was the “perfect embodiment” of “white supremacist philosophy”.
The event also made the claim that the British Empire was “far worse than the Nazis”.
Sir Nicholas Soames ended his political career as an MP in 2019.
He said: “The college benefits enormously from Churchill’s name.
“If they traduce it, should they be able to have their cake and eat it?”
He made these comments in the foreword to a paper co-authored by Churchill biographer Andrew Roberts and issued by the Policy Exchange think-tank.
They made the claim that Churchill College had made a “clearly premeditated malice and character assassination” of Sir Winston Churchill.
The event at Cambridge College was said to be a “critical reassessment of Churchill’s life and legacy in light of his views on empire and race”.
The panellists who took part in the talk included Kehinde Andrews, who is a professor of black studies at Birmingham City University.
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He continued that it marked a “new low in the current vogue for the denigration in general of British history and of Sir Winston Churchill’s memory in particular”.
In the paper for the Policy Exchange think-tank he said: “If there was one academic institution in the world that one would hope and expect would give Churchill a full and fair hearing, rather than give a platform to those who overlook his astonishing contribution to the defeat of the most murderously racist regime in all history, it surely should be Churchill College Cambridge.
“The college was named in my grandfather’s honour and now home to his personal papers and one of the world’s most important archives.
“It really seems to me that Churchill College should be defending his remarkable legacy, not allowing pseudo-academic detractors to smear him unchallenged.
“I am very worried, given these circumstances, about the direction Churchill College seems to be taking.”
