VAT is the least of it! Public Schools are Naff

I don’t think I had ever met anyone who had been to public school until I went to work for a certain liberal newspaper. Possibly I was naïve, though I had been round the world and had countless other jobs. I left school at sixteen because I hated it, so I thought anyone with a braincell would too. I was wrong.

This new species did not talk directly about what school they had been to but lapsed in meetings to endless metaphors about cricket, ties, clubs or, for a change, rugby. They all shared certain reference points. They lacked interest in anyone who was not one of them, which is not what you want in a journalist. At first, I was intimidated by them because they seemed to know a lot of facts. Dates specifically. History was reducible to their ability to memorise battles. The ability to analyse, observe and connect – the things I consider make a person clever – were not the things they valued. Yet of course I was bowled over by their self-confidence as they would come up with a totally mundane suggestion that they considered to be a novel and astute idea. I am sure those guys speak highly of me too.