Speeches, etc.

Margaret Thatcher

Written Statement welcoming foundation of Murdoch chair at Oxford

Document type: Speeches, interviews, etc.
Venue: No.10 Downing Street
Source: The Times, 15 May 1990
Journalist: Douglas Broom, The Times, reporting
Editorial comments: Item listed by date of publication.
Importance ranking: Minor
Word count: 415
Themes: Higher & further education, Media

Thatcher welcomes Murdoch Chair at Oxford

The Prime Minister welcomed yesterday the announcement that News International plc, parent company of The Times, is to give £3 million to establish a professorial chair at Oxford, University to study the impact of the media on the English language.

The first holder of the Rupert Murdoch Chair in Language and Communications, named after the chief executive of The News Corporation, will be elected later this year.

The gift, which was made on the personal initiative of Mr Murdoch, will also fund three Times lectureships in English and endow a News International Research Fund. It takes the total donated to the university's fund-raising Campaign for Oxford to £110 million, half way to its target of £220 million by 1993 to secure Oxford's future.

In her strongest endorsement of Oxford's fund-raising drive, which began almost two years ago, Mrs Margaret Thatcher said she hoped Mr Murdoch 's gift would lead others to give generously.

The Prime Minister has given a substantial private donation to her old Oxford college, Somerville, She said yesterday that the Campaign for Oxford was “doing us a great service in leading the way towards better, stronger, more autonomous universities” . She had “long believed in the supreme importance of universities in the life of the nation and the pre-eminence of Oxford within the British university system” .

In future, students of English at Oxford will have the opportunity to experience life in newspapers, radio and television through a vacation work-placement scheme to be established by News International.

Mr Murdoch, who was unable to attend a London press conference to announce the gift because of influenza, graduated from Oxford in 1953, having read politics, philosophy and economics at Worcester College.

Sir Patrick Neill, QC, president of the Campaign for Oxford and Warden of All Souls College, said: “The new chair will provide leadership in the study of modern media and communications and their influence on the way English is used in contemporary society.”

There was already intense interest in the media among staff and students and the new money would lead to a great expansion of its study at Oxford. He added: “This gift will permanently associate Oxford, an international university, with a global industry and with a man whose keen understanding of mass communications has brought him to a pre-eminent position in the media world.”