Ah, the dreaming spires. Two events in Oxford. The first at Pusey Hall was on my Harold Wilson biography. Harold was at Jesus College in the 30’s studying what was then called Modern Greats, now better known as Philosophy, Politics and Economics. The most brilliant student of his generation, he was the first to get an Alpha Plus in Economic Theory. An MP in the 40s, Cabinet Minister in the 50s and Prime Minister in the 60s and 70s, this year marks the fiftieth anniversary of Wilson’s decision to bow out, the only post-war PM to go at a time of his own choosing, and he was still only 60 years of age!

Later, at the Sheldonian Theatre, I interviewed Sir Sajid Javid about his incredible memoir, ‘The Colour of Home – Growing Up in 1970s Britain’.

Born in England the son of Pakistani immigrants, Sajid overcame racial violence, brushes with the police, low educational expectations and outright discrimination to carve out his own future rather than the one mapped out for him which included an arranged marriage. The book stops in the last century, before Sajid occupied six cabinet positions including Home Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer.