A petition has been released to boycott Taylors, a chain of sandwich and deli shops across Oxford. The petition was created by Oxford student Atticus Stonestrom, a co-chair of the Oxford Coalition Against Homelessness (OCAH), and has been supported by Turl Street Homeless Action (TSHA).

The petition is a response to an incident which occurred in one of the cafes last summer when staff refused to allow two rough sleepers to drink their beverages on the premises, despite the fact that they had purchased the beverages in the store. According to the TSHA and the two individuals in question, Taylors demanded that the rough sleepers leave after taking their orders because of an offensive ‘odour’, supposedly deterring other customers from eating their food.

According to OCAH, the company issued a private apology for “miscommunication”, but OCAH reports that they “nonetheless failed to acknowledge the discriminatory nature of this conduct, in particular refusing to give assurance that this kind of behavior would not occur again.”

A spokesperson for Taylors told Cherwell that: “the allegation about Taylors discriminating against homeless people is inaccurate and untrue. We are aware of an incident in July where two individuals were asked to leave our premises due to a number of customer complaints over a period of approximately one week about a strong, unpleasant odour originating from them. The conversation between us and Adrian and Theodora was, unfortunately, handled poorly by the then Shop Manager and they were not given a clear reason as to why they were asked to leave. They assumed that this was down to their appearance and the fact that they were homeless which is regrettable as this was absolutely not the case.”

They went on to say: “We do not discriminate against anybody visiting our shops. However, we do have a duty of care to our customers and we cannot allow individuals to remain on our premises when other customers are walking out and raising complaints about hygiene standards in an establishment which provides food throughout the day. None of this has anything to do with the fact that the people asked to leave our premises were homeless.

“We are acutely aware of the serious homelessness problems within Oxford but this incident is being taken out of context and exaggerated. We have apologised for our initial poor handling of the communication and this apology was accepted. Oxford’s homelessness situation is a large and complicated issue to resolve and far beyond our circle of impact. We have however been discussing this internally and are working out ways where we can, in our own little way, play our part and do what we can to help.”

The petition advocates boycotting all Taylors establishments until they issue a public apology for the incident and assent to a list of demands put forward by OCAH. These include agreeing not to eject customers who have not displayed harmful behaviour, even on the basis of other customers’ complaints; not to deny service or entry to such customers; not to enforce time limits if there are enough tables free for new customers; and not to harass rough sleepers or treat them differently from any other customers.

Stonestrom posted the petition with the caption: “Those of you who know them have probably heard about the absolutely appalling treatment Theodora and Adrian have received in the past year; unfortunately this kind of persecution is common.

“Here’s an attempt to push back; please do sign and help publicise as much as you can.”

In a comment Stonestrom told Cherwell: “Unfortunately persecution against rough sleepers is commonplace; the demands we’re raising here are a bare minimum for combatting this kind of conduct.”

The petition can be found online at: https://www.change.org/p/oxford-businesses-boycott-against-discrimination-of-rough-sleepers-by-oxford-businesses?fbclid=IwAR1N4Ibp5cQTM27e8RMhpm6sg22zrNebtmt4xiUHZ5yH0_O2ba1QHXsrSF8

Oxford has seen a fall in house prices in recent years. According to the Zoopla Cities House Price Index, average house prices in Oxford fell 0.1% in the two years to February. Across 2019 as a whole, the average price fell by 0.4%.

Zoopla, a property website and app, produce the index by comparing the house prices in 20 different UK cities. Across the country, house price growth has hit a two-year high of 3.9%. This healthy increase follows stagnant to decreasing prices in the second half of 2018. It is believed to be the product of increased buyer demand, with sales transactions up 11% year-on-year in December. In the first weeks of 2020, it was 26% higher than it had been in the same four weeks in both the previous years.

In Oxford, the average house price has fallen slightly and now stands at £413,000. Oxford was one of only two cities that posted a fall in the last year. The other, Aberdeen, saw a fall of 0.7%. This can be compared with cities of faster growth like Edinburgh and Manchester. They saw a growth rate of 5.4% and 4.7% respectively. Between November last year and a year previously, there were 351 sales of homes priced above £500,000 in Oxford, down 13%.

Various reasons have been suggested for the fall. Oxford’s most desirable properties – largely situated in the Victorian terraces of the northern part of the city, or in Jericho – saw a significant increase during the years following the 2008 crash. This was largely driven by the migration of wealthy buyers from London attracted by Oxford’s good transport links and leading private schools like The Dragon School and St Edward’s. However, this rapid growth has now caught up with the market, with buyers being deterred by a shortage of homes for sale and high prices. Moreover, the second-home tax, introduced in 2016, has reduced the number willing to move to Oxford without selling their London home as well. Brexit worries have also been suggested as a factor putting buyers off: Zoopla indicate that average prices were up 1% in February on a year previously.

At an average ratio of house prices to average income of 12.6%, Oxford is almost tied with London (on 12.7% ) as the least affordable city in the UK to live. By contrast, Glasgow posted a ratio of just 3.7%. House price growth is expected to be a healthy growth of 3% across the UK next year. Zoopla’s Research and Insight Director Richard Donnell comment that this was “partly due to fading political uncertainty; households holding off moving are now starting to return to the market and this momentum has been supported by low mortgage rates.” However, without a sharp rise in the number of properties on the market in Oxford, any large growth in prices in the city is unlikely in the near future.

Oxford University’s Classics Faculty is considering a proposal to remove the study of Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid from the Mods syllabus, a decision which has shocked undergraduates and tutors across the university.

The move is part of a series of reforms proposed for the the preliminary stage of the Oxford Classics degree, known as Honour Moderations. Unlike students of other humanities courses, who sit their preliminary examinations at the end of first year, moderands sit their exams in Hilary of second year. Mods consist of ten papers based on material covered over the four terms preceding the examinations, two of which cover Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid.

The content of the Mods course, as well as the way in which it is taught, has come under increasing scrutiny in recent years, largely owing to the significant gaps in marks attained by Course I students, who have studied Latin and/ or Greek to A-Level, and Course II students, who study one of the two languages ab initio. There is also a significant gender gap in marks received for candidates sitting both Mods and Finals.

A number of other proposed reforms, which include changing the way in which Courses I and II are differentiated, as well attempts to standardise and increase the amount of language tuition available to all Classicists have been welcomed and praised across the faculty. However, many students and tutors have regarded the removal of Homer and Virgil as unnecessary and a step too far.

Jan Preiss, a second year undergraduate studying Classics at New College and the president of the Oxford Latinitas Project, has set up a petition to stop the proposal from further consideration and to rally support for its reversal among both students and educators at the university.

Speaking to Cherwell, Preiss said: “Removing Homer and Virgil would be a terrible and fatal mistake. [The proposal] would mean that firstly, Oxford would be producing Classicists who have never read Homer and never read Virgil, who are the cen-tral authors of the Classical tradition and most of Classical literature, in one way or another, looks back to Homer and interacts with the Iliad. Removing it would be a shame because Homer has been the foundation of the classical tradition since antiquity and it is impossible to understand what comes after him without studying him first.

“One of the big issues is that these reforms are marketed as ones that will increase access, but the proposal [to remove Homer and Virgil] would go completely against this because it will effectively mean that there will be people coming to Oxford with previous knowledge of Homer and Virgil, who have studied Latin and Greek at school, but no one else will be taught Homer or Virgil until Greats (the second part of the course) and that is only if they choose it as an optional paper. Because of how fundamental the study of Homer and Virgil is, it would put the latter group at a disadvantage in trying to understand the literary canon and this disadvantage would carry through Mods and possibly beyond.”

Preiss went on to praise a number of other reforms that have been proposed, including the removal of the labels “Course I” and “Course II” and their replacement with Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced levels, as well as the proposed construction of text-based papers designed to simultaneously aid students’ grasp of the classical languages. However, he along with others believe that removing the study of Homer and Virgil from the Mods syllabus would be an extreme step.

Classics is one of the few courses at the university which is perhaps as old as the institution itself, and the study of Homer and Virgil is one that has been continuous and uninterrupted since the course’s inception. As the faculty approaches its fifth decade of accepting ab initio students of Latin and Classical Greek, many of its members, both students and tutors, are rightfully sceptical about whether removing Homer and Virgil from the syllabus would really be a move that benefits these students.

Regardless of the outcome of the debate within the faculty regarding the passage of such proposals, it is clear that the new decade is one that has brought new challenges for Oxford’s oldest course, which will surely be followed by classicists and non-classicists alike with interest.

A spokesperson for the University of Oxford said: “Over the last thirty years, the number of students starting the undergraduate classics course with both A-level Latin and Ancient Greek has decreased, and the number of those acquiring one or both ancient languages while at Oxford has increased.

“The Faculty of Classics monitors these changes and keeps the course under review to keep it equally stimulating and engaging for all students. In this connection we are reviewing the first part of the course, called Honour Moderations in Classics. As part of this we are considering the question of whether Homer and Virgil are best studied in the first part of the course or the second. We are currently consulting staff and students and no final decision has been made.”

Oxford’s £600m spin-out, Oxford Sciences Innovation (OSI), has been shaken by boardroom disputes with two key figures leaving the venture. Patrick Pichette, former Google chief financial officer, stepped down as chairman this month, following Charles Conn who left his position as chief executive in November.

OSI stated that Pichette stepped down “to focus on his other international commitments,” though sources claim that a “misalignment in views” was behind his decision. The Telegraph reported that the disagreements arose from the emergence of South African company Braavos Capital as an investor.

Backed by South Africa’s richest woman, Magda Wierzycka, Braavos has become the OSI’s largest shareholder in the last sixth months. The investment fund has seen its holding in the company rise to 20%, after buying shares from Neil Woodford.

A former Rhodes scholar at Balliol, Conn said: “I wish to thank management and the board for the opportunity to serve OSI for the last year and look forward to the company’s next phase of growth.”

He will be succeeded by Chris Chambers, an OSI board member and investor.

Jim Wilkinson, interim chief executive at OSI, said: “While the last few months have seen changes to our board and executive team, our strategy has always remained the same – to identify and develop cutting edge science and technology from the University and create and grow world-leading companies.”

OSI is Britain’s largest university spin-out company, with its funds being used to invest in science and technology companies.

If an Oxford academic starts a company, the University takes as much as a 50% stake, with half of that given to OSI.

This is unlike other universities, where it is optional to work with venture funds.

Entrepreneur Hermann Hauser has criticised this system. In 2017 he said: “It’s a double whammy that Oxford suffers from. One is this monopoly that the university asks for. But then they have done this deal with OSI where they basically pledged all the IP to a single fund, preventing competition in spinouts, which is always bad.”

OSI is one of 62 spin-out companies Oxford produced in 2007-2016, the most of any university. It previously attracted controversy due to investment from Chinese tech company Huawei, which ended after the University suspended donations and sponsorship from the company.

Oxford University Rowing Clubs (OURCs) has announced drastic changes to the structure of this year’s Torpids, the University’s winter rowing races. Changes mean that only crews from the top two divisions will be allowed to race. It marks a dramatic reduction from the six men’s divisions and five women’s divisions which would race normally.

Results from this year’s race will also not affect overall college rankings or determine the new head of the river.

Although Torpids has been cancelled in previous years, the decision not to let race results affect college rankings is the first action of its kind since the Second World War, during which crews were forced to amalgamate crews, and rankings from 1939 were carried over into 1945.

OURCs were forced to change the rules for this year’s races as heavy rain and flooding have made conditions on the Isis dangerous.

The rule changes were decided during an extensive captains’ meeting attended by over 80 voting members of OURCs.

In the end, the motion to change to “pseudo-torpids” was passed by 45 votes to 24.

Pembroke, with both their men’s and women’s boats currently second on the river, attempted to amend the motion so that results from the top 12 crews could affect college rankings, while pseudo-torpids would be run for the rest of the boats. The amendment failed by a sizeable majority.

Currently the Isis stands at red flag, meaning that no crews may row on the river.

A number of crews have already withdrawn from Torpids, including Christ Church’s M1 boat, which finished in sixth place in 2019.

Speaking to Cherwell, the vicecaptain of Oriel College women’s rowing said: “Disappointing that it is that Torpids will not be going ahead as usual, the vast majority of rowers realise that OURCs are working for the safety and benefit of everyone. Not all clubs are lucky enough to train off the Isis, and it ensures that only crews that are safe will race. I’m very proud of the work that Oriel women have put in, and looking forward to (hopefully) a great four days on the water, regardless of whether the results count or not.”

Joe Lord, OURCs secretary, told Cherwell:“I look forward to a week of fun and safe bumps racing, if the river allows.”