Sir – I write in response to Graham Johnson’s letter (June 11), entitled ‘70 per cent in favour’. He refers to my letter of the previous week. All I had done was repeat verbatim what was in Pall Mall Consult’s report to Oxford Brookes and which makes it unclear that all responses were not numbers of those individuals with negative comments but more than one comment from each individual.
On studying the 100-page report further it strikes me as almost an internal Brookes report on responses to a questionnaire that was circulated. Of the 369 people that responded, only 97 were local residents, the rest being Oxford Brookes staff, Oxford Brookes students, Oxford Brookes alumni and one other.
It goes further to state that of those 97 local residents, 57 per cent had a connection with Oxford Brookes University, being either staff or students, which equates to 42 local residents without any connection with Brookes. Of those 42, 84 per cent were residents local to Headington the rest being local to Wheatley, Harcourt Hill and Marston which equates to 35 local Headington residents without any connection to Brookes. As a percentage of total respondents it is 9.6 per cent.
As Mr Johnson points out, there was overall a 70 per cent approval rating for the new design, which as over 90 per cent were either connected with Brookes or local residents living near to campuses away from Headington doesn’t seem the overwhelming vote of confidence that it first appears.
I have telephoned and spoken to Mr Johnson, but he was understandably unable to confirm my conclusion off the top of his head.
Colin Rosser, Headington Hill
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