All must have prizes

Every year, the university awards honorary degrees to people it thinks have contributed to the community. I was pretty angry when they gave one to the father of India's illegal and immoral nuclear weapons programme, but by and large, they're a good bit of publicity and a fine way to recognise sometimes unheralded work.

The full list for this year is out, and available here. Amongst them, Sathnam Sanghera wrote a fascinating account of his double life as a good Sikh boy and as a journalist playboy - though an honorary doctorate for one book and a lot of articles is a little premature. Nigel Slater fully deserves his, and most of the rest seem like fair choices.

Except, perhaps, for Esther Rantzen. Yes, she's done great things with Childline, but she's now a parliamentary candidate, and it looks like we're endorsing yet another celebrity who thinks fame is a passport to authority. (Then again, our Chancellor is a tax-avoider and leading New Labour shill).

Oddly, no mention on the uni's website of 250 redundancies.