Election of Gordon Brown as Rector, 1972

In 1973, Gordon Brown, postgraduate student and future Prime Minister, was elected Rector of Edinburgh University.

Student Militancy

The late 1960s and early 1970s were a period of intense student militancy at Edinburgh University, centring on two causes: the demand that the university cut all financial ties with the Apartheid regime of South Africa and a call for greater student participation in university governance. These issues first came to prominence during the Rectorship of Kenneth Allsop (1968-1971) who was broadly supportive of student aspirations. Students demonstrated against the touring South African rugby team at Murrayfield Stadium in 1970, persuaded the University to sell its shares in South African companies, and urged it to cease investing in companies that did business in South Africa. At the same time, the Student Rector Campaign gained momentum, arguing that the only way for students to gain a voice on the University Court was to elect one of its own number as Rector. The Campaign triumphed with the election of student Jonathan Wills in 1971.

Jonathan Wills

As Rector and ex officio Chair of the University Court, Wills clashed repeatedly with Principal Sir Michael Swann (1920-1990), University Secretary Charles H. Stewart (1910-1981), and Chancellor's Assessor John Cameron (1900-1996). Points of controversy included Wills's requests that student observers be present at Court meetings, that Court Minutes no longer be confidential, that he be permitted to access politically sensitive files on university finance, and that the university sell shares in companies that continued to maintain business links with South Africa. He also protested the Court's decision to ban Allan Drummond, President of the Students' Representative Council, from attending Court meetings after he had participated in a sit-in at the university's administrative offices.

Brown's Election

Wills held office for one year only (as promised in his campaign), resigning to complete his Ph.D. in Geography. His successor was another postgraduate student, Gordon Brown, who was working on a thesis in Scottish History. Brown easily defeated the only other Rectorial Candidate, Sir Fred Catherwood, former Director-General of the National Economic Development Council. Almost 200 students (5.6% of the electorate), however, deliberately spoilt their ballot papers, to protest a perceived lack of transparency in the nomination of Brown as the 'student rector' candidate.

Brown's Rectorship was perhaps the most controversial in the University's history. He came into conflict with fellow members of the University Court on the following issues:

• Confidentiality: Brown repeatedly used Court Minutes to reveal more about the deliberations that lay behind Court decisions than the Court desired. In April 1973, the Court determined that the Minutes should record only decisions reached and votes cast.
• Choice of Rector's Assessor: In 1973, Brown chose as his Assessor Allan Drummond, who had previously been banned from attending Court meetings due to his participation in a sit-in. Seeing Brown's choice as a deliberate affront, the Court voted to reject Drummond. Drummond took his case to the Court of Session who ruled in his favour but laid down the conditions that Drummond refrain from disruptive activities or from inciting other to participate in them and that he maintain strict confidentiality on University Court proceedings.
• Congress of the Association of Commonwealth Universities: This five-yearly event was to be held in Edinburgh in 1973. Brown protested against the participation of scholars from white-majority-run Rhodesia and South Africa. The Court ultimately decided that it could not dictate to the Association of Commonwealth Universities.
• Investment in South Africa: When the University Court proposed the re-appointment of two co-opted members of the University Court, Brown proposed two candidates of his own, who were, he argued, more representative of the wider community in Edinburgh.

Allan Drummond Assessor in 1973

Shortly after Brown's election, the University Court carried a motion demanding that the Rector no longer have the right to chair meetings of the Court. Several attempts were then made to oust Brown from the chair, the most serious, in 1973, proposing that the chairperson be elected annually by the Court itself. This was successfully resisted by a student petition that was backed by the General Council, the newly formed Edinburgh University Students' Association, the university's non-academic staff, the Edinburgh Section of the Association of University Teachers, and the Town Council.

protested that the university still held shares in companies that did business with South Africa

Removal of President of Student Representative Council Allan Drummond for holding a sit-in at university property