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One never wants to spoil a good story but it is important to correct some of the facts in ¡°Expos¨¦ brought Warwick success¡± (News, 10?April).

It is not true that the university employed a detective to spy on David Montgomery and he did not, as far as I know, attend a meeting of the Coventry Labour Party. Montgomery was a visiting labour historian and attended a trades union-run meeting at Chrysler UK at the Ryton plant in Coventry. He was observed there by a member of the Chrysler security staff who reported his attendance to Gilbert Hunt, chairman and managing director.

Hunt, who was a member of the university council, and who was facing one of the many strikes that affected his company, wrote a letter of complaint to the vice-chancellor. The vice-chancellor sent him a formal acknowledgement and that was the end of the matter until the correspondence was unearthed by students rifling university files during a sit-in.

I am surprised that the allegations made by E.?P. Thompson in Warwick University Ltd, that Warwick was a business run by the lay members of its council, are still given credence. These allegations were examined by Lord Radcliffe, the law lord, who was Warwick¡¯s chancellor, at the invitation of the senate ¨C he rejected them.

From my observation, which began only at the end of 1969, the council, which was chaired by a fellow of the Royal Society and former professor of Imperial College London, was no more interventionist than the council of my previous university, Leeds, and a great deal less than many university governing bodies operating today.

Michael Shattock
Visiting professor
Institute of Education, University of London