The news that only 16 "free schools" are set to open next year (Report, 6 September) should again focus attention on the New Schools Network, the campaign group hired by Michael Gove to promote the new schools and assist with applications. NSN, run by a former adviser to Gove, is being paid £500,000. Four of the group's trustees and advisers are also involved in Ark, the company launched by City hedge fund speculators to run academies, and it is notable that two of the schools announced this week are Ark projects. What we don't know, however, is who, other than the government, subsidises NSN, and whether its funders include organisations with a more rapacious interest in free schools than the not-for-profit Ark. My freedom of information requests – aimed at finding out more about the education department's relationship with NSN and seeking assurance that there is no scope for a conflict of interest – have so far been stonewalled, as have parliamentary questions asked by Labour MP Lisa Nandy.

Clifford Singer

The Other TaxPayers' Alliance

Report finds Swindon school failed to recognise racist incidents before assault that left Henry Webster brain damaged

The mother of a white 15-year-old boy who was left with brain damage after a hammer attack by a gang of British Asian pupils blamed his school today after a report found it failed to recognise a series of racist incidents prior to the assault.

Henry Webster was repeatedly punched, kicked and hit with the sharp end of a claw hammer in an assault by the gang on the tennis courts at Ridgeway school in Wroughton, near Swindon, Wiltshire, in January 2007.

His mother, Liz, said the serious case review (SCR) showed the school was responsible. "This review has confirmed our belief that the Ridgeway school was responsible for the horrific, devastating assault on our son which has left him with permanent injuries," she said.

Mrs Webster claimed the local authority had got off lightly in the report. "The criticism of the local authority is tantamount to a whitewash as it is so minimal and limited.

"The review doesn't mention what needs to be done to improve race relations in Swindon, which is an urgent concern considering the considerable increase in the vote for the BNP."

She accused the school and the local authority of being "excessively defensive" and claimed there had been an attempt to "deflect blame from the school and the local authority".

Her son had agreed to fight a boy "one on one" to end the harassment that he felt he and his friends were experiencing.

The ensuing attack happened when four boys pointed him out to three Asian men who had arrived in cars. It took about one minute. Henry Webster suffered six blows from a hammer produced by one of the intruders and was left with a depressed skull fracture.

Henry, who is now 18, has recovered sufficiently to return to part-time education but still has short-term memory loss.

The attack led to the conviction in 2008 of seven young men for wounding Henry with intent to cause him grievous bodily harm, with a further five men being convicted of conspiracy. Another admitted violent disorder.

They were given custodial sentences ranging from eight years to eight months, with others receiving suspended sentences of up to 18 months. Four were pupils at the school.

Mrs Webster said the school's race relations policy "was not worth the paper it was written on", adding: "There was no cohesive approach to dealing with matters of race.

"Whilst Henry has been the primary victim, we are and always have been of the firm belief that this school also let down the young Asian pupils who were eventually prosecuted for this attack.

"They have been criminalised and demonised. Had their integration been properly handled we are certain this attack would not have happened."

Mrs Webster said she and her family were "very concerned" that the report had failed to address many of the failings surrounding their treatment, saying: "Our faith in the justice system and the establishment has been severely damaged. We feel badly let down."

Last year, Henry, of Wroughton, and his family launched a high court challenge claiming that the school had been negligent, failed to maintain proper discipline and failed to deal with racial tension. The school denied liability.

In February this year Mr Justice Nicol rejected their claims and said the school did not breach its duty to take reasonable care to keep Henry reasonably safe while on its premises.

Following the high court ruling, the Swindon Local Safeguarding Children Board (LSCB) commissioned a serious case review to examine the facts and allow professional agencies to learn lessons.

The executive summary, published today, says the school, despite knowing in advance, did not prepare for the arrival of a significant number of British Asian students in 2005.

Some incidents between white and British Asian pupils were not recognised as racist by the school and by dealing with these incidents itself, it missed the opportunity to gain a better understanding of what was actually going on through external intervention, the review says.

Other agencies did not challenge robustly the school's approach or its procedures, the report says.

Mike Howard, independent chair of the Swindon LSCB, said: "I am sorry that what was already an extremely distressing experience was made worse by the lack of co-ordinated support they received from some agencies.

"The attack took place over three and a half years ago and, despite the regrettable delay in concluding the SCR process, many of the measures made in the recommendations have already been identified and acted upon by individual agencies.

"Swindon has made significant progress in many areas of safeguarding. Most importantly I hope that Henry will be able to move on from this tragic and protracted incident and be able to achieve his ambitions in life."

Steve Allsopp, the president of the Swindon Race Equality Council, said that the saga had not increased racial tension in the area. He also refuted Mrs Webster's claim that the attack had resulted in an increase in votes or support for the BNP.

The school said it could not have "forseen or prevented" the attack.

In a statement it added: "We are sorry that the family feel that they were not supported adequately following the attack. We have noted the recommendations contained within the report."

As Cambridge tops the QS world university rankings, one graduate asks if it is worthy of the accolade

This week Cambridge University took Harvard's place at the top of the QS world university rankings. According to the survey of 15,000 academics, it is the best place for research in the world. But what is it like for the students who study there?

I have written for G2 today about my experience of a Cambridge education when I studied social and political sciences there back in the late 1990s.

If you went to Cambridge, did you think it was unique, and did you think it gave you the best education you could get? If you didn't go there, do you find Cambridge graduates insufferably smug or more confident than their "education" merits? Or are you just chippy?

And does it matter that Cambridge graduates continue to feature prominently in the professions that rule over us in Britain?

• Share your thoughts below, or read Patrick Barkham's full feature here

Concerns raised over 'lack of transparency' surrounding pay, but Elms cites flexibility and freedom as advantages

A headteacher who was criticised for being paid more than £240,000 last year has defended controversial plans to convert his primary school to academy status.

When parents discovered in July that Mark Elms' pay package had reached almost £250,000, many defended him for transforming the fortunes of a school which has been rated "outstanding" under his leadership.

But since then, some parents have launched a campaign against proposals to turn Tidemill primary into an academy – which would be free from local authority control and able to set its own pay rates.

Concern has been fuelled by what one campaigner claimed was a "lack of transparency" over Elms' pay. He is thought to be the most well paid headteacher in Britain.

Elms said today that converting to an academy would enable the school to be more flexible in helping children who spoke English as a second language.

Speaking for the first time since the pay controversy, he said it would also free the school to set salaries at a level that would attract the best teachers.

"There are obviously lots of freedoms; there's the freedom to design your own curriculum. We have very unique characteristics, 65% [are non-native English speakers], 45% free school meals… lots of refugees."

"We need to make sure the curriculum is designed to match their needs, to reflect their background and experience."

Tidemill, in Lewisham, south-east London, has a high proportion of children who do not speak English at home. The school itself estimates that 30 languages are spoken there, including Somali, Farsi, French and Yoruba.

Elms declined to comment on his pay, but said: "Finances are very important. You can do an awful lot in terms of recruiting highly qualified, suitable staff."

Elms earned a basic salary of just over £82,700 in the last financial year. He also received payments totalling £102,955 for work he did over two years as part of Labour's City Challenge programme, which aims to use proven success stories to help underachieving schools.

His pay package reached nearly £250,000 with the inclusion of £10,000 for out-of-hours work, arrears of £9,317 for 2008-09, an employer's pension contribution of £16,700 and an "appointment and retention" payment of £26,413.

One of the parents campaigning against the proposals, Leila Galloway, said she was seeking greater transparency over the head's pay. She has asked for minutes of financial discussions at governors' meetings. Galloway, who has two daughters at the school, said she was concerned that the expansion of academies under the coalition government would create a two-tier education system.

"I believe in comprehensive education. Labour kickstarted [academies] but they've turned into a totally different beast. It drains funding from all the other schools. Personally, I think it will devastate the country. It's a huge social experiment," she said.

Galloway said she had organised a petition and a public meeting to campaign against the proposals.

Elms insisted that a broad consultation was taking place. He said the school had asked in its annual questionnaire whether parents would like more information, and 70% had said yes.The school is also carrying out a telephone survey of 8-10% of parents and held a public meeting yesterday to explain the plans.

"It's a very complicated, very controversal new policy, and we're not wanting to rush into it," he said.A total of 32 schools opened as academies this month out of 2,000 that had expressed interest since May

Over 140 schools are expected to convert to academy status in the coming school year after the government passed a new law to allow every school in England to opt out of local authority control.

Schools like Tidemill that are rated "outstanding" by Ofsted were pre-approved, meaning that those who applied immediately are the most likely to open as academies first.

The speed at which the legislation moved through parliament led to accusations that ministers rushed the reforms using a timetable usually reserved for emergency laws, such as anti-terror powers.

Edward Acton gave 'inaccurate' information to MPs by telling them the university would reassess key scientific papers following the UEA climate emails controversy

The vice-chancellor of the University of East Anglia gave "inaccurate" information to MPs when he told them that the university was setting up an inquiry into the reliability of key scientific climate change papers produced by his researchers, according to the man who led the inquiry.

Lord Oxburgh told MPs on the science and technology select committee today that Edward Acton had been wrong to tell the same committee in March that his inquiry would look into the science itself.

"I think that was inaccurate," he told the MPs. "This had to be done rapidly. This was their concern. They really wanted something within a month. There was no way our panel could evaluate the science."

Committee member Graham Stringer MP said this went against what the university had said at the time.

"We were told very clearly both by press releases and by Acton when he came [before the committee] that this was going to be an investigation into the science. Oxburgh made it very clear that it was an investigation into the integrity of the scientists," he said.

Oxburgh was appointed in March to head the second of two inquiries initiated by the university to look into the fallout from the online release of emails and documents from its Climatic Research Unit (CRU).

When announcing that inquiry during a grilling by MPs on 1 March, Acton said "[The main inquiry led by Sir Muir Russell] is not looking at the science. It is looking at allegations about malpractice. I am hoping later this week to announce the chair of a panel to reassess the science and make sure there's nothing wrong."

When it was formally announced, Professor Trevor Davies, the university's pro-vice-chancellor for research, described the Oxburgh inquiry as an "independent assessment of CRU's key publications in the areas which have been most subject to comment".

Dr Evan Harris, who was on the science and technology select committee before losing his seat as a Lib Dem MP in May, said that a full evaluation of the science produced by the CRU was impractical.

"I don't think it's reasonable to expect that inquiry to repeat a peer review analysis of the papers themselves," he said.

"That is the responsibility of the journals that published them. I think the science community is satisfied and therefore parliament should be as well that the scientific reputations of the individuals and the unit remain intact."

Oxburgh defended the inquiry from MPs' suggestions that the nine-page report which took less than a month to complete was superficial or rushed.

"I don't think we could have done usefully any more than we did to answer the question that we were set," he said.

"We worked very hard and I'm afraid I worked the panel very hard. They were very experienced people. Given our limited remit I don't think we in fact needed any more time."

He also denied that the panel was biased in favour of the scientists and said that complaints about lack of openness were wide of the mark. He said that contrary to speculation, one of the panel members was sceptical about climate change – but he refused to say who.

"I think the views of individuals are their own," he said.

MPs also asked whether the expert panel had looked specifically at a paper on Chinese weather stations published by Prof Phil Jones the head of the unit that has been the subject of an allegation of fraud by the amateur climate analyst and former City banker Dough Keenan. Oxburgh said it had not.

Stringer asked why Oxburgh had decided not to publish the notes made by committee members during their deliberations.

Oxburgh, who has been unwell and sometimes erupted into violent bouts of coughing during the evidence session, said that he did not think that the notes would have added to the report.

Stringer disagreed. "If you put [comments from panel-member Professor Michael Kelly] next to the conclusions in the Oxburgh report then they look strange," he said.

"I think people would read the Oxburgh report differently if the minutes of the meetings that had taken place and the comments of the professorial investigators were also there."

A man whose runaway van killed two young people after he failed to apply the hand brake properly when he parked was today found guilty of causing death by careless driving.

The Government's review of extradition arrangements will consider whether the treaty between the United States and the UK is "unbalanced", Home Secretary Theresa May said today.

An emergency Commons debate has been called to examine newspaper phone hacking, it was announced today amid fresh pressure on Downing Street communications chief Andy Coulson.

Unions reacted with shock today after manufacturing giant BAE Systems announced plans to axe almost 1,000 jobs, mainly from its military division.

A "complex and interlinked" series of events involving mechanical failures and human judgments led to the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster, a report by oil giant BP said today.