Ex-attorney general to lead Christ Church review after Percy row

A former attorney general has been appointed to lead an independent review of governance of a University of Oxford college that was gripped by a bitter dispute with its dean.

Christ Church, Oxford, said that Dominic Grieve would chair the review which was announced following the resignation of the dean, Martyn Percy, in April.

Revd Percy had been locked in a battle with the college’s fellows that stretched back four years. Under the terms of his departure, disciplinary proceedings were dropped and the college will pay his legal fees and compensation, reportedly totalling more than £1 million.

Revd Percy was originally suspended in 2018 in a dispute over his pay and efforts to reform college governance. The following summer a college tribunal chaired by a retired High Court judge cleared the dean of “immoral, scandalous and disgraceful” behaviour, but efforts to remove him continued.

Revd Percy was suspended again in 2020 when a woman accused him of sexual harassment, claiming that he had stroked her hair – allegations which he denied, and which police and the Church of England had declined to pursue.

The row led Lord Patten, Oxford’s chancellor, to express concern about the impact on the university’s reputation, and the Charity Commission to warn that the acrimony was damaging the college’s ability to govern itself.

Announcing the appointment of Mr Grieve, the former MP for Beaconsfield, the college said that he would “make recommendations that the governing body will carefully consider, to ensure that Christ Church’s statutes, by-laws and governance arrangements meet the needs of this unique institution in the 21st century”.

As well as being a college of the University of Oxford, Christ Church’s college chapel serves as the cathedral church of the city’s Anglican diocese.

The Percy row has focused attention on how Christ Church’s dean serves as head of both head of the cathedral and the college, and how the college’s 60-odd fellows also serve as its trustees.

Mr Grieve, a practising Anglican and a former member of the London diocesan synod of the Church of England, said he was “delighted to play a role in this process”.

“I am both pleased and honoured to be chairing this review, which I believe will help Christ Church to sustain its long history of academic excellence and flourish as a modern institution,” Mr Grieve said.

At the time of the settlement with Revd Percy, Christ Church said that the woman who accused him of harassment had “settled her claim with the dean, on terms which, at her request, are confidential”.

chris.havergal@timeshighereducation.com