There’s nothing like a taste of your own medicine, is there, Amber Rudd?

Sure, Amber Rudd is not comparable to the far-right figures more often denied platforms. Yet her ignominious political career makes it entirely understandable why the Oxford society reneged their offer

There’s nothing quite like a taste of your own medicine.

Yesterday, former home secretary Amber Rudd was uninvited by a student society at the University of Oxford, to whom she was billed to deliver a talk, over criticism of her role as architect of the Windrush scandal, and her support of austerity policies which impacted Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) and working-class women.

The UNWomen society extended the invitation to Rudd to share her experiences in her earlier role as minister for women and equalities, “encouraging young women into politics” in the run-up to International Women’s Day. However, a majority vote cast last minute by the student society’s committee cancelled the event thirty minutes before it was due to begin.

In a stellar example of the politician who cried wolf, Rudd tweeted this morning: “Badly judged & rude of some students last night at Oxford to decide to “no platform” me 30 minutes before an event I had been invited to for #IWD2020”.

With female members in the House of Commons still woefully underrepresented at 34%; with disturbing levels of online misogynistic vitriol targeting female politicians from Nicky Morgan to Dianne Abbott (the latter of whom receives nearly half of abusive tweets directed at female MPs); in a world where politics remains stubbornly “pale, male and stale”, I’d be the first person to advocate platforming female politicians across the political spectrum.

However, as actress Susan Sarandon said in 2016 when asked why she refused to back Hillary Clinton: “I don’t vote with my vagina.” Nor I with mine.

Sure, Amber Rudd is not comparable to the far-right figures more often denied platforms. Yet her ignominious political career makes it entirely understandable why the Oxford society reneged their offer.

Any ounce of political integrity Rudd demonstrated as minister for women she lost instantly with the Windrush scandal. Rudd’s subsequent resignation and “deep regret” (despite her admission that she lied about enforced deportation targets) did little to mitigate the crisis she oversaw, which left 5,000 individuals jobless or homeless, 164 wrongfully deported and 11 dead. Two years on, the effects of Windrush are still being felt, with deportation flights leaving for Jamaica as recently as last month, despite more than 170 MPs called for the flight to be halted. Rudd is no champion of women – she is the architect of a hostile environment that victimised the most vulnerable in our society.

There’s no doubt Toby Young’s Free Speech Union will soon rear its ugly head, decrying the illiberal liberalism of authoritarian snowflakes to defend figures like Rudd who are victims of the “woke” brigade threatening to destroy their liberty.

However, the problem our country faces is not that some university students wish to deplatform those whose behaviour they conclude are beyond the pale. The problem is the impunity with which politicians promote racist policies such as the hostile environment, with which they whitewash hateful rhetoric such as the prime minister’s.

As the censuring of BBC presenter Naga Munchetty painfully proved, racism is not subjective. It is not an opinion. If your politics are built on my oppression, there is no dialogue to be had.