At the Conservative Party conference in 1993, John Patten, the secretary of state for education, denounced Tim Brighouse as a “nutter” and a “madman” who went around “frightening the children”.
At the time Brighouse was the chief education officer of Birmingham and Patten’s view was not widely shared. Teachers and educationists launched an appeal to raise the funds for him to sue for libel.
The story became known as Nuttergate and Patten was forced into a humiliating climbdown in the High Court, where he accepted that his remarks were “false and without any justification” and was ordered to pay Brighouse a “substantial sum” and his costs. Brighouse donated the money to educational charities and a month later Patten was removed from his post by the