The event, organised by the Spectator magazine and Brewin Dolphin investment consultants, took place in London¡¯s Shaw Theatre on 4 March.

Former Apprentice contestant and Sun columnist Katie Hopkins argued that ¡°we no longer have the luxury of the liberal arts¡±.

When it was announced that she was taking part in the debate, she told the audience, Nicholas Stern, president of the British Academy, had made a point of describing her as ¡°utterly stupid¡±. Yet her advice to young people was: ¡°Don¡¯t follow your heart; follow jobs¡±. It was ¡°mediaeval¡±, she added, that ¡°we still teach students on university campuses¡±.

Julia Hobsbawm, founder of the networking business Editorial Intelligence, described the snobbery she had faced earlier in her career because she did not have an arts degree, suggesting that today¡¯s ¡°arts graduates are not moving into a market which can fully support them¡±.

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Spectator columnist and contributing editor Harry Cole called his degree in social anthropology ¡°an MA in sweet FA¡±. He had worked out that it had cost him ?20 an hour ¡°to be lectured by an incomprehensible Frenchman with a goatee¡± and wondered why ¡°some [academic] subjects spend more time questioning if they are a subject than being a subject¡±. Could it really be right that ¡°our universities are splitting at the seams with time-wasters like me¡±?

Arguing against the motion, entrepreneur Doug Richard declared that his opponents wanted to ¡°reduce us all to vocational economic drones¡±, when in reality an arts degree was ¡°a core opportunity to learn to think, be creative and innovate¡±.

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Anthony Seldon, headmaster of Wellington College, claimed the debate was really ¡°about the future of humankind, of living life fully¡±.

Novelist Will Self, professor of contemporary thought at Brunel University, agreed that it was all about ¡°spiritual values and nurturing the soul¡±. Politicians anxious about ¡°unassimilable immigrants¡± should come to his classes to ¡°see young women in hijabs discussing Spinoza¡¯s religious philosophy¡±.

And those who believed that face-to-face contact no longer had a place in education should ¡°start bringing up their kids on Skype¡±.

matthew.reisz@tsleducation.com