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Cambridgeshire Mayor James Palmer said the decision brought “great shame” to the university city and shows “disdain” for the Armed Forces in the centenary year of the end of the First World War. Cambridge University’s Student Union had been asked to do more to promote Remembrance Sunday in a motion aimed to “ensure that Remembrance Day becomes a well-established and well-marked event across the university”. But the motion, put forward by two members of the university’s Conservative Association (CUCA), was rejected in favour of plans put forward by a student activist. Stella Swain said organisations should “reshape remembrance away from glorification and valorisation of war” and campaign “against militarisation”.

She said “all lives lost and affected by war” should be commemorated, and any mention of British war veterans, Remembrance Day or poppies, was deleted from the motion. Mr Palmer told the Daily Telegraph: “It is something I find difficult to comprehend – that students can’t be grateful and respectful of previous generations and their sacrifices. “It is easy to judge from a distance when you have the luxury of safe and comfortable democracy. We have an enormous debt to our Armed Forces in this country.” CUCA claimed students were trying to “erase” history.

Remembrance Day poppies could glorify war, students said

Tony Blair, Jeremy Corbyn and John Major at London's Remembrance Sunday service at The Cenotaph

Chairman Timur Coskun said he wanted more promotion of Remembrance Day as many students do not wear poppies. A student union spokesman said: “Discussions were not about erasing the past but broadening the focus of remembrance to include those who suffered and died wherever they were in the world.” Undergraduate and postgraduate students will still lay wreaths at a Remembrance Sunday event. The motion comes as a Silent Soldier ‘Tommy’ was decapitated for a second time in a Welsh village.

Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge, and Sophie, the Countess of Wessex