Trevor Phillips, the former chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, has condemned critics of an Oxford academic, who has called for a reappraisal of colonialism, as 'Stalinist'.

Fifty-eight staff have signed a statement criticising Nigel Biggar over an article in which he said feelings of guilt about colonialism may have gone too far.

The regius professor of moral and pastoral theology at Christ Church wrote that society should take a more balanced view of the Empire rather than simply remembering it with shame.

Trevor Phillips has condemned critics of Professor Nigel Biggar as using a line of attack of which 'Joseph Stalin would have been proud'

But defending Professor Biggar, Mr Phillips said in a letter to The Times, one of positive outcomes of colonialism was today's multi-ethnic Britain.

'I have no reason to defend colonialism. But we should constantly reappraise its consequences, one of which is today's multiethnic Britain,' he wrote.

'It may be that the 58 Oxford academics would prefer to inhabit the largely mono-ethnic, pre-Windrush Britain (a population mix somewhat preserved in their own university) but it is a fact that we are only here because you were there.'

'Students' misreading of history is entirely understandable if they are instructed by the academics who criticise Nigel Biggar for asking "the wrong questions, using the wrong terms", an attack line of which Joseph Stalin would have been proud.'

Professor Biggar has been at Oxford for a decade and is also a canon of Christ Church Cathedral as well as the director of Oxford's McDonald Centre for Theology, Ethics and Public Life.

He is leading a five year project entitled Ethics and Empire to reappraise colonialism.

Professor Nigel Biggar is leading a five-year project re-evaluating colonialism, which has been condemned by 58 of his colleagues

Professor Biggar drew the criticism for his views after writing an article, also in in The Times, in which he said 'apologising for empire is now compulsory but shame can stop us tackling the world's problems'.

His colleagues claimed he was 'breathtakingly politically naive' and was engaging in 'very bad history'.

They said they 'rejected' his views because they gave the impression that Oxford 'celebrated' imperialism.

The academics also branded his new research project, Ethics and Empire, aimed at re-evaluating colonialism as 'too simplistic to be taken seriously' and vowed not to take part in it.

Criticism was not an attempt to silence the professor or curb free speech, they insisted.

He had 'every right to hold and to express whatever views he chooses or finds compelling, and to conduct whatever research he chooses in the way he feels appropriate'.