A team from Monash University, Australia, Fiona Prowse and Victor Finkel, won the annual Cambridge Union Inter-Varsity (IV) held on the November 19 and 20.

Cambridge alumnus Sam Block, representing Manchester, was awarded the best speaker prize, having scored the highest number of speaker points in the 5 preliminary rounds.

The Cambridge Union IV is one of the world’s most famous debating tournaments, consistently attracting over a 100 teams from all over the world. This year’s tournament involved 106 teams, with more than 70 from outside the UK. Teams came from various countries, such as the USA, Australia, Ireland, Germany, Russia, and India.

The debates were in British Parliamentary format with 7 minutes speeches. Each round began 15 minutes after teams were assigned positions, rooms and a motion for debate. In all there were 5 preliminary rounds followed by the qualifying rounds and  final, which featured teams from Durham, Manchester, Monash and Sydney universities.  ‘English as a Second Language’ semi-finals and final were also held for teams from countries where English is their second language.

Topics for debate in the preliminary rounds included making pre-nuptial contracts mandatory, disbanding the UN, making casinos liable for debts incurred by problem gamblers, and one that asserted that western governments should fund madrasses overseas.

The motion for the final round was: ‘This house believes in the virtue of a disproportionate military response’. The choice of topic was purportedly inspired by a scene from the TV programme ‘The West Wing’.  Durham interpreted the debate to consider how it would be both justifiable and advisable for the Israeli government to respond to Hamas and Palestine by a disproportionate military response. Monash argued that Durham was thus justifying ‘genocide’, to which Durham surprisingly retorted: ‘we don’t have morals; we are genocidal maniacs.’

The debate took a philosophical turn with highly sophisticated arguments regarding the duties of a state to its citizens and non-citizens, if any, especially during war. Interesting arguments were also put forward regarding ‘an a priori justification for the ‘right to life’’. In the end, in a split decision by the judging panel, seven to one, the team from Monash was declared the winner.

Victor Finkel, of the winning team, an aerospace engineering student, told Varsity it was his first time at Cambridge, and he had flown all the way from Australia for the tournament. Finkel, a World Universities Debating Championship finalist in 2009, said that the tournament was ‘well organised, with brilliant motions, and great judging’, and that he thoroughly enjoyed his time at Cambridge.

A team from Leiden University, Holland made up of Rob Honig and Ali Al Khatib, won the English as a second language category final.

The chief adjudicators were Art Ward and Cambridge alumnus Daniel Warents. Both Ward and Warents are World Universities Debating Championship finalists.