“To the patrician class entry to Oxbridge is regarded as a right rather than infatuation”
But not a “right” they can exercise freely because (unlike in the US) you can’t just buy your way in. You can buy tutoring and schooling but you still actually have to be clever. Two of Tony Blair’s kids didn’t get into Oxford even though he was PM at the time.
I agree many British politicians are “deeply unpleasant” but I don’t think anyone would argue that Boris Johnson isn’t “intellectually gifted”. I don’t know anything of Chris Grayling, but a 2:1 in history from Cambridge in 1984 doesn’t exactly highlight anyone’s intellectual gifts.
I think the difference is that in the US “class” is defined more explicitly by money, whereas in the UK it’s defined more by your background and social circles. No one in the US would look down on someone who made tens or hundreds of millions from their startup’s IPO, whereas in the UK that would make you an arriviste.