Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill (Fourth sitting)

David Simmonds Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2021 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

May I ask you to keep your answer brief, Professor Layzell, because two more members of the Committee have indicated that they want to speak?

Professor Layzell: There is a concern around the litigation and making both student unions and universities more risk averse, without the sort of protections that we put in our written submission.

[David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)]

Q I want to push you on this point about the effectiveness of non-legislative measures and how we compare the norms in different environments. I am not entirely convinced that Facebook, which is essentially an unregulated environment, would have the same norms as you would find in a university and the world of academia. I am not entirely convinced by that analogy, although I understand the point. Both of you have mentioned training and things like anonymisation of promotion processes as a way of addressing the issue, but presumably if those things were entirely effective and consistent, we wouldn’t be hearing the evidence about people suffering this chilling effect. Would you like to reflect on the effectiveness of those existing measures and any lessons that we as a Committee might need to take on board from what appears to be inconsistency in the way they operate?

Professor Layzell: As I said earlier, I think Universities UK would recognise that there have been cases where this approach has not worked as well as one would have wished. If the legislation is proportionate and does not create undesired side-effects such as more risk aversion, it may help to achieve a greater degree of consistency, but it is about keeping proportionality.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

Q Thank you for your evidence, which has been extremely interesting. I am going to ask similar questions to those I asked earlier about the director of freedom of speech. In the past few evidence sessions, we have heard varying opinions on who the director should be, how they should be appointed and what skills or knowledge they should have. In your evidence, you referred to

“the desirability of the preferred candidate having experience of either the higher education or legal sector.”

Why do you think that is desirable?

Professor Layzell: I think because the challenges that vice-chancellors feel they face arise when situations are complex. A simple black and white issue of saying yes or no is not where the problem is. It is the confluence of a number of legal requirements that you need to get your head around. You have got to have that legal experience and/or experience of dealing with these sorts of situations in higher education. It would be wrong to think that these issues are very simple yes/no decisions; they are generally more complex.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Okay. I call David Simmonds.

[David Simmonds]

Q I thank Danny for his comments about the usefulness of the IHRA definition. A brief question for Hillary: you said in a number of your responses that there are a lot of things in the Bill that need to be closely scrutinised; luckily, the purpose of this Committee is to ensure that scrutiny. Can you say specifically which points in the Bill the NUS wishes to express a view about, and how you feel the Bill should change in the light of the NUS’s point of view?

Hillary Gyebi-Ababio: Hopefully you will have seen our amendments, so to save time I will not repeat them. All our amendments cover the fact that there are confusing regulatory positions in the Bill, which add regulation to a sector and a space that are already regulated quite well. It is concerning, in that the Bill will cause chaos and confusion for students and academics alike, I imagine. There is not a lot of clarity around the measures. I have spoken a lot about the disproportionate financial impact that they will have on student unions. They do not show a preparedness to be transparent and accountable in relation to the Director for Freedom of Speech, and more generally in how the regulatory framework will work. Again, as I said—and this speaks to the last question I was answering—there is not enough reassurance—

[The Chair]

Order. I am afraid that brings us to the end of the time allocated for the Committee to ask questions of this panel. I thank the witnesses on behalf of the Committee for their evidence. I invite any member of the Committee who wishes to register an interest to do so now.

[Mr Holden]

I declare an interest as the vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Durham University.

[David Simmonds]

I am an honorary fellow of Birkbeck College.