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

Matt Western Excerpts

Tuesday 7th September 2021 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

We have our first panel of witnesses, so a very warm welcome to Professor Kathleen Stock and Dr Arif Ahmed. We will go straight into the questions. As always, time is of the essence and it would be much appreciated if you keep your remarks directly related to the questions and keep them as brief as possible.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

Q Thank you for joining us this morning, Professor Stock and Dr Ahmed. I have a couple of questions I wish to raise with you, Professor Stock. You suggested in a recent Guardian article that university management groups and vice-chancellors have been unable to

“manage the modern problems around suppression of academic freedom.”

Yet, every university I have spoken to already has a code of practice on the freedom of speech and academic freedom. Many, including King’s College London, have based their code of practice on the renowned Chicago principles. If universities are already under a duty to protect academic freedom and freedom of speech under the Education (No. 2) Act 1986, how can it be said that university management groups are failing in their duty to uphold academic freedoms?

Professor Stock: I think that the traditional problem of academic freedom has expanded. Several relevant factors are now in play that were not before, including the internet, which is the most obvious one, social media, academics being encouraged to engage online, student fees, encouraging us to think of students as customers, competition with student recruitment and encouraging universities to present their most PR-friendly face towards students, which might involve playing up certain political views that students have to attract them and being rather embarrassed about certain political views that they think will not attract those students.

It might also involve—it certainly does involve—bringing activist groups in to do equality, diversity and inclusion. It appears to me there is no oversight on how these new factors, which are significant, are impacting on individual academic freedoms within institutions. It is not really institutional autonomy; it is about individual freedom or unorthodox, non-conformist thinkers being able to say, write or think what they want. I think there is plenty of evidence that that is being chilled.

[Matt Western]

Q Is that something you have witnessed yourself?

Professor Stock: Yes, I have experienced it myself. I have submitted some written evidence, which I am sure you will see. Various things have happened to me. There is evidence of students, colleagues and various other bodies, but the important point is the message it sends to others. What I get is private correspondence from lots of academics saying that they are genuinely frightened, whether rightly or wrongly, but they are frightened to say what they think about matters of controversy.

Even if universities think that in reality these people would not be censured, the fact that they believe they would be censured is enough to chill academic freedom, and that is a problem for what university is for, which is producing knowledge and understanding.

[Matt Western]

Q You will have read the Bill. How do you envisage that the provisions in the Bill are going to protect the likes of yourself and others from these supposed threats to academic freedom?

Professor Stock: The Bill is quite vague, so it is going to need a lot of guidance, concrete examples and accompanying notes. The main point of it, which is to impose a duty on universities to act and promote a culture of academic freedom, should be, if it is done right, a countervailing weight against the irrationality that can be found among some academics and some students, and universities’ apparent inability to deal with it.

As for just having academic freedom in people’s minds, I think most students are not even aware of what that means. Quite a lot faculties do not really know what it means. Being aware of the law as it stands would be good, as would having discussions about the value of academic freedom, and thinking all the time of how this new equality, diversity and inclusion directive relates to academic freedom. There are a lot of moving parts in a university. It is complicated and legislation is always changing. To have a focus on that constantly would be great.

[Matt Western]

Q You are at the University of Sussex.

Professor Stock: Yes.

[Matt Western]

Q Are you suggesting that the University of Sussex does not promote academic freedom of speech?

Professor Stock: I am suggesting it could do better. It says it does, but that is not my experience. For instance, it hardly ever advertises a thing I do, and I do fairly high-profile things. Normally, a university would be very keen to advertise the high-profile things that its academics do, so why is that? It could be concluded that it finds me embarrassing because it has to sell Sussex to students, particularly left-wing students, particularly north London students. That is a difficult demographic to manage when dealing with the issues that I deal with.

Sussex is not out of line with the sector. I talk to lots of colleagues at other universities and they say the same thing. There is the problem of basically selling yourself to students, which is obviously going to interact with matters of pressing social importance that do not quite square with what students think.

[Matt Western]

Q To pick up on your point that universities could improve, or the University of Sussex—

Professor Stock: I would rather not talk just about Sussex. It is a general problem.

[Matt Western]

No, but we all tend to speak from personal experience because it is more direct and authentic. Do you not find, when institutions could improve, it is actually about some changes within, and that perhaps you do not need legislation to force it through? It is thought very widely that this is a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

Professor Stock: The problem is that unfortunately we do need legislation, because universities have not got on top of this. With the people I am talking to, and the stuff that I refer to in my written evidence, we are not talking just about deplatforming. I know there is a focus on public events and public speaking. There is a range of areas where speech is being suppressed or controlled, where junior academics are being put on vexatious complaints for expressing their perfectly legitimate academic views, and where people are being very cautious about what they teach because they want to avoid controversy.

If universities had been able to get on top of all of that, they would have done, I assume, but they have not. In some cases, they just deny the problem. This legislation says that there should be a positive duty to promote academic culture. That could be a very positive, forward-looking initiative; it does not have to be heavy-handed, although obviously it has the capacity to be punitive. But there is also the dimension of encouraging universities to examine what the value is of academic freedom, which is not a discussion that I see happening.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

Q There is legislation already, in the Education Act. What you are saying is that that is not working. If I follow your argument, universities are not following that because what they want to do is to ensure that they have not got individuals like you or perhaps other academics who are going to put off students from being attracted to those universities, because of their views. To follow it to a logical conclusion, is not the ultimate thing that is going to happen this? If the only motivation behind it is that somehow they feel that if they allow you and others to express your different views—which I fully support, personally—that will put off students from going there, are they not going to just not employ people like you?

Professor Stock: I am not a lawyer, but I assume that there should be some discussion of how recruitment happens and—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)]

Q Something a lot of people, particularly the Opposition, were asking on Second Reading was whether this is just a total sledgehammer to crack a nut. How big a problem is this self-censorship, really? We have seen the evidence today: that 35% of academics in the UK are self-censoring versus 19% in the EU. Is this something that is actually stopping you doing your work as academics?

Dr Ahmed: Yes, I believe that it is. For instance, I genuinely think that there are things now that I would hesitate to say. Because I am in the position that I am, I am prepared to say them, but I know many people who are not. There are questions that many people would hesitate to explore, so it is now stopping academics from doing their jobs.

Professor Stock: It is not stopping me doing my job, but is unreasonable to expect the average academic to have to go through the things that I have gone through and overcome the obstacles that I have had to. I have to do so much in order to be able to teach a class on feminist philosophy where I can say, “Here is what I think, and I can say this because I have all this research that backs it up,” and even then I get complaints, and colleagues will call me a bigot. It is not reasonable to put that as the standard for the average academic saying what they think.

My concern, in talking about my experience, is not, “Oh, feel sorry for me.” It is that people see this, and it sends a message. I just want to point out that, of course, self-censorship is by its nature quite hidden. Universities will say, “Well, nobody’s told us this.” There is a real elision in our culture between saying that something is right and saying that someone should have the right to say that it is right. People confuse those all the time. If somebody says, “I think Kathleen Stock should have the right to say what she thinks,” that can be interpreted as, “She’s right,” and then that person is called a bigot too. It is infectious.

Dr Ahmed: I forgot to mention that, of course, the issue of self-censorship affects students as well as academics. Many students are simply not asking questions. If you have a class about religion, immigration or trans issues, there are students who might want to ask questions that they genuinely want the answers to, philosophical or otherwise, which they are afraid to ask in class because of what will happen if they ask them.

[Matt Western]

Q We are running out of time; I think we have one minute. Can I just ask a final question to you, Dr Ahmed? In point 12 of your written evidence, you say that the Bill would require

“a credible mechanism for holding to account those that do not”

promote free speech. Do you view the Office for Students, as it is currently organised, as a credible body that is capable of delivering a credible mechanism?

Dr Ahmed: Broadly, yes, I do.

[Matt Western]

Q Even though its chair is a Conservative peer, is party affiliated and has made a donation to the Conservative party since his appointment.

Dr Ahmed: There are always concerns with the regulator —that it has to be impartial—and there are also concerns in this particular case. The question is the general impartiality of the regulator. I do not know anything about Lord Wharton. I would not be the right person to ask about that. If it is to do with the issue of free speech, what we need in a regulator is someone who has guts and principles.

[Matt Western]

Q He would be responsible for the appointment of the director of free speech. Would you have absolute faith in that?

Dr Ahmed: There is no evidence that I am aware of that there would be any problems with the appointments process.

[Charlotte Nichols]

Q If the Bill goes through, what would the measure of success be? You have talked about academic freedom, the chilling effect and self-censorship; these are things that exist in a very abstract way. You have referred to the UCU research. What would success look like to you?

Dr Ahmed: One thing would be that we could do self-reported self-censorship. That would be something that one could measure and that has been credibly measured. One could work out whether that was declining. The second thing would be that since the Joint Committee on Human Rights report in 2018, which has been cited I believe by members of the Opposition, I could think of about 45 cases that have come up since then—documented cases—of disciplinary action against harassment of students, staff and so on for things that they have said that were legal and those are all public, so a second measure of success would be a decline in those cases.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

We welcome our second panel: Trevor Phillips OBE, who is joining remotely via Zoom, and Professor Nigel Biggar CBE, who is the Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at Oxford University.

[Matt Western]

Q Welcome to you both. Thank you for joining us and for your written submissions. A question to both of you: English PEN, one of the world’s oldest human rights organisations, raised concerns about whether a director for freedom of speech and academic freedom will be a regulator, an adjudicator or an adviser on free speech issues? How do you envisage the role of the director? Do you have concerns over the independence of the role and whether the director could infringe academic freedom in and of itself?

Trevor Phillips: Good morning. Thank you very much for the invitation to join this conversation. I am, of course, a great respecter of English PEN and in my role—I guess I am principally appearing here as chair of Index on Censorship, which is the global freedom of expression advocate, 50 years old—we work rather closely with English PEN. Today we publish censored work in our quarterly magazine, build our “Banned by Beijing” campaign and fight for freedom of journalists, for example, in places such as Belarus.

The reason I make that point is that Index broadly supports the intention of the Bill, but coming to the specific question you asked me, from our point of view we look at this from the international perspective. Many of those who face censorship regard Britain as an exemplar and use us as a standard to aspire to. However, so do authoritarians of all political stripes. Any extension of the state’s power over speech at home can be used by those who want to as a means of, as an example, limiting freedom of expression. Your point about the regulator is an important one. To be honest, unless the regulator is actually a regulator of behaviour, there seems little point. Universities do not lack for advice of various kinds.

The important point about this post is that he or she should be a protector of the freedom of expression of students and academics—and indeed, by the way, those who are not academics. For example, there was a case in Cambridge where a porter essentially lost his job because of a view he expressed. In my view, if we are going to go down this road, that individual role has to be the role of a regulator and a protector of freedom of expression.

A very good example at the moment that is not much talked about is the position of international students. I welcome the presence of international students: I was one myself many moons ago. But we have concerns that certain countries—I am specifically thinking of China—covertly monitor and try to control the behaviour of their students. That has been exacerbated by the introduction of security laws in Hong Kong. It seems to me that a regulator should have the will, the power and the capability to ensure that those students and their right to express their opinions are protected.

[Matt Western]

Q Thank you. Can I ask Professor Biggar the same question?

Professor Biggar: One of your questions was whether the director would be simply an adviser or a regulator-adjudicator. Certainly the second, because he or she would be responsible for judging complaints. That is an adjudicator role. What is more, I imagine that one of the main jobs of the director would be to develop and publish guidance, which would carry authority, so it is more than just advisory.

I think your next question had to do with the impartiality of the director. Those who think there is no problem would prefer a director who agrees with them and changes nothing. Those who think there is a problem want a director who is going to effect a corrective bias. So, someone like me, who thinks there is a problem—and I guess the Government do, given the legislation—wants a director who has a certain partiality of that kind.

Beyond that, the director will occupy a public position. I take it that it will be made clear to the director that this is not to be used for private, partisan purposes. It is a public position. Whatever advice the director is to give will be within the law and it will have to take account of different bodies of law, the Equality Act on one hand and legislation dealing with free speech on the other. There are various constraints but I am not worried about that.

[Matt Western]

Q Can I come back to Sir Trevor? In November 2020, Sir Trevor, you wrote of a “dark edge of censoriousness” emerging. I think that was in an article that appeared in The Times. You will be aware of this creeping sense of Government interference in, say, the appointment of members to boards of trustees of museums and appointments to universities and elsewhere. Do you think that more oversight of the sector through the director will not be merely the inverse of the edge of censoriousness but will actually favour the Government?

Trevor Phillips: No more so than in any other Administration. By the way, there may be a sound problem, but I think you called me “Sir Trevor”. Her Majesty has not made that mistake; that would be a major error. The creeping edge of censoriousness is, to be honest, rather little to do with Government. There is often confusion about the word “independent”, particularly in higher education. People tend to use the word “independent” when they actually mean opposition to Government.

I do not think there is any danger of the higher education sector as a whole developing a culture of deference to the existing Government. My reference to the creeping edge of censoriousness was far more in relation to peer pressure and the emergence of self-censorship. We have noticed something at Index. Over the past couple of years we have run a campaign to try to increase the resilience of students in being able to express their opinions. We have run some training courses and so on. We do not think that the real big problem here is that everybody is looking over their shoulder and saying to themselves, “What does the Secretary of State for Education or Secretary of State for Culture think about what I am about to say in a seminar?” They are more concerned, if they are students, about whether an unfashionable or “unorthodox” view may get them marked down in exams. If they are junior academics, I think they are more concerned about whether their professors, who have no qualms about expressing their political views, may decide that the next time there is an opportunity for preferment, their views make them less likely to be favoured than someone else. My view about the issue of censoriousness is that it is far more a question of self-censorship. What we are concerned about, I guess, in relation to the legislation is that you can do quite a lot with law, but you need to support it with a clear cultural programme that supports, advocates and promotes diversity of opinion within the institutions.

[Michelle Donelan]

Q My first question is to Trevor. You have spoken in the past about the erosion of free speech. How exactly do you think that the Bill will tackle that?

Trevor Phillips: It is a short Bill, which perhaps begins to close some gaps. Simply, the process of debating it will help to highlight some of the issues about which we are concerned, but the central proposition, which is that there should be some regulatory apparatus and guidance, is valuable. We think that it is important that there is not a wild west here. To be completely honest, my own view is that if the university authorities had been doing their jobs properly, behaved like grown-ups and taken responsibility for what is happening on campuses, this would not be necessary.

However, what in the last three to five years we have seen example after example of where university authorities have essentially abdicated their responsibility to protect their own academics and students. That is why the Bill appears to have value. Because the university authorities are not doing their jobs, the Government have felt it necessary to step in. That does not mean that I think that everything that is being proposed is absolutely on the money, but I can see why it is felt necessary to do something of this kind.