Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill

Debate between Miriam Cates and John Hayes

Report stage
Monday 13th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir John Hayes]

I agree entirely, which is precisely why this Bill is so welcome, but it needs to be part of a bigger programme of work by the Government to do what I described earlier, which is to unpick some of the legacy of the dark days of Blairism and the impact that that has had on all kinds of aspects of our wellbeing. My hon. Friend is right. This Bill is significant, but modest, so let it be the beginning of a crusade to establish freedom as the default position across all our legislative considerations in exactly the way—with erudition and diligence, matched by experience—that my right hon. Friend illustrates.

Free speech is complex and, in the words of the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington, may be seen as an abstraction, but if it is an abstraction, it is one that is essential for the wellbeing of our free society, for it is at the very heart of what an open society is all about. The ability to say things which, as I said earlier, alarm, disturb, or even shock, and hear things with which we disagree is the very nature of what good universities are all about. I fear that that is jeopardised by some of the thinking that permeates universities, particularly university leaders and managers. For example, Professor Ahmed also spoke of

“issues to do with race, with transgender, and with Israel and Palestine on which they were simply unwilling to say what they thought”––[Official Report, Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Public Bill Committee, 7 September 2021; c. 13, Q22.]

people fear the consequences of doing so. It is not just those issues, although those are notable among the list of things that people now regard as beyond the scope of free and open debate.

[Miriam Cates (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does he not agree that much of the controversy surrounding this Bill comes from a conflation of physical safety with emotional and intellectual safety? Although students should have the right to be physically safe on campus, there is no right to feel safe and, as he rightly says, universities are the place where we should feel emotionally and intellectually challenged and, perhaps, unsafe at times.

[Sir John Hayes]

Burke said, as you well know, Mr Deputy Speaker:

“He that struggles with us strengthens our nerves, and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper.”

Part of developing intellectually and personally, particularly for young people at university—we should not assume that only young people go to university—is exactly that. It is being stimulated, sometimes being excited, sometimes being challenged and, yes, sometimes being offended. I am often offended in this Chamber by all kinds of things, and not always things that I hear from those on the Opposition Benches.

--- Later in debate ---

[Miriam Cates]

I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. The belief that human life starts at conception is a scientifically valid belief, and one that I hold myself. Students and staff should absolutely be protected in reflecting that view. He leads me on to my next point, which is that for every high-profile case we have discussed in the House today, many more never make the headlines. Underneath these incidents lies a culture where students and academics alike are becoming afraid to discuss and share their views. Last October, the University and College Union published a report showing that 35% of UK academics had undertaken self-censorship for fear of negative repercussions, such as the loss of privileges, demotion or even physical harm. The report’s authors commented:

“Self-censorship at this level appears to make a mockery of any pretence by universities of being paragons of free speech and…the pursuit of knowledge and academic freedom.”

The evidence is clear: free speech and academic freedoms in our universities are under threat, so I welcome the Government amendments that will strengthen the Bill further. Amendments 1, 2 and 16 extend protections to academics by removing the express limitation that academic freedom covers only matters within an academic’s field of expertise. They are important: first, because in many disciplines it would be hard to define exactly where the boundaries of a particular field lie; and secondly, because it is right to recognise that research and ideas do not exist in silos. There are obvious crossovers, for example, between science and ethics, politics and economics, philosophy and history. We need our greatest minds to be free to write, to speak and to conduct research in an unrestricted way for the benefit of our whole society.

[Sir John Hayes]

As ever, my hon. Friend is making a compelling case. University authorities are often either complicit in this, or in denial. The Bill will send a signal to them that it is simply not good enough to brush the attacks on freedom under the carpet. I hope that she will press the Government to go still further, as I have done, in ensuring that the Bill has all the provisions needed to ensure that freedom is maintained.

[Miriam Cates]

My right hon. Friend is right: this Bill is an important marker for universities, which will be forced to recognise that these are not specific isolated issues, but that there is a culture change that needs to be addressed across our whole country. We are also seeing it in other countries in the world, particularly America.

I support the amendments to remove the restriction on field of expertise, and I also support Government amendments 3, 4 and 6 to 10, which will ensure that higher education providers cannot require visiting speakers or hosting bodies to bear some or all of the costs of security. This will prevent no-platforming by the back door. As my right hon. Friend the Minister has already said, if universities have a physical safety and security issue on campus, they should urgently address the root of that.

On safety, amendment 18, in the name of the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western), would compel the Office for Students, when considering a free speech complaint, to be mindful of the right of students to feel safe on university campuses. I have no doubt that the amendment is well meant, and I listened carefully to his arguments, but I fear that it would further embed the culture and attitudes that have led to the chilling effect on free speech and that have made this Bill necessary.

In the amendment, as on campus, we see the conflation of physical safety with intellectual and emotional comfort. Students should of course be physically safe, and higher education institutions have a duty to follow health and safety law, like all other organisations, but I suspect that is not what the amendment is getting at. Universities should absolutely not be cultivating an atmosphere on campus where students believe they are or should be free from emotional and intellectual discomfort. Just as our bodies must go through training, challenge and discomfort to become physically fit, so our minds must experience challenge, discomfort and sometimes even offence to become stronger, more resilient and more wise.

In the recent book, “The Coddling of the American Mind”, the authors describe “anti-fragility”, the idea that young people’s brains must be exposed to challenges and stresses, or they will fail to mature into strong and capable adults able to engage productively with people and ideas that challenge their beliefs. Nowhere is it more important to understand the concept of anti-fragility than in our universities, where institutions are cultivating minds that will become the thought leaders of tomorrow. Since our universities act as an incubator for wider public culture, we will fail to uphold freedom of debate in this country if we fail to uphold it on campus.

Freedom of speech is the bedrock of democracy. As a recent New York Times editorial put it:

“Ideas that go unchallenged by opposing views risk becoming weak and brittle rather than being strengthened by tough scrutiny.”

We saw the impact of that cancel culture in political and social debate during covid, where damaging, un-evidenced, ineffective and wasteful policies went unchallenged. If we value the kind of rigorous debate that upholds democracy and ensures the best policies are produced, we must not allow this concept creep of the term “safety” on campus.

Despite levelling up, Brexit and enormous economic challenges, this is possibly one of the most important Bills making its way through Parliament, because our ability to unite and level up in this country is threatened by the culture on campus. The starkest division in British society—not only in voting behaviour, but in social values—is between graduates and non-graduates. The trend towards a homogenous worldview in our higher education institutions is exacerbating this division. Instead, we need our universities to be places where it is the norm for competing ideas to co-exist and to be openly interrogated and challenged by evidence.

Abortion (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2021

Debate between Miriam Cates and John Hayes

Monday 26th April 2021 General Committees

[Miriam Cates]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. I understand that the regulations are law as things stand, but I will urge the Government later in my contribution to repeal section 9, which I believe is the right and moral thing to do.

It would be one thing for this legislation to bring Northern Ireland’s abortion framework in line with that for Great Britain, but the measures go beyond Great Britain equivalents. They mandate an abortion regime that is quite unrestricted and, I believe, unsafe. Unlike in England and Wales, there will be no requirement for two doctors to certify, and abortion will be routinely available at GP’s surgeries rather than only in restricted places. Although I appreciate the Government’s requirement for safeguards, the regulations could permit sex-selective abortion by default, as they allow abortion for any reason until 12 weeks’ gestation.

[Sir John Hayes]

What my hon. Friend is saying is, frankly, shocking. She is saying that, far from the claim that we are bringing Northern Ireland into line with the rest of the United Kingdom, Northern Ireland’s laws on abortion will be entirely different from those that pertain to the rest of the United Kingdom—considerably more permissive, and therefore further out of line with local opinion even than the laws that prevail in England, Wales and Scotland.

[Miriam Cates]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention. I appreciate that this is a very emotive issue, as other hon. Members have said. Many of us have different opinions—I fully accept hon. Members’ opinions—but I would like to make progress on the particular point of view that I bring to this issue.

The enforcement of the regulations could not only permit sex-selective abortion, but allow abortion up to birth for babies with disabilities—even those disabilities that do not prevent people from living fulfilling lives. I am particularly concerned that, without necessary safeguards, women in abusive relationships may be coerced into abortions. The regulations and their enforcement introduce new possibilities for sex and disability discrimination, and go far beyond what is legally necessary or even safe.