Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill

Paul Blomfield Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 12th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab) [V]]

I have to confess that I have some sympathy with the Universities Minister, recognising that she will soon be winding up this debate. She is a decent Minister who knows the real issues facing our universities and their students, and I am sure that she knows that this Bill is nonsense. She has certainly struggled to explain its impact. She knows and she has admitted that it will protect some hate speech, but she is having to defend it to play her part in stoking up the culture wars that are at the heart of this Conservative party’s electoral strategy.

Let us be clear: free speech is at the heart of our values. We on the Labour Benches have a long record of protecting it, but it has too often been used by the Conservative party as a political football. I remember 35 years ago, with unemployment at a post-war high of 14% amid the deep gloom of that Tory decade, when Margaret Thatcher produced the Education (No. 2) Act 1986, requiring universities to uphold freedom of speech. I played my part then in drafting the code of practice for the University of Sheffield to ensure our compliance with the legislation. The Act was followed by a series of speaker meetings orchestrated by Conservative students to provoke a reaction and fuel division.

Then, almost 10 years later, with John Major’s Government struggling, out came the free speech dead cat again with the 1994 Education Act, which this time decided that too much free speech of the wrong sort was a bad thing and tried to limit the activities of student unions.

Now, with the mismanagement of covid leaving the UK with one of the worst recessions and worst death rates in Europe, the Government’s flawed Brexit deal hitting businesses in every sector, people at work facing insecurity and rising inequality across society, free speech is again rolled out as a diversion, a “look over there” tactic. With no irony, they are introducing this Bill the week after Ministers were cracking down on free speech with the anti-protest provisions of the policing Bill.

As the Universities Minister acknowledged on Radio 4, this is a Bill that empowers holocaust deniers and other purveyors of hate speech by giving them the powers to make vexatious complaints against universities. As if that did not do enough to fuel the culture war, it also creates a new director for freedom of speech at the Office for Students with a full-time responsibility to keep the issue alive. No doubt it will be another job for another Conservative crony with undue influence over academic debate. Does the Minister really believe that this is the most important addition to the IFS team? Is it more important, for example, than a director of learning remediation to deal with the lost learning experiences for both new and current students as a result of covid? Does she not recognise that the financial and legal liability in the Bill could be a chill factor on open debate, requiring universities to spend more on lawyers and less on students, but, of course, the Bill is not about the real priorities. I represent both of Sheffield’s universities and more students than any other Member of this House. Over the last year, I have received hundreds of emails from students, from parents with children at university, from staff working hard to provide the best possible learning during the pandemic against a backdrop of confusion and late decisions from the Government; I have received none on free speech.

We could have spent our time better today looking at the issues that are being raised. We could have discussed the recommendations of the report by the all-party parliamentary group for students, which involved two of the Minister’s Conservative predecessors and argued for a learning remediation fund to assist universities to provide access to experiences, specialist facilities and equipment for skills development and more—those things that students have missed during the pandemic. We could have discussed our case for proper hardship funding in respect of rents paid for unused accommodation by students who have lost out from part-time jobs that dried up in hospitality and retail sector. We could have considered why students in England have been treated far worse than those in Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland, with an average of only £43.70 allocated per student in England for hardship support while those in Wales received an average of £400 per head, Northern Ireland £500 per head and Scotland £80 per head plus other support packages.

We could have talked about the issues for staff who have faced enormous pressure and made huge efforts to move entire courses online, delivering the best possible teaching but knowing that some of the learning experiences would inevitably be lost. We might have asked why the latest guidance for teaching in the autumn has been issued too late, after timetabling has been done, making things more difficult than needed. We could have been considering the quarantine arrangements for the new session, as those of us on the all-party parliamentary group for international students have been arguing. We could have discussed the vital role that our universities will play as we rebuild our economy after covid. Instead, we are faced with this sorry Bill. The Government really need to deal with the priorities that we face. I hope that they will drop this unnecessary Bill.