Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department will take to ensure academic standards are maintained by UK universities that amend course material to comply with Chinese National Security Laws.

It is absolutely critical that universities ensure all students have access to the teaching materials they need to continue their studies and fully immerse themselves in our world leading education system.

Academic freedom and freedom of speech are cornerstones of the UK’s world-class higher education system, and are fundamental to a student’s experience, wherever they may be based. Providers in England are required to uphold these freedoms through a combination of legislation and regulation by the Office for Students and we expect all universities to comply with these expectations whilst also ensuring they abide by any local regulations.

Following my letter to Universities UK, and given the importance of these values, departmental officials are supporting a Universities UK-led programme of work to assist universities manage and mitigate the security risks associated with any international collaboration and to maintain UK higher education values. A key output of this work is the production of guidelines to support the sector, to be published this autumn.