Policy background
- The policy underlying many of the provisions in this Act was published in the policy paper ‘Higher education: free speech and academic freedom’ in February 2021. In this paper the Government committed to several policy and legislative changes to strengthen freedom of speech and academic freedom in higher education. These were to:
- Legislate for a Free Speech and Academic Freedom Champion to be appointed as a member of the OfS Board with responsibility to champion free speech and investigate alleged breaches of registration conditions related to freedom of speech and academic freedom.
- Legislate to require a new OfS registration condition on free speech and academic freedom.
- Explore further the option of strengthening the section 43 duty to include a duty on higher education providers to ‘actively promote’ freedom of speech.
- Legislate to extend the strengthened section 43 duty to cover students’ unions directly.
- Set clear minimum standards for the code of practice required under section 43.
- Introduce a statutory tort that would give private individuals a right of redress for loss as a result of a breach of section 43.
- Ensure wider and enhanced academic freedom contractual protections.
- The policy paper followed the statement in the Conservative Manifesto of 2019: "We will also strengthen academic freedom and free speech in universities".
- This Act enables the Government to meet these commitments.
