The Office for Students should keep out of the culture wars
Students at the Falmer Campus, the University of Sussex (Credit: Simon Dack / Alamy Stock Photo)
3 min read
Our universities are in crisis.
The crushing impact of Brexit has forced higher education to cope with huge funding losses, including the UK’s exclusion from the Erasmus programme, and rising visa fees putting off international students, lecturers and researchers from even thinking about studying and working in the UK.
Then came the extreme financial pressure of Covid. And now, another problem that threatens to engulf more of our precious seats of learning.
It very much feels like this ruling has been orchestrated to make an example of Sussex
Last month the Office for Students (OfS), an independent regulator of higher education created by the last government, slapped my excellent and vibrant local university, the University of Sussex, with a staggering £585,000 fine, concluding what the vice-chancellor has called a “flawed” three-and-a-half-year investigation.
The accusations investigated were focused on a series of university policy statements, all designed to protect the welfare of trans and non-binary staff and students across university life. The regulator’s view was that these statements could result in students and academic staff “self-censoring” and should not be tolerated.
All universities rightly prize academic freedom to research controversial subjects but they also all have policies in place to prevent abusive, bullying and harassing speech across their campuses. The clash with equalities legislation is clear and the dire implication of this ruling is that universities could now be at risk of six-figure fines for policies that are there to protect students and staff not only from anti-trans abuse but also from racist, homophobic, antisemitic, anti-Muslim or other speech.
Universities might now also be powerless to remove hateful and offensive propaganda, or discipline those responsible, for fear of regulatory action that falsely takes a draconian line on freedom of speech.
Academic freedom and freedom of speech can, and should, be protected, but not at the extreme cost of policies put in place to keep staff and students safe from abuse under the Equality Act.
Higher education bodies are now scrambling to understand the implications of this ruling. The Office for Students must answer how universities are meant to uphold this ruling with a legal obligation to prevent hate speech on campus.
In a 2023 report on the regulator, the House of Lords attributed the poor relationship between the OfS and universities to the Office’s “overly distant and combative” approach. The report noted the Office “is seeking to punish rather than support providers towards compliance, while taking little note of their views”.
From conversations I’ve had with university leaders about how this investigation was conducted, the Lords were on the mark.
The OfS refused to engage except via email but asked for large amounts of written material, resulting in three years of combing through university documents, policies and guidance, and thousands of hours spent by staff responding to information requests.
The OfS refused any substantive meeting with the university and cancelled the only one that was ever scheduled. This is an absurd way to conduct such an investigation. How can a true picture of the evidence have possibly been collected?
This disproportionate fine, 15 times higher than any other sanction previously imposed by the OfS, supports the suggestion that the regulator is acting as a more punitive than supportive force. It very much feels like this ruling has been orchestrated to make an example of Sussex and send a message to the sector, which deeply worries me.
The OfS’ stated mission is “to ensure that every student, whatever their background, has a fulfilling experience of higher education that enriches their lives and careers”. If it cannot achieve this, ministers must look again at what the Lords have said and take action.
Siân Berry is Green MP for Brighton Pavilion
