Wharton: ‘wrong’ pick for free speech job would mean ‘challenges’

The government’s creation of a campus free speech champion could be “really positive” if “we get the right person”, but will raise “some challenges” if “we get the wrong person”, according to the Conservative peer who now chairs the Office for Students.

Lord Wharton of Yarm made the comments in his first public appearance as chair of the English regulator, at a GuildHE conference held online on 26 May. The peer, a former Conservative MP who chaired Boris Johnson’s successful campaign to become party leader, was asked about the plans Mr Johnson’s government has to create, via the free speech bill introduced to Parliament, an academic freedom and free speech champion who would sit on the OfS board.

Toby Young, the right-wing commentator and founder of the Free Speech Union, is the main name to have figured in public discussions over who the government might appoint to the post. But given the government was forced to back down over a previous attempt to appoint Mr Young to the OfS board, following coverage of offensive comments he made on social media, he may not be a genuine candidate.

Lord Wharton said: “A lot of it is going to depend on who gets appointed…I hope I will be on the panel to see who gets appointed, but I don’t think it will be my choice. I suspect it will the Secretary of State for Education’s choice which will…then be approved by Number 10.”

He added: “If we get the right person, I think it will be a really positive and constructive thing. If we get the wrong person, then clearly there could be some challenges.”

Lord Wharton said his job would be to “make it work for the sector” and in terms of “the ambitions that sit behind it”. Concerns in government, he suggested, go beyond speakers being disinvited from speaking at campus events, and surround “a monoculture” in “some parts of the sector”, where people “feel they can’t speak out”.

“I think the whole sector has a role in challenging that and in ensuring everybody feels free to debate and discuss,” he continued. “That’s not just students, it’s professional staff, it’s the teachers, researchers, people who work in higher education.”

“What I’m not yet clear about is how the freedom of speech champion will interact with that challenge. Because I’m pretty sure that’s part of the concern that’s led us to where we are.”

Lord Wharton added of the free speech champion role: “It will need a very careful approach by, hopefully, a thoughtful and experienced person. But we will see who we get…I’m looking forward to getting some good applicants if I do get to be on that [selection] panel.”

More widely, the OfS chair said his priorities would include focusing on access and widening participation, “concerns around grade inflation”, employability – particularly key in post-Covid recovery and the government’s goal of “levelling up” in the regions – addressing “the spectre of antisemitism” by calling on universities to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition, and addressing sexual harassment in universities.

He stressed the importance of levelling up for universities and the impact it would have on them. “Institutions will increasingly be expected to work with their local economies,” he said.

Lord Wharton was also asked about plans – which the government aims to put into law via the skills bill – for the OfS to regulate using absolute, rather than benchmarked, quality measures on graduate outcomes.

He said it was “dangerous to have too absolutist an approach, but I do think there are challenges for the sector” on “variance of quality and rigour” across universities.

john.morgan@timeshighereducation.com