The head of the Office for Students has said that universities must balance equality laws while upholding free speech duties.
Office for Students (OfS) Chief Executive Susan Lapworth has said that university leaders and academics should be proactive in upholding freedom of speech on their campuses.
Lapworth made the comments in a commentary ahead of the OfS annual review, which was published on Thursday. The OfS is the independent regulator of higher education in England.
“In our view, it would not be sufficient for a university’s free speech code only to deal with the organisation of meetings and speaking events. In our view, a free speech code should go a lot further than that,” the OfS wrote in a briefing paper (pdf)….