Holding out against French code not viable strategy

The decision of chancellors to ­assert their precedence over university management on the freedom of speech issue is very significant for higher education.

Ever since Education Minister Dan Tehan launched the review of freedom of speech in universities by former High Court chief justice Robert French last year, university management, represented by the body Universities Australia, has reacted defensively.

It was seen as yet another threat to the autonomy of universities. It followed the revelation that Tehan’s predecessor, Simon Birmingham, had secretly used his ministerial prerogative to deny several research grants that had been approved by the Australian Research Council.

In fact, if freedom of speech had to be reviewed, there could not have been a fairer or more reasonable person to review it than French who had thought deeply about the issue. He said clearly that there was no free speech crisis and came up with proposals that steered a middle course that would appear to be palatable to universities.

Among the things he did not recommend was the imposition of laws that would prescribe to universities how they would deal with freedom of speech and academic freedom issues. His answer was a voluntary code that universities could subscribe to and align their policies to, with freedom to vary them where they saw necessary.

That should have pleased the universities. It is puzzling that the vice-chancellors, represented by Universities Australia, did not back it. Now the chancellors who chair university governing bodies and are ultimately responsible for the institutions have intervened and said that freedom of speech is a matter for them. They have collectively got behind the French model code for freedom of speech.

It’s no coincidence the chancellors are people with a huge reservoir of experience in business, politics and public life. It is clear to them, if not to the universities they preside over, that holding out against the free speech code proposed by French is not a viable strategy for universities.