University of Sussex fined £585,000 by Office for Students

[OhBuggerandArse]

The inquiry in the wake of Kathleen Stock's experience has finally been completed:

'An English university is set to be fined a record £585,000 over allegations it failed to uphold free speech and academic freedom, in a landmark ruling in the debate over student rights on campus. England’s higher education regulator found “significant and serious breaches” of free speech and governance issues at the University of Sussex, according to a draft press release seen by the Financial Times. The Office for Students press release, to be published on Wednesday, said policies intended to prevent abuse or harassment of certain groups on campus had created “a chilling effect” that might cause staff and students to “self-censor”.'

Sussex 'has reacted furiously...'

https://www.ft.com/content/d39f0db7-877a-4cf3-8c12-dd5581eecd0b?fbclid=IwY2xjawJP_1RleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHVWF1ZXM3cKbxGAvtKfecgeMyAXNae5933M9a3dru0zohKTe7Vk24foIeA_aem_HpdtsUQc6ipMGY9J5AGFWQ

The strange thing is that Sussex has a law department. There must be people employed by the university who could explain the line between free speech and harassment with reference to anti-abortion protestors standing outside abortion clinics. I don't understand why this was all so difficult to manage.

They will not only have a law department but an actual legal team who are employed specifically to spell this kind of thing out to them.

"Eventually, the OfS has found two historic breaches. One relates to a two-page statement intended to protect the welfare of transgender staff and students, and the second to the University’s way of approving a small number of documents."

This is enraging from the current VC. Disgustingly minimising. We all saw the videos of bullying students and staff chanting, yelling, setting off flares, the smoke, masked people chanting, the horrific placards and graffiti.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10172813/KATHLEEN-STOCK-reveals-really-like-vilified-beliefs.html

It must have been terrifying for Kathleen (and those supporting her). In looking back to find the videos, I found this article in which she explains how she was horribly bullied as a child and adolescent, and the effects that had. It's also a really good article on her general life and work, and her career path - I had no idea!

https://www.holyrood.com/inside-politics/view,kathleen-stock-i-wont-be-bullied-into-submission-18395

Why doesn't academic training have an element on the law and philosophy around speech, a bit like journalists have to do for their training?

As a PP said there are strong protections in favour of free speech in the press, (for example fair comment in libel law, the public interest test etc) which journalists are taught about and learn how to navigate in the course of their work. Without these defences our entire news ecosystem would only be full of happy clappy stories about lovely people doing wonderful things. Essentially this would be pure untrammelled PR and it would be a nightmare. It is chilling that some academics do not recognise the need to maintain the ability to criticise, who ever the group. The investigation is right to call out that document about 'only positive representations' as being a core breach of free speech.

Ironically big city law firms are very captured. I wonder if that extends to legal colleagues in other sectors

That's such a good article, thank you. I was going to quote some of my favourite bits, but, basically - all of it!
https://archive.is/dOEGl#selection-1331.0-1333.32

Many journalists have no training in journalism. Many journalists who have training in journalism seem to have forgotten them. Hello BBC I'm looking at you - one of the modules I did at uni which is particularly relevant to this area was also taught to BBC staff as part of their training in the late 1990s. It was identical and taught by the same lecturer - he made a big deal about it. Did everyone who took this course just evaporate into thin air?!

fromorbit thanks for the link to the recent Stock article.

I don't think all lawyers are "captured" (good phrase) by the one ideology (I am a lawyer - although even saying that these days can be an issue as our professional conduct rules control what we post in our own time even under a different name online - not that I ever say anything illegal or even nasty). It is still a fine line.

If I write that fundamentalist Christianity or the Bible or Islam treats women badly, is that "making offensive or pejorative comments relating to another person’s race, sexual orientation or religion"? If the recipient of the comment is offended because their belief is that Biblical or Islamic rules relating to women, submission to husband or limiting number of wives a man can have to protect women, are protective not damaging to women - does that then mean because the reader is offended my comment breaches my professional rules and means I can be struck off as a solicitor? It is the lack of clarity that is the issue.
https://www.sra.org.uk/solicitors/guidance/offensive-communications/

Unclear laws are bad laws.

Very true. There is self-censorship within the media too and often it is top down imposed as we saw at the Guardian and their treatment of female journalists who wanted to write critically about this matter.

But I think the problem of self censorship is even bigger in academia. At least we have a vaguely pluralistic media - ie if the Guardian won't publish the Daily Mail will etc. But there are fewer alternatives in academia, where getting published in a tiny selection of journals is make or break for a career and where what you say is highly influenced by the anticipated reactions of a small group of peers. It is a tribal system and you will be ostracised from your clan/peer group for saying the wrong thing and that can be career ending.

Did Sussex have similar policies about eg gay people? Disabled people? Or were trans people singled out to be given such preferential treatment? And if so, why, and on whose say so?

A very good question which puts into focus the VC’s attempt to argue that the OfS action will enable racism, antisemitism and anti-Muslim animus.

Reminds me a bit of the argument that not giving puberty blockers to children would bar teenagers from having abortions.

Good points. The thing is even on its own terms the protests were utterly biased because the students and the University were totally fine then and now with monotheistic religions lead by men who don't believe in "trans" stuff at all and actively work against it. Doc Stock writing and saying things was more notable or powerful than the Vatican or Islam somehow.

Sussex Uni has its own sex divided Muslim prayer room. Totally breaking its policy on nonbinary stuff being important.
https://sussex.page.isoc.link/p/688efb/

Its Catholic chaplain is a monk.
https://catholicstudents.org/about/

A requirement for “any materials within relevant courses and modules [to] positively represent trans people and trans lives.”

It's not just transactivism, it's extreme transactivation.

What on earth could possibly be the mindset of someone to agree to that? It's sacred caste on steroids.

I'm going to hazard a guess that the University of Sussex's trans population skyrocketed after that.

idiots. Dangerous too

On point of course:

J.K. Rowling

I feel nothing but sympathy for some of those who kept silent while the gender wars raged around them. I’ve had literally thousands of emails on this subject and some of the most desperate have been from people who risk their livelihoods and face persecution and harassment if they speak up.

That said, I have zero sympathy for academics who did nothing to prevent illiberal and authoritarian activism stifling debate, freedom of speech and academic enquiry at their place of work. Defending those values is fundamental to academic life and you didn’t just fall short, you disgraced yourselves. Your inaction and cowardice enabled a campaign of persecution against one of your own that shamed SussexUni
.
There are times in life where we are confronted by clear moral choices, when there is no middle route. Either you stand up for freedom of speech and belief - yes, even up to the point of causing offence - or you bow down to a totalitarian culture that relies on intimidation and threats to sustain itself.

It’s deeply depressing to think that a university requires a punitive fine to make it wake up to the fact that it’s abandoned basic liberal values, but the OfS has at last drawn a much needed line in the sand. I wouldn’t bet against more monster fines to come, though. The University of Sussex is far from the only institute of learning where a culture of fear has been allowed to flourish.

Certainly, nothing like it existed for any other protected group, either at the time or since.

Dr Stock says they did not. What a shock.

I do not understand the need for any institution to go further than the law requires. Certainly not dictate curriculum and thoughts.

Well said JKR.
As for going further than the law (which in my view is when we start to get into danger areas), universities have always done that to some extent - eg what they regard as plagiarism goes further than breach of copyright - I understand why they do that and it is a very different topic than the one in hand.

I do not really follow these issues very closely, but I am certainly glad the tide has started to turn back to some normalcy and common sense but we need to keep pressing to make sure things are changed. As a mother of 5 and grandmother of 4, I am not at all happy about the ways some of the NHS even in 2025 refers to pregnant people etc when women are at their most vulnerable giving birth etc - that particularly annoys me. It denies us one of the few things we can do that men can't.

Having to use only positive materials must have made any criminology course interesting. "The lowest rates of sex offending are seen in straight south Asian women aged over 80¹. The highest rates are ... um... well... never mind that - the highest rates aren't important." Or do you go Trumpian and claim the bigliest, best, most huge rates ever for your sacred caste as a positive?

¹ Imagined statistic for illustrative purposes. I've not actually looked up details.

Thanks for the link to that blog, it’s always good to get a different take on things.

the comments section is the usual mix of rational comment and “everything is transphobic” so it will be interesting to see how that debate continues.

I'm interested in this from something that was posted upthread

Adam Tickell (now at Birmingham) defended Stock’s academic freedom and announced an investigation into the protests.

I didn't know about an investigation in addition to the empty words. I wonder what happened to it, did it just stop when he and Doc Stock left.

I can understand the current VC's frustration if she feels ignored, that there were no meetings with the OfS, but really what could be said? The problems identified were with the written dictats the University had around trans and NB. Would she have said 'but that's not what we meant'? So, it shouldn't have been published like that.

I've just made a rare visit to Bluesky, and did a search for Kathleen Stock to see how it is being discussed. Wow, it really is a different world over there.

The general consensus is that she is bigoted bully who has become famous off the back of attacking trans people and that the OfS ruling is biased and corrupt. There didn't seem to be any challenges to this view that I could see.

Academic Blusky is an absolute cesspit of nutjobs wanking each other dry over their position on the right side of history.

I doubt anyone who was inclined or willing to challenge it would remain on Bluesky.

They are losing ground elsewhere though. The UK Politics sub on Reddit is pretty sane on this news.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1jk4fqh/sussex_university_fined_585000_in_transgender/

Good point here from X I think this is another huge blow against this stuff.

Jon Pike

It seems very financially imprudent for any (English) University to remain affiliated with Stonewall.
If you fail to act on their recommendations, there is no point in spending all that money.
If you act on their recommendations, you make yourself liable for a huge fine.

I think this is good of course, because I think Stonewall has become a terrible organisation. But I'm just spelling out the options that any chief financial officer faces, in a neutral way. And if that is right, then many universities will leave Stonewall in the next few months. They will aim to do so very quietly.

Yes, the main UK subreddit (which is quite TRA) less so though, as I posted yesterday.