For some time now free speech advocates in this country have been enviously following the passage of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act through the UK Parliament. The act gave teeth to the freedom of speech provisions in the 1986 Education Act by allowing students and academics whose free speech rights had been trampled on to seek redress though the courts, and also established a new ‘Free Speech Czar’ for English universities.

That all looks in doubt now, with newly installed Labour Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson announcing last Friday that she has ‘stopped further commencement’ of the act ‘in order to consider options, including its repeal’ only a few days before it was to come into force.

Phillipson said that the legislation would have been ‘burdensome’ to universities even though official estimates put compliance costs at less than £5 million a year – an amount that pales in comparison with the £565 million English universities have allocated to ‘access and participation’ this year.

Phillipson also suggested that the act ‘would have exposed higher education providers to costly legal action.’ But that is a risk universities could virtually eliminate simply by not deplatforming speakers or disciplining dissident academics.

Phillipson’s concern that the act might have led to universities being forced to allow Holocaust deniers to speak on English campuses seems similarly misguided. Holocaust denial is not protected by the European Convention on Human Rights (which the UK is still bound by), and the new act would only have protected speech ‘within the law.’

However weak the new Education Secretary’s reasoning, though, the act looks dead in the water. With Labour holding one of the largest majorities in British history, repealing it is easily within the new government’s power.

Many academic freedom advocates in New Zealand had been expecting to be able to point towards the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act as a shining example of how sensible legislation can play a role in fixing our universities.

Bridget Phillipson’s announcement has scotched those hopes. But it may also have opened up an opportunity.

If New Zealand passes academic freedom legislation of its own, that might help our universities gain an edge as a haven for English-speaking academics tired of certain views being shut down.

Granted, that looks a very distant prospect at this point. Paradoxically, though, the UK Education Secretary’s cold feet about the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act may just have brought that possibility a step closer.