CAF has given the University of Cambridge a further 14 days to answer questions about a controversial offer of “support and advice” specifically to black staff, after the institution failed to address concerns raised on behalf of academics who feared professional repercussions if they challenged the communication and its underlying assumptions themselves.
Our follow-up letter warns that, failing a substantive response, CAF will advise the academics on bypassing Cambridge’s internal grievance procedures and bringing their complaints directly before the Office for Students (OfS) under its new free-speech complaints scheme.
Earlier this month, CAF wrote to Cambridge Vice-Chancellor Deborah Prentice about an email circulated to all staff following the death of Dr Jason Arday. Titled “A message from the Senior Black Leaders Group at Cambridge”, it contained a statement from five members of that group, including two Deputy Vice-Chancellors and college heads. Contested claims inflected by critical theory, concerning the “hyper-surveillance”, “structural pressures”, “hostility” and “systemic barriers” faced by black scholars at “high-profile institutions” – presumably including Cambridge – were then presented as established facts.
The email went on to say that Arday’s death required the University to “strengthen – not retreat from – EDI efforts” and claimed black academics “have to achieve far more and clear significantly higher hurdles than their peers” to succeed.
The signatories – Professor Franklin Aigbirhio, Sonita Alleyne, Professor Dame Ijeoma Uchegbu, Lord Woolley and Professor Toni Williams – described themselves as “institutional advocates”, speaking “in our senior roles”, before the communication concluded by inviting black staff to contact them for “support and advice”. It read: “Black members of staff are welcome to contact any of the members of the Senior Black Leaders Group for support and advice.”
As one of the academics told the Telegraph:
“Whether intended or not, the message is hardly inclusive. If I question the analysis being advanced, does that mean I might be regarded as part of the ‘hostility’ that black scholars are said to face at a ‘high-profile’ institution like Cambridge? That’s quite an extraordinary message for senior members of staff to send via the university-wide email system.”
Another added:
“Senior Cambridge figures have racialised the Arday plagiarism affair throughout, from the moment concerns were first raised through to a signed letter disputing findings of plagiarism. This fosters a racialised frame that defines staff primarily by race, undermining what should be an inclusive and meritocratic environment. It also suppresses free speech by implying that the institution will call you a racist if you dare to advocate for universal academic standards.”
That academics feel unable to raise concerns of this kind within their university without protecting their identities is something Cambridge’s senior leadership might wish to reflect upon. Given that such apprehensions are liable to have a chilling effect on academic freedom, narrowing the universe of permissible discourse by discouraging scholars from challenging claims advanced by senior institutional figures, CAF agreed to raise the matter on their behalf.
In our letter, we asked Cambridge a series of admittedly rather technical legal questions about the nature of the support offered, whether access was afforded or facilitated on the same basis irrespective of race, the legal and evidential basis for any difference, particularly under the Equality Act’s section 158 positive-action provisions, and what consideration had been given to the communication’s potential effect on relations between black and non-black staff under the public sector equality duty.
Cambridge has now replied, and its answer is not quite what we were hoping for.
While we welcome the Vice-Chancellor’s assurance that the academics concerned will suffer no detriment for raising these matters internally, that assurance clearly cannot, by itself, dispel apprehensions arising from their experience of professional relationships within the University. Nor does it address the more immediate difficulty that Cambridge fails to answer any of the substantive questions we raised on their behalf.
Instead, the Vice-Chancellor directs them towards the University’s established employment procedures, while indicating that Cambridge will “take into account the matters you have raised and determine if there is any action that the University needs to take proactively in light of them”. As gentle bureaucratic brush-offs go, it’s nice enough. Indeed, from a purely aesthetic perspective, one has to admire the Sir Humphrey-like ingenuity involved in using so many words to commit to, well, nothing at all, really. But as a response to a serious casework intervention on behalf of academics concerned about their professional futures, it leaves rather a lot to be desired.
Having effectively separated the academics’ concerns from CAF’s request for information, the University is able to treat them as though they were unrelated. But of course the academics approached CAF precisely because they feared the professional repercussions of raising these matters in their own names, and asked us to act as their representative to establish the factual and legal basis of the communication so that they could assess the merits of their concerns, the risks of pursuing them, and whether the available remedies offered a realistic prospect of redress, including through formal grievances.
Cambridge’s response reverses that sequence, effectively requiring the academics to expose themselves to the very professional risks they apprehend without first obtaining answers to questions which might strengthen or narrow the grounds for a grievance, or obviate the need for one altogether.
The importance of establishing the factual and legal basis of the University’s communication and the arrangements it advertised from the outset is particularly acute under the Office for Students’ new free-speech complaints scheme. Under Rule 15, the OfS may dismiss a complaint as frivolous or vexatious where the complainant continually changes its substance (Rule 15(b)) or fails clearly to identify the issues or matters complained of (Rule 15(d)). Our original letter was intended to establish those matters before any grievance was initiated, allowing the academics to formulate the strongest possible grievance should they decide to proceed, while also giving Cambridge an opportunity to resolve the concerns without proceedings.
We have therefore reiterated our request for substantive answers, this time within 14 days.
Failing a substantive response, we will advise the academics concerned on bringing their complaints directly before the OfS without first initiating internal grievance proceedings.
It’s true that Rule 14 provides that the regulator will “normally” accept complaints only after the relevant internal procedures have been completed or 90 days have elapsed since they began. But in this case, we consider there are substantial grounds for asking it to depart from that practice, not least given the academics’ continuing apprehension about professional repercussions, the chilling effect upon their willingness to challenge the communication openly or discuss the wider issues, and Cambridge’s failure to engage with the preliminary enquiries undertaken on their behalf.