Professor Drummond Bone, Universities UK president, criticised the wording of the Bill said:

Universities UK has grave concerns that certain elements of the Terrorism Bill might cut across academic freedoms. We are sure that this is unintentional. But the Bill is drafted in such a way that it might well get in the way of normal academic work. It might provoke the kind of suspicion and intolerance we are trying to deal with.
We think that the Bill is drafted in such a way which could cut across academic freedoms and get in the way of the daily business of universities.
When you start talking about [something] being 'suspicious' - that's a word which gets used in Clause 6 – 'suspicion' is a very unfortunate phrase. One gets worried when chemists might be forbidden from producing a certain kind of noxious substance. Where do you draw the line there?

Now Science reports that "Several scientific and academic groups objected last week to a tough antiterrorism law making its way through the U.K. Parliament. The critics argue that academic freedom could be endangered by language stating that if lecturers and lab chiefs 'know or suspect' that their students are terrorists, they must withhold from them knowledge of 'noxious substances.'"

 

Last week the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) pointed out that, "as drafted, the bill could make it illegal to teach about the safe use and handling of chemicals with explosive properties." Neville Reed, director of RSC community and members' services said, ""We understand the reasoning behind the bill, … but because it is written so broadly, there's a danger of encompassing things that are part of normal teaching." A lecturer might be put in the position of having to demand why a question is being asked, rather than saying, 'That's an interesting question.'"

 

Science also reports that, the Association of University Teachers (AUT) also lobbied for changes in the bill's language, arguing that there is a "huge risk that entirely legitimate forms of academic enquiry will be criminalized." AUT head of parliamentary affairs John Whitehead cited three clauses that aroused concern, one of which has now been rewritten to narrow a prohibition against the "glorification" of terrorism so that it applies only to people who clearly intend to engage in terrorism. But he says the clause that refers to people whom an instructor "knows or suspects" of having bad intentions needs to be changed simply to "knows."

 

When presented to the Commons the law was amended as regards the time a terrorism suspect may be held without charge from 90 to 28 days. It now proceeds to the House of Lords and there is every prospect that it will be subject to further amendment.

 

Meanwhile in Australia the Senate Legal and Constitutional Committee has acknowledged some 251 submission from organisations and members of the public with regard to the government's Anti-Terrorism Bill (No. 2) 2005.

 

So far as TFW can determine not one Australian society representing the sciences or humanities has made representations to the Senate committee and the only university based submissions are from the National Tertiary Education Union and Macquarie University's Division of Law.

 

And why the Minister for Education, Science and Training, Brendan Nelson, is waging war on student unions seems even more ludicrous in the light that no university student group has taken the trouble to make its views known to the committee.