It’s an emerging issue in enterprise bargaining, with the National Tertiary Education Union proposing a clause for uni agreements which is broad indeed in application

It includes requiring universities to consult all employees in decision making processes and structures and for staff to have the right to express opinions about the operation of their institution and HE in general.

But the bit that observers suggest managements may not want to wear is the union intent that enterprise agreement protections not be subordinate to university codes of conduct or workplace behaviour policies.

Universities are likely to push for adopting the free speech code drafted for the previous government by former chief justice Robert French, which meets the Commonwealth’s Higher Education Threshold Standards and can accommodate university codes of conduct and comment policies

This may not cut it for the comrades.

As former NTEU generally secretary Matthew McGowan put it, “If we are serious about academic freedom, a voluntary code is not good enough, and unless staff have workplace protections in their collective agreements, changes to legislation will not guarantee freedoms,” (CMM June 24 2019).

That universities may now back the French code will be a change for managements which previously opposed it to the extent that former education minister Alan Tudge legislated to make them adopt it (CMM March 17 2021).