Nottingham University’s decision to withdraw the offer of an honorary degree to the author of a government report on race has divided staff, it was claimed yesterday.
Dr Tony Sewell, who runs Generating Genius, a charity helping black children into higher education, was criticised for concluding that Britain was not institutionally racist. Nottingham’s offer was withdrawn because of the “political controversy”, it said.
Professor Matt Goodwin, who taught politics there for five years, called the decision “politically motivated” and said that his former colleagues were unhappy about it.
Goodwin, 40, now a professor at Kent University, said: “I know for a fact, through my networks, that people there are not happy with the decision that’s been taken. Most people awarded honorary degrees have delivered social, political or cultural change precisely because they are politically controversial. You see that whether it’s Nelson Mandela or Martin Luther King. I fear that administrators and bureaucrats have decided they simply disagree with Tony Sewell’s report.”
The university gave a degree to Mandela in 1996, its records show, and to other controversial figures including Najib Razak, a former prime minister of Malaysia, who was jailed for embezzling £537 million from a state-owned company.
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Sewell’s report said that although Britain was not yet a post-racial society, it was not institutionally racist. Nottingham decided to offer the degree in 2019, but withdrew the offer last December.
Sewell said universities were stifling free speech “like the Soviet Union”, adding: “I have helped thousands of black children from poor backgrounds to get into universities. I’m a one-man levelling-upper. But [Nottingham] said . . . they didn’t want to offend the students.
“How can you offend students with a report which says the equalities watchdog should have more power, that stop-and-search should be improved and that we need to get more people from ethnic minorities into university?”
Nottingham University denied last night that its committee’s decision to withdraw Sewell’s honorary degree had been split, saying that it had been unanimous. A spokesman said: “The university has strict criteria governing honorary degrees, as these are conferred at our public graduation ceremonies. The criteria preclude us from awarding them to figures who become the subject of political controversy.
“The university is categorically not making any judgment on Mr Sewell or expressing a view on his work.”
