Australia is to hold a parliamentary enquiry into foreign influence on the country’s universities, specifically whether this is undermining free speech and the exchange of ideas.
The issue was championed largely by an independent MP from Queensland, Bob Katter. It has been taken up by the country’s centre-right government, and has been referred to the Joint Committee on Security and Intelligence.
Committee head Andrew Hastie has long warned about Chinese influence on Australia.
The issue came to public prominence in recent months when University of Queensland student Drew Pavlou was suspended from the institution after activism critical of China – such as over the status of the Uighurs and Hong Kong. He was physically attacked on one occasion, but little action was taken against his assailants. The latters’ actions were praised by a Chinese diplomat who holds an academic position at the university.
A reluctance on the part of the university to take action has been ascribed to the income universities derive from their links to China, not least from the large number of students from China who study in Australia.
The university has denied that its posture in respect of Pavlou is influenced by China.
Pavlou meanwhile has pledged to participate in the enquiry. ‘I have got a lot to say about what goes on in the UQ senate, under parliamentary privilege. I have a lot of interesting things to say about UQ,’ he told the media.
Katter said that a university must be ‘a nursery of ideas and a garden of freedom’.
Despite extensive trade and economic ties, relations between Australia and China have deteriorated lately. Tensions between the two have seen Australia call for an inquiry into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic, after which China slapped tariffs on some Australian goods. Australia has moved to modernise its military, implicitly signalling concerns about Chinese power projection. Senior Australian government figures have expressed concern about joint research projects between institutions in the two countries.
In addition, it has been announced that Cheng Lei, a Chinese state television anchor who holds Australian citizenship, has been detained in China. It is not clear what the grounds for the arrest are.