Now students try to hound out professor in woke row
Seven groups want him axed after talk left them ‘unsafe’
DURHAM University students ramped up their campaign to oust their college head last night as seven societies accused him of ‘gross misconduct’.
In a joint statement they claimed Professor Tim Luckhurst, principal of South College, promoted ‘a culture of harm and hate’ by inviting Spectator journalist Rod Liddle to give a speech.
The seven student groups said the speech, at a formal dinner on Friday, made them feel ‘unsafe’ and ‘distressed’. They even claimed it was in breach of the equality Act and demanded ‘disciplinary regulations’ be brought to bear on the professor.
The professor had further angered them by shouting ‘pathetic’ when students staged a walk-out during the talk, although he later apologised.
Students were also upset that the professor’s wife Dorothy called one of them an ‘arse’ during the confrontation and repeated the word several times.
Last night a friend of the professor said: ‘Tim is one of the most decent, kindly and intelligent people I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting. he’s really being victimised here.’
Professor Luckhurst has now been placed under investigation by the university and is barred from duties following the furore.
It is understood he is not allowed to speak about the incident while the case is live.
The university societies signing the statement were those representing ‘mature students’; ‘working class students’; ‘LGBT+’; ‘students with disabilities’; ‘international students’; ‘people of colour’; and ‘womxn’ – a word activists use for females which includes trans women.
The statement laid out a list of ‘demands’, saying: ‘Under Durham University’s disciplinary regulations ... we believe these actions constitute gross misconduct.’ They also demanded a ‘formal investigation’ into Professor Luckhurst’s ‘neglect of duty of care to students’ and ‘his verbal condemnation of students’.
And they said all future speeches should have ‘content warnings’ for potentially offensive material.
The statement added: ‘By platforming Rod Liddle, Tim Luckhurst is promoting a culture of harm and hate towards disabled, LGBTQ+, POC [people of colour], and working-class students being normalised. These actions have resulted in students feeling unsafe to attend formals at their college.’
Meanwhile, the Durham students’ union separately demanded the professor be sacked, calling his position ‘untenable’.
During his appearance, Mr Liddle said the Left were ignoring science when it came to trans issues and also claimed colonialism was not the main cause of Africa’s problems. he also said the underperformance of pupils of Caribbean descent was not mainly due to institutional racism.
he told the Daily Mail these are mainstream views held by many academics and Government experts. he added: ‘I’m not racist and I’m not transphobic. I want a world where transgender people can live in happiness, dignity and equality. I loathe racism.’
Mr Liddle said the main point of his talk was to ‘have tolerance of other opinions and doubt in our own opinions’.
Professor Luckhurst emailed students to apologise for using the word ‘pathetic’ but defended his right to invite Mr Liddle and said he was in favour of ‘free speech’.
But the university announced an investigation, saying it was ‘concerned at reports that the behaviours exhibited at the occasion fall short of those that we expect’.
As Professor Luckhurst tried to reason with a group of students, his wife was filmed saying to them: ‘What are you frightened of, you silly people?’
She called one of the students an ‘arse’ and then after repeating the word over and over, she added: ‘We are not allowed to say the word arse apparently.’
She later commented on Twitter: ‘Bunch of inadequates thought it was clever to walk out on a speech tonight because they were afraid of what the speaker said.’
She added: ‘Incidentally they thought it was OK to ask my husband to apologise for my comments. I know it’s an old notion but I can speak for myself. Maybe the woke generation haven’t heard of women’s equality.’
Yesterday the university would not comment further.
The Mail has tried to contact Professor Luckhurst.
‘Tolerance of other opinions’