Though introduced to the House of Commons by his immediate successor Kenneth Baker,[1] the Act was prepared by Margaret Thatcher's second Education Secretary, Keith Joseph, an ideological opponent of "statism" who sought to empower parents against local bureaucrats.

[2] Section 43 of the Act, which remains in force, imposes a duty on universities to protect freedom of speech, and in particular to ensure that "the use of any premises of the establishment is not denied to any individual or body of persons" on account of their beliefs.

[6] This measure was originally introduced in response to disruptive student protests and the rise of "no platform" policies among student activists in the mid-1980s, and was included in the Act after pressure by the House of Lords following an earlier private member's bill to protect freedom of speech in universities sponsored by Conservative backbencher Fred Silvester.

[7] In 2021, the Conservative government of Boris Johnson brought forward a Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill that would extend this duty to students' unions.

[9] This article relating to law in the United Kingdom, or its constituent jurisdictions, is a stub.