The noble Lord makes several important points, the first being the quality of our universities and the pride that we all take in that—the Government echo the sentiments he expressed about their quality and the global esteem in which they are held. We take this appointment extremely seriously, hence the fact that we are following the public appointments process.
The role of the regulator is very sensitive, as the noble Lord understands extremely well, and that is absolutely why there is the level of transparency and accountability to Parliament that I just set out. We take this extremely seriously, for some of the reasons the noble Lord expressed. The only point I might disagree on is that the driving force behind the Bill was a concern about freedom of speech within our universities, rather than a particular political angle, but we can perhaps discuss that outside the Chamber.
Most recently, the chief executive of the OfS went before the Education Committee as a witness in relation to controversial research content and free speech. If the focus of the appearance were to be on free speech in the future, the director for freedom of speech and academic freedom may well of course be involved with that.
Given what I have said, I hope that your Lordships agree that there are sufficient safeguards in the Bill as drafted to deal with these important points of concern. I hope that the noble Baroness opposite will withdraw her amendment.