"Racist" lecturer at Manchester

The Commission for Racial Equality has stepped into a row over a university lecturer who claims that black people are, on average, less intelligent than whites.

Students at Leeds University have called for Dr Frank Ellis to be sacked. But the university says academics have the right to their personal opinions. It will not act unless the students produce evidence of prejudicial treatment, which they have not alleged.

The commission responded last night by demanding an inquiry into whether the lecturer's views had affected his assessment of students.

Dr Ellis, an expert in Russian literature in the department of modern languages and culture, told a student newspaper that he was a supporter of the late Enoch Powell, the Conservative MP who warned that immigration would lead to "rivers of blood". Dr Ellis also said he would support repatriation if it were done "humanely".

He told the Leeds Student that the British National Party was useful as "a canary" to warn the Government of views on multi-culturalism, which was doomed to failure because "it is based on the lie that all people, races and cultures are equal and that no one race or culture is better than any other".

The student union said it was horrified by Dr Ellis's views. Students are threatening to picket his lectures unless the university "takes all necessary action to remove him".

It said: "We are extremely concerned that students from ethnic minorities, who he claims are inferior, could face discrimination from Dr Ellis's presence on campus."

Dr Ellis said yesterday that while free speech was an issue, so was the question of whether it was true that some races were less intelligent than others for genetic and not environmental reasons.

"The people who want to denounce the evidence as racist or fascist or whatever the latest 'ism' is are trying to stop people considering the argument because they don't want it discussed," he said.

It is not the first time that Dr Ellis has been at the centre of a row. In March 2000 he attended a conference of far-Right groups in the United States where he attacked the findings of the inquiry into the death of Stephen Lawrence, the black teenager murdered on the streets of London in what the police treated as a racist attack.

He was also criticised for an article on the internet in which he states: "It is considered politically incorrect to say so, but were one to take the 'white' and the 'male' out of science and technology, one would have no science, just witchcraft, third world squalor, misery and mega-incompetence."

Dr Ellis said he stood by the statement. He denied that his views amounted to racism, saying they were based on scientific evidence.

The university issued a statement saying the views expressed by Dr Ellis in the student paper were "abhorrent".

But it added: "Dr Ellis has a right to his personal opinions but he does not have the right to treat students or colleagues in a prejudicial or discriminatory manner. The university has no evidence yet that this has happened."

A spokesman for the Commission for Racial Equality said public bodies were under a duty to promote good relations between people of different racial groups, to promote equality of opportunity between those groups and to eliminate unlawful racial discrimination.