Selina Todd helped to organise the event from which she was barred

Free speech campaigners have complained after an academic was forced out of a conference she had helped to organise at Oxford University following pressure from trans activists.

Selina Todd, a professor of modern history who focuses on working-class women, was to give a speech at Exeter College on Saturday to mark 50 years since the inaugural Women’s Liberation conference at Ruskin College. The event went ahead with her name deleted from the programme.

Professor Todd’s links to Women’s Place UK, which campaigns for separate spaces and services for women, were said to be behind the decision. The organisation has been criticised by trans activists for opposing changes to the Gender Recognition Act.

Professor Todd, a tutorial fellow at St Hilda’s College, wrote on Twitter