University Admissions: Equality

Baroness Finn Excerpts

Thursday 7th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Finn (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, for calling this important debate on the promotion of equality of opportunity in university admissions. The noble Baroness is impressive in so many ways but has, in particular, been a superb force in promoting real social mobility, especially during her years at Oxford.

I should like to stress the personal significance of today’s debate: I was one of the lucky ones. At a time when low academic attainment and low aspirations prevented many Welsh youngsters from applying to top universities, my comprehensive school in Swansea bucked the trend and, in the 1970s and 1980s, regularly got 10 to 15 pupils a year into Oxbridge colleges alone. These results were down to some outstanding teachers who were prepared to stand up for academic excellence and encouraged us to apply for great universities from a part of the country where there was simply no such tradition. This progress, however, is not guaranteed. Young people today harbour fears similar to those of my peers—fears about cost and value, about community and fitting in and about the life they can expect to lead during their studies and upon graduation. These are the concerns that must be addressed if we are to truly champion equality of opportunity and enable all to flourish.

There are those who seek to place responsibility for lack of opportunity with the universities themselves. This is simply not justified, and I welcome the findings of UCAS, which demonstrate that there is,

“no evidence of systemic bias in the admissions system”.

As many suspect—and despite noisy aspersions to the contrary—universities are as eager as ever to welcome the most willing and able students. It is simply not the case that the universities impede equality of opportunity; on the contrary, they are one of its strongest champions. But they will not and must not compromise on standards. Universities should be academically elitist, not socially elitist. So we must draw from the widest pool of talent but we must not ask universities to lower their standards, otherwise the product is damaged and this helps nobody.

There exists a fashionable perception that insufficient numbers of particular groups are finding their way into the universities, a claim notoriously difficult to substantiate and one that should not be accepted at face value. If true, it must be tackled at source, which is to improve the quality of primary and secondary education. The former Secretaries of State for Education, Michael Gove and Nicky Morgan, made encouraging progress in improving the quality of such provision with their programme of academies and free schools, which are open to all. I welcome further government efforts to advance this initiative.

The salient issue is how we reconcile extant institutional fairness with perceptions that, even if you are sufficiently capable, university might not be for you. These are students who could, and would, go to university, but do not because it is not encouraged in the communities in which they grow up or because their school teachers tell them that the universities are “not for the likes of you and me”. The solution is not to arbitrarily mandate that a certain proportion of a certain kind of young person go to university—irrespective of aptitude or preference—but rather to stimulate the imaginations of these students and inculcate in them aspirations of self-betterment and societal contribution. My alma mater, Lady Margaret Hall in Oxford, seeks to do this through the implementation of a foundation year, which allows those who are capable, but who may have never considered an Oxford application, to experience the process first hand and decide for themselves afterwards whether they would like to pursue a degree at Oxford or elsewhere. We need to address practical barriers as outlined so sensibly by the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, such as paying for train tickets for those schoolchildren whose families might not be able even to afford the cost of a visit.

As my noble friend Lady Wyld has said, however, the responsibility for improving equality of opportunity lies not exclusively with the universities. It is with the schools, the teachers, the families and the students themselves to believe in—and create—the change that they would like to see. In the higher education landscape of modern Britain, it truly is the case that if you can dream it, you can achieve it. It is this we must encourage, just as my teachers did for me many years ago.