Higher Education and Research Bill

Debate between Lord Giddens and Lord Waldegrave of North Hill

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 9th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Giddens (Lab)]

My Lords, as a former director of the London School of Economics, I think it is perhaps appropriate for me to speak next. I have to say that I do not wholly disagree with all of what the noble Lord, Lord Myners, said. I disagree on the fundamental point of principle, but the criticism he offered was entirely appropriate. In contrast to him, I strongly support this amendment. In the Second Reading debate, I was highly critical of aspects of this Bill. My objections were not motivated by some sort of stick-in-the-mud desire to resist change and innovation. On the contrary, in some ways the Bill is, in my eyes, too conservative—with a little ‘c’, of course.

I accept and endorse the need for an overall legislative framework for higher education. We need to clear up inconsistencies and ambiguities in the existing system and, far more importantly, embrace the deep transformations beginning to affect both teaching and research. At the same time, however, as other speakers have rightly said, we must be careful not to undermine the very qualities that have propelled higher education in this country to the very top globally.

In amending the Bill—and there is no doubt in my mind that substantial emendation is necessary—we must ensure that we avoid the huge problems created in the US around deregulated for-profit institutions. They have a place but they are not the future. As in almost every other sphere, higher education is likely to be transformed in a radical way by the digital revolution—and, in my view, in very short order. This is a revolution of unparalleled pace and scope. Much more potent models for exploring what is to come include edX, linked to Harvard and MIT, and Udacity, which had its origins at Stamford. We should be investing in analogues, and some of that has to be public investment.

As the amendment makes clear, a university is not just a knowledge provider but an active creator of knowledge and ideas—even the noble Lord, Lord Myners, stressed that point. That relates to what teachers do, because research and teaching are part and parcel of a combined enterprise in a university. Disciplined research and the active protection of academic freedom are crucial to this task. In my eyes, it would be a major step forward to have these principles spelled out in binding fashion, as this amendment does. The amendment, in fact, looks to have a great deal of support across the House, and I hope that it will not be treated in partisan terms. Perhaps the Minister will be moved to accept it without driving the matter to a vote. Many other pieces of what could turn out to be a very difficult jigsaw puzzle for the Government would fall into place were he to do so.

[Lord Waldegrave of North Hill (Con)]

My Lords, I declared my interest at Second Reading. I am the most junior member of the club of chancellors mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Myners, as the newly appointed chancellor of the University of Reading. I have a number of concerns about the Bill and without making a Second Reading speech again, I shall look to the Government to strengthen protections against interference with autonomy.

These are not theoretical objections. In this House, we are all in danger of falling into our anecdotage, but I will give just one. I was once the holder of a similar office to the Minister who is so courteously handling this Bill. My Secretary of State was my late friend and former colleague Sir Keith Joseph. The Secretary of State became incensed by the economics teaching at the Open University, so his junior Ministers, Rhodes Boyson and myself, were given the books to read. This had rather extraordinary results. The Open University’s reply to what Sir Keith saw as unfortunate bias in its teaching was made much worse by its defence that there was a book by Mr Peter Walker that in its view provided balance, which did not necessarily help Sir Keith. This was slightly comic and Sir Keith was a man of immense courtesy and deep understanding of the autonomy of the institution, and nothing much further came of it. But in crude hands and in different worlds it could have done. I shall therefore be looking through the course of this Bill to various things that will help us to strengthen autonomy.

My interest in this first clause is whether a definition helps us. Do we need a definition to say what it is we are helping to provide special protection for? I am made a little nervous by my noble friend Lord Willetts’s comments because the reason that things have not been defined in Bills over the years is the danger of a definition excluding things by accident. Very often when we draw a line we find that we have produced a new boundary and that it is better to leave some things a little greyer. In the 19th century, universities probably meant places where there were multiplicities of departments, but we know of very good liberal arts universities in the United States that do not teach science and are perfectly properly described as universities. Other examples were given by my noble friend Lord Willetts.

I am nervous about the clause as it is defined at the moment, but am interested in the Minister’s response. If he can say that he will take it away and think of this problem of definition, I would be happy with that. As drafted, it is not perfect. It would be odd for any small and perhaps specialised university of great distinction in certain areas that the behemoth of the regulator could demand that it was failing because it was not helping overseas markets or something or other, so there is a danger here. I want definitions to be defended. I do not think that we have it quite in this clause, but my support or not for the clause will somewhat depend on the spirit in which the Minister replies and whether he will agree to take this away and work at it to see if something a little more workable can be discovered.