Lifelong Learning (Higher Education Fee Limits) Bill

Lord Storey Excerpts

Monday 10th July 2023 Grand Committee

I therefore pose the following questions to the Government. Why have distance learners been excluded from receiving maintenance support? What would need to happen to persuade the Government to extend maintenance support to distance learners? Will excluding distance learners from maintenance support distort student choice and force students who want to study via distance learning and require maintenance support to either choose less suitable modes of study or not to study at all? By not allowing maintenance support for distance learning, a significant barrier will be created for participation in lifelong learning. I urge the Government to look again and support these amendments from my noble friend Lord Watson and other noble Lords.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, I added my name to this amendment. I apologise for not being present at Second Reading. I echo the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, that it is really important that everybody is able to take up these opportunities. The Minister should think carefully about those people who live in rural areas. Last year, I went to Northumberland where I met a group of students who have to travel scores of miles to get to the local college. There is no financial support for their travel, but one way round that would be distance learning. By not providing that opportunity, the Government are denying the opportunities they want to achieve in this very welcome and important Bill.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I will speak to Amendments 3 and 6, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Watson of Invergowrie, and also in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Addington and Lord Storey, and the noble Baroness, Lady Twycross. These amendments would require that per-credit limits and credit-differentiated activity may not be prescribed solely according to whether the learning is in person or distanced.

Fee limits are not different for distance learning currently, and there is nothing in this Bill that would change this. I hope that reassures the noble Lord, Lord Watson, on one of his questions. I can assure your Lordships that the Government have no intention of differentiating fee limits between distance and in-person learning under the LLE. The per-credit fee limits will be the same for full-time, part-time, face-to-face and distance learning.

Distance learning courses will remain in scope for tuition fee loan support under the LLE. As your Lordships have pointed out, these courses will also continue to be out of scope of maintenance support, which is in line with the current system. However, the Government are committed to encouraging flexibility, and I was grateful to the Committee for acknowledging the important expansion in the use of maintenance loans for living costs and targeted grants. This will make maintenance support available for all designated courses and modules under the LLE, including those currently funded by advanced learner loans and those studied part time. It will also include—a point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox—targeted support grants such as the disabled students’ allowance and the childcare grant.

Your Lordships expressed real concern that the absence of maintenance loans might impact on demand for distance learning. The noble Lord, Lord Watson, referred to the impact assessment. I will need to check, but my understanding is that distance learning was not specifically covered in the Bill’s impact assessment. Rather, as the noble Lord knows, the impact assessment was very positive overall, particularly when referring to learners who might be debt averse.

The ratio of distance learners to campus learners has been constant, at around 10%, despite the rapid growth in campus learners over that period, so I do not think there is compelling evidence that the absence of maintenance loans is impacting on demand for distance learning, relative to campus learning.

The noble Baroness, Lady Wilcox, stressed that distance learning was the key to unlocking lifelong learning. I only partly agree with her: I think the key is choice. We need to offer learners choice, whether that be campus learning for those who would benefit from and prefer that approach, and distance learning for those for whom campus learning is not their ideal situation.

On the maintenance loan and distance learners, the Government will roll over the existing exemption that enables distance learners with a disability to qualify for maintenance loans and disabled students’ allowance. The disabled students’ allowance will be extended to all designated courses and modules. The Government intend to review attendance validation more widely, and we will consider any necessary policy changes following the outcome of that review. We believe this amendment to be unnecessary, and therefore the Government will not support it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Willetts (Con)]

My Lords, I shall indeed ask some further questions of the Minister arising from the proposal in this amendment, because I think that it is aimed at learning as much as possible about this very bold initiative. First, following on from some of the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Twycross, how will this scheme interact with employer spending? Clearly there are upsides and downsides. It is possible that the ability to spend some money from this loan alongside spending from an employer will make vocational courses and provision viable when they otherwise would not have been, and that is a good thing. On the other hand, there is the risk of some employers shedding their responsibilities and expecting an employee to use this loan scheme to finance training that they would otherwise have funded. It would help a lot of us if in her answers—they are always very helpful and informative—the Minister could explain exactly how the Government envisage they are going to monitor and manage that process so we know how we get the best possible outcome of the extra total spend on training and not the worst outcome, which would be the taxpayer simply picking up more of the bill with no increase in the total. Any indications on how employer spending might react would be very helpful.

Secondly, on the provision of courses offered by higher and further education providers, the Minister will know that I am interested in one possible use of this scheme being that at last we have a clear indication of public finance through loans for four years of higher education. Of course, that could be taken at different points over someone’s life in lots of different engagements with higher education, but equally, it could be four years in one go. If she could offer an indication of the Government’s support for that way in which students could benefit, it would be helpful.

I hesitate to add any suggestions of uncertainty when there is quite a lot of cross-party consensus on this issue, but it would be understandable if some people young thought “I don’t know how long this lifelong loan scheme is going to be around; if I’m currently eligible for it, I am going to take my chance now and get on with it rather than necessarily being confident it’s going to be around in 20 years’ time when I’m at a different stage of my career”. Being clear on the opportunity for people to take a four-year loan now would be helpful, and I hope the Minister can inform the Committee further on that.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

I rise to support my noble friend Lord Addington’s amendment. I want to tease out of the Minister some answers on sharia law and its effect on accessing education opportunities for all. I was with a group of about a dozen Somali women on Sunday. They have that conflict between faith and education. The Minister will remember that in 2014—nine years ago—the Government published a report on Islamic finance in the UK that acknowledged the lack of an alternative financial product to conventional student loans. It was a matter of concern. The report also identified a solution: a frequently used non-interest-bearing Muslim financial product. The Government explicitly supported the introduction of such a product. However, since then no sharia law-compliant student finance scheme has been made available. Why not, Minister, and what we are going to do about it?

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 11. Before doing so, however, I want to touch on a point that the noble Lords, Lord Addington and Lord Storey, made about sharia-compliant loans. I can remember a time so far back it was before the Minister was even in your Lordships’ House, during the debate on the Higher Education and Research Act. The noble Lord, Lord Willetts, will remember, because he was very active in that. At that time, the issue of sharia loans came up. That finished immediately prior to the 2017 general election, six years ago. Why on earth has it taken so long? I suspect the Minister will not have the answers now, but someone in the Department for Education—or maybe the Treasury—should have. The answers must be found, it cannot be that difficult. Basically, I echo what other noble Lords have said: get a move on because it is a problem that surely cannot be insuperable.