Higher Education Funding

Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd Excerpts

Thursday 12th September 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)]

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, for his excellent introduction, after having secured this debate. I want to turn to one aspect of what he said: the need for us to consider this in the long term and in the wider interests of the UK economy. It may be surprising that I want to take this from the vantage point of law, which is not necessarily seen as an important industry—but it is, as well as a significant contributor to the economy.

One can see two aspects of the current lack of a coherent policy in what has happened recently. The first involves overseas students. As the chancellor of Aberystwyth University who has travelled to visit lawyers and the judiciary in overseas countries, I have seen the enormous advantage of training overseas lawyers here. In Aberystwyth, a huge number were educated in the 1960s, 1970s and onwards who now have important positions in the law in other countries. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Irvine of Lairg, brought in an excellent programme for teaching judges from countries such as China and elsewhere.

This is not soft power; it has real benefit to the UK economy. The muddled thinking of the previous Government on visas shows that there was no strategy for how you relate universities to the greater benefit of the economy.

One can take this analogy with the subject of law slightly further, in that you not only learn law at universities but you gain hugely from doing a short amount of practical work. Therefore, not thinking through the restrictions imposed on working thereafter was a grave mistake. The other mistake in this respect was to fail to realise the intense competition other nations have in law and other fields.

There is a second aspect of the lack of strategy, which law illustrates. Law is a very cheap subject to teach, and cheaper now than it has ever been because you do not even need a library. Therefore, it is often referred to as a cash cow—I am sorry to use such a cheap and vulgar expression in such a place. It is important to realise that this has a detrimental effect—unlike the example that the noble Lord, Lord Trees, gave—on the way the UK works. We are teaching people law when we do not need them, but we are doing it to drive the universities’ finances.

Therefore, I entirely support the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, and others who have spoken. We need a proper long-term strategy, and there are three points about that. First, it must safeguard university independence, because that independence is almost as important as the independence of the judiciary—I hope noble Lords do not mind the word “almost”. Secondly, it seems to me that we must look at this on a UK-strategic basis. I am a huge supporter of devolution—many may be surprised to hear that—but you cannot do this without the strategy of a union Government, so that all have the same purpose. Thirdly, I fear that there probably is no alternative other than looking to fee income.