Disabled Students Allowance

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Wednesday 2nd July 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr Willetts]

I will give way briefly to the hon. Member for Huddersfield, but I have a lot of specific points to make, so after doing so I shall make progress.

[Mr Sheerman]

The Minister knows what I am going to say. He is looking through rose-tinted glasses at the future of finance in higher education, but it is not all as rosy as that. A vice-chancellor recently said to me, “The real worry that I have is that the whole HE system is based on a mountain of student debt.” That is our worry. It is not as rosy a picture as the Minister has painted.

[Mr Willetts]

That is a separate issue. The graduate repayment system is a fair, sustainable and viable way of financing our universities, and it would be a mistake to try to reverse that.

I turn to some of the specific issues that have been raised. Let me say clearly to right hon. and hon. Members that we will fund non-medical help that would not be a reasonable adjustment for higher education institutions to make. We will define the obligations of the institutions, and on top of that there will be support for non-medical help, which in certain situations will include support for students with specific learning difficulties, as well as other groups. Hon. Members mentioned IT, and we will make a contribution to the costs of higher-cost and higher-specification computers in certain circumstances if they are required purely because of the student’s disability. We will pay the extra costs that arise from those computers being required by students with a disability, rather than have a general payment for laptops when they are now widespread across society. We will also cover additional costs of specialist accommodation in exceptional circumstances.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 10th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

6. What steps he is taking to ensure that universities remain financially sustainable in the long term.

[The Minister for Universities and Science (Mr David Willetts)]

Our higher education reforms have increased university income and reduced costs to taxpayers. In 2011, universities received £7.9 billion of income for teaching. Next year, they will receive £9.9 billion. Universities are now well funded, on a sustainable basis for the long term.

[Mr Sheerman]

The Minister will be surprised to hear that I do not agree with relative complacency. I am a member of the Higher Education Commission and we are taking evidence on the long-term financial viability of our higher education sector. Time and time again, the Higher Education Policy Institute, the vice-chancellors, Lord Baker, Charles Clarke and everyone else who gives evidence to the commission say there is a serious, deep problem. We are not getting any British post-graduates as a result of the £9,000 a year. Something is deeply wrong. Will the Minister act before it is too late?

[Mr Willetts]

We now have record numbers of people applying to university. The funding is going to the courses that students choose. We are getting rid of controls on numbers of students. This system is financed by graduates—not students, but graduates—paying money back. That is the right way to finance our higher education. It is the system that all three parties have ended up proposing when they had to confront the realities of financing higher education. It is the right way forward for our young people.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 7th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I hope the Minister will forgive me for describing that answer of his as a tad complacent. The fact of the matter is that when we talk to leading academics and leading investors in business we find that they think that in life sciences we are lagging behind the other countries we are competing with—particularly China, but also many other places. They are worried that what will happen in life sciences is what is steadily happening in pharmaceuticals, whereby we are losing our pharmaceutical industry and it is switching overseas.

[Mr Willetts]

There is certainly a global race and I believe that the Government’s policies are securing us a strong position in it. We are not complacent, but the improvements in the tax relief, the protection for medical research and the innovations taking products closer to market ensure that when companies look around Europe it is clear to them that Britain is the best place to locate their pharmaceutical activities.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 8th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

I have happy memories of visiting the university of Chester when Opposition spokesman and so will certainly try to visit as a Minister. My hon. Friend describes just one example of the reason why the World Economic Forum recently placed the UK second out of 144 countries for the quality of university and business collaboration in R and D.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Minister agree that there is so much in Lord Heseltine’s review, “No Stone Unturned”, that it shines a light not only on the eyes we see under the rock, but on the policies that affect the relationship between universities and the business and research communities and the entrepreneurship we need in all our regions to make this country economically vibrant?

[Mr Willetts]

Lord Heseltine’s report was excellent. The message that we need to see growth across the entire country is absolutely correct. It is also correct that universities across the country are crucial drivers of local economic growth, and that is one of the many reasons we are supporting them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 2nd February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Of course, this week is the first anniversary of the announcement by Pfizer that it was planning to close completely its facility at Sandwich. That will now be transformed into a research and business park, not least thanks to the excellent efforts of my hon. Friend. Indeed, Pfizer will be an anchor tenant employing, we believe, 750 Pfizer staff. That shows we can fight back and we can maintain life sciences activity in this country. Through the proposals we set out in December, we aim to increase that.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

If we are to get business growth in our country, we must provide finance. Does not the report that the Minister has just made on the green bank show the truth that we want that sort of bank in each region, particularly in Yorkshire and the Humber? We want a bank for every region that knows the local circumstances and will invest in our regions.

[Mr Willetts]

I have a lot of sympathy with the argument that overall we need to see much greater diversity in British banking. Indeed, one reason why the Government are implementing the proposals from the Vickers commission is precisely to make it possible to have once more local banks that understand the needs of the local business community and local individuals, but our position on the green investment bank has been made clear by the Secretary of State.

Postgraduate Education

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Wednesday 25th January 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to speak in Westminster Hall again, Mr Hollobone, but under your chairmanship for the first time. I hope that I will not need much calling to order during my remarks.

The Minister knows about my long-term interest in higher education and so do my colleagues. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods), truly a good friend and not just formally so, who had the original idea when she asked, “Isn’t it time that we talked about postgraduate education?” thereby inspiring me to request this debate, which I am delighted about and lucky enough to introduce.

I introduce this debate with a fair-minded point of view. Many hon. Members know that I have a long-term interest in education. I chaired the Education Committee under its different names for 10 years and particularly enjoyed my time as the Chair of the Education and Skills Committee, when I had a brief covering higher education, stolen away as it was when I became the Chair of the Children, Schools and Families Committee, which did not have the higher education remit. I have missed it.

Many years ago, I started the all-party parliamentary university group, on which my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham now has a senior position, because it was important that this vital sector in our economy had a good relationship, good conversation and good communication with Members of both Houses of Parliament.

I have a long-term interest. I am now involved in the newly formed Higher Education Commission, chaired by Lord Broers, the first inquiry of which will look at postgraduate education. It is important to discuss that part of higher education because it is a bit isolated—on its own—and we have had a pretty eventful period for undergraduate education over the past months and years. Everyone has been busy looking at student finance for undergraduates, which has led, unfortunately, to our taking our eye off the postgraduate world.

I read somewhere recently that the Minister said—I believe him—that the noble Lord Mandelson could not be persuaded to include the postgraduate sector in the Browne review of higher education. I shall give way to the Minister if he wants to correct me.

[The Minister for Universities and Science (Mr David Willetts)]

In the negotiations that happened under the previous Labour Government, when Lord Mandelson was Secretary of State and I was shadow Secretary of State, I specifically urged that the terms of reference should make it clear that postgraduates, not just undergraduates, were included. The terms of reference included postgraduates, but Lord Browne did not advance any specific proposals. Postgraduates were included in the terms of reference partly at the request of the official Opposition.

[Mr Sheerman]

It is good to get that on the record. Of course, there is barely a page in the Browne report about the postgraduate world.

We desperately need to consider postgraduate education, because higher education can only be considered holistically. Where do we get our students from? What are the qualifications for getting into university? Who is pitching up to be taught as undergraduates in universities? How difficult is it for children of all the talents to get into university and higher education, even into elite research institutions? We have concerned ourselves with many things to do with universities and will continue to do so.

In respect of the changes under the Browne recommendations and the coalition Government’s implementation, there has been a fundamental shift and change in the situation for undergraduates. I will make my remarks today pretty much on an all-party basis, so there will be no hauling over the rights and wrongs of that. We are where we are, but to deny that the new situation for undergraduates does not have real implications for the postgraduate world would be foolish.

In a sense, we are in a bit of a policy vacuum in respect of postgraduate education. I urge the Minister and the Government to set themselves the task of filling that vacuum with something that is innovative, informative and positive. The fact is that, taking the dismal view of the situation at the moment, it might be said—in terms of economics being a dismal science—that the health of our research base could be threatened. The universities are some of this country’s greatest assets. Indeed, if universities were taken out of many of our towns and cities, they would be in a parlous state.

Any hon. Member who saw this week’s review of the health of cities will know that, although there is not entirely a correlation, a city without a university is likely to be in the lower percentile of success as a city. I am greatly concerned about our universities being threatened in any way. My wonderful university of Huddersfield is the largest employer in the town. It is a vast, expanding and developing university in the top 10 for employability and for widening participation. It is debt-free, successful and is developing and expanding, with strengths right across the arts, the sciences and design—in almost every subject that can be thought of—but with a practical bent in most departments.

Looking across the university estate, the problems faced by postgraduate education are different depending on where it sits. Universities are at the heart of our national wealth and well-being and are absolutely at the heart of the likelihood of our economy remaining diverse and successful. I shall speak about the threat to our research base, particularly in respect of the science, technology, engineering and mathematics subjects—big science—and will come to that in a moment.

Higher education is going through a period of uncertainty and change, with the new funding arrangements coming from the Browne report and the reduction in funding for teaching—the £9,000 cap. That is the situation that we are in.

I would be happy if the Minister mentioned something that we all discussed at some length when the Government produced the White Paper, “Higher Education: Students at the Heart of the System”. I told the Minister that I was a bit worried about that, because he kept saying that students had to be in the driving seat. When I worked for a living—[Interruption.] That is supposed to be an amusing aside. When I worked for a living I used to be a university teacher and I have reflected on the fact that, when students pitched up to be taught by me, I expected and thought that teaching staff were in the driving seat. Sometimes our job was to be quite nasty to undergraduates if they did not work hard enough or did not take their courses seriously enough. Part of the university experience is to get some pretty good, firm advice. I was worried that, with the White Paper, we seemed to be moving into a rather soft world, where we treated students as the consumer and the consumer could do no wrong, and we would have to dance around and provide nice soft courses and a lovely three years before students were ushered out into the wide world.

A lot about the students quite worried me, but I was waiting with anticipation for an education Bill. Suddenly, to my great surprise, shock, horror, I had to reach for my iPad and tweet. That is how serious it was. An early tweet—that method of communication provides early news—informed me that there would not be an education Bill any time soon. Today is a splendid opportunity for the Minister for Universities and Science to put us right. There have been rumours that a Bill will not be presented for two or three weeks, two or three years, or until 2013-14. There are also rumours that the Liberal Democrat part of the coalition has said, “No, no, no”, and that it will not be this side of an election. If the Minister wants to enlighten us, I will happily give way.

[Mr Willetts]

The Government will set out authoritatively our position on how we will implement our reforms in the White Paper very soon, but not in response to the bait being offered by the hon. Gentleman at this very moment.

[Mr Sheerman]

I think the Minister has gone as far as we can persuade him to go. Perhaps there is time for reflection, because there was almost nothing about postgraduate research in the White Paper, and perhaps this is an opportunity to cover that. If the higher education sector is not considered holistically, something is very wrong indeed. It should be considered from when students are recruited right through to PhD, doctorate and post-doctorate level.

I am sure, Mr Hollobone, that you took part in the Royal Society’s twinning scheme between research scientists and Members of Parliament. It was one of my most enlightening activities as a Member. One realises what a precious resource it is when young people have come through university, obtained a brilliant first degree, are encouraged to go on to a master’s degree, followed by a full research doctorate, and then post-doctoral work. In my placements when I have been part of the scheme under the last Government and now, it is a worry that if there is no continuous educational progression, the research stream starts to dry up. Post-docs get to a stage when they are getting on bit, they are married, they have a couple of kids and they are finding it hard to maintain a decent standard of living, and if there are no full-time scientific research positions or academic posts that are well paid, or relatively well paid—we are not talking bankers here—the whole system starts to look very thin indeed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Willetts]

The total amount to pay back is determined by the cost of the higher education, and it keeps the connection with the university. That is where I part company with the graduate tax. The point that I am trying to make is that graduates will experience only a slightly higher deduction from their pay packet by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, and if their income ever falls to less than £21,000, no payments whatever will be made. That matters to the debate about postgraduate education. I am not simply trying to reopen the debate on our undergraduate proposals.

The idea seems to be that it will be harder for postgraduates to finance themselves, because they will suddenly have an enormous amount of debt. In all the conversations that we have had with lenders about, for example, graduates’ ability to access a mortgage, they have said that what lenders look at is fixed monthly repayments. We have increased the threshold for repayments from £15,000 to £21,000, so the monthly repayments under our system have fallen compared with the system that we inherited from Labour. That matters to postgraduates’ ability to fund themselves. That is the source of Opposition Members’ anxiety: a misunderstanding of the implications of the reforms.

Nevertheless, I accept that there is concern about postgraduate issues. We recognise the need to monitor closely what is happening, investigate if problems arise and be absolutely clear what they are and what will need to be done about them. Today, we published the letter that we sent to the Higher Education Funding Council for England with the grant statement for the coming year. A paragraph in that letter specifically discusses postgraduates:

“We are pleased that the Council is taking the lead on gathering evidence to improve our understanding of the purpose and characteristics of, and outcomes from, postgraduate study, with the intention of reviewing postgraduate participation following the changes to undergraduate funding.”

We accept that it must be monitored.

“We also note the progress the Council is making, with its HE Public Information Steering Group”

on better information for postgraduate students. Also, of course, we refer to continuing

“work on strategically important and vulnerable subjects”.

[Mr Sheerman]

Where can we get hold of that letter? We would like it urgently. I also remind the Minister, who always mentions that I studied under Michael Oakeshott, that I was also taught by Ralph Miliband.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 8th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

My hon. Friend has absolutely described what a cluster is; I congratulate her. We support them. They are important for innovation and growth. Indeed, in the proposals published today, we are talking about making it easier for groups of institutions to come together to bid for funding from research councils, and also our enlightened Treasury has agreed that in future there will not be VAT on cost-sharing arrangements in which groups of institutions come together to share services in the interests of efficiency.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister will know that in life sciences and many other areas of innovation there are lots of small companies, often in partnership with universities. Will he comment on the fact that many of those partnerships tell me that with the demise of the regional development agencies they have no access to a large amount of money held in Europe, essentially for innovation? There are billions of pounds that they cannot access.

[Mr Willetts]

The catalyst fund that I referred to in my previous answer is aimed specifically at getting financial support to new start-ups, and will help finance them through the so-called “valley of death” before they can get commercial funding. At the Competitiveness Council in Brussels on Tuesday, I argued that European research funding should be more easily accessible for small and medium-sized enterprises. The best way to achieve that is by cutting bureaucracy and the complexity in the current arrangements for accessing European funding. That is what I urged on the Commission.

Manufacturing

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 24th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

Perhaps such a meeting could be arranged through BIS or the Treasury. Lowering barriers to entry is one way of ensuring that a market is dynamic, that new entrants can come in and that innovation happens, and that is as true in banking as it is in the rest of the economy. My hon. Friend’s suggestion of a meeting is very welcome.

We heard a range of excellent speeches. I congratulate the hon. Member for Huddersfield on his contribution and welcome his support for Huddersfield university. Although my hon. Friend the Member for Weaver Vale (Graham Evans) is no longer in his seat, I pay tribute to the excellent work that he has done in support of Daresbury, which I have been happy to visit with him. It is a crucial R and D centre for the future where we are committed to strong investment and which has enterprise zone status. We heard from the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden)—

[Mr Sheerman]

The Minister said that we have a Minister for manufacturing; we will have to think about that, because some of us were not convinced. Two themes that have come out of the debate—I am sure that the Minister will get round to them—are the need for a long-term strategy for manufacturing and the role of Made by Britain. Does he endorse Made by Britain, and does he think that all Members of Parliament should find a fine design or product in their constituency? We are over halfway there, so will he support our going even further?

[Mr Willetts]

The hon. Gentleman says that he is not convinced. I think that if the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford, who has responsibility for business and enterprise, were here, he might have shed a quiet tear at that, because there he is, doing all this work in the Government and being responsible for all these sectors, including manufacturing and delivering the advanced manufacturing growth review. There are arguments about the titles that people should have, but the reality is that he does an enormous amount for manufacturing.

On strategy, if the hon. Gentleman looks at the growth review that we published with the Budget, he will see that there was a range of specific commitments, ranging from our advanced manufacturing review to commitments across a host of manufacturing sectors. We are doing further work on the future of manufacturing through the foresight exercise that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is leading. Manufacturing was a crucial strand of the growth review and there is now a forward-looking exercise in the foresight framework.

I will briefly take the House through some of the things that we are doing to strengthen manufacturing, which as I said were covered in the Government’s “The Plan for Growth”. Lowering business taxes is fundamental. That is why we are planning to cut corporation tax year on year. Although some people have criticised our decisions on the structure of corporation tax, it is worth remembering that we have legislated to extend the capital allowances and short-life assets scheme for plant and machinery from four years to eight years to improve the tax incentives.

We are also backing innovation. Several Members from both sides of the House have referred to the importance of the research and development base. I am particularly pleased that we have been able to draw on the lessons from Germany, which has been referred to favourably on both sides of the House, and to learn from its Fraunhofer institutes. Those were a model for the technology innovation centres that we are setting up with £200 million, even in these tough times. We have already identified some of those centres, notably in advanced manufacturing. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is opening the National Composites Centre in Bristol today. That is the new home of world-class innovation in the design and manufacture of composites. We have also announced that there will be technology innovation centres in cell therapies and offshore renewables, and that there are more to come. We are trying to plug the gap between the pure research in universities and the commercialisation for which individual companies are responsible—the so-called valley of death. The technology innovation centres are one way in which we can plug that gap.

We are also committed to improving our performance on exporting. That is why we launched the national export challenge, a series of initiatives to help SMEs take the first steps to break into new markets. Currently, only one in five companies in Britain export. We want to increase that to one in four. That means reaching out to mittelstand businesses, or SMEs, that have not thought about exporting. That is why we have set UK Trade & Investment the target of doubling its client base to 50,000 businesses in the next three years.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Willetts]

I can assure my hon. Friend that the Department is very well aware of the particular pressures facing energy-intensive industries, and we are considering them very carefully.

[Mr Sheerman]

The Minister has mentioned tax twice. When I talk to manufacturers and people in the business sector, they ask why the Government want a blanket cut in corporation tax rather than something that would actually give a tax break to innovators and entrepreneurs.

[Mr Willetts]

We are also providing specific support for innovators and entrepreneurs, for example by increasing the value of the R and D tax credits. We are doing specific things, but the coalition’s overall philosophy is that if possible, we like to bring down the basic rates of tax in a simpler tax system. I think that is an admirable objective.

I do not want to take up too much time, because I know that other Members still wish to speak, but I will briefly go through some of the other things that we are doing, in addition to the lengthy list that I have given—I will not repeat it, but I am sure hon. Members agree that it is very impressive.

Several hon. Members have mentioned apprenticeships, and we can be very proud of the rate of growth in their number that we have delivered. We now estimate that the really extraordinary figure of 440,000 apprenticeships have started in 2011. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Minister for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning, who we all know has an intense personal commitment to apprenticeships. We are absolutely committed to their being of high value. Level 3 equivalent is a minimum, and in July the Prime Minister announced a £25 million fund to support up to 10,000 advanced and higher-level apprenticeships in companies, particularly SMEs.

Of course, we announced only last week a package to encourage small firms to take on their first apprentice, with an incentive payment of £1,500 for up to 20,000 apprentices aged 16 to 24. There are still too many regulatory burdens and too many problems of red tape, and we have made it clear that companies do not need to add extra health and safety burdens to the basic framework that all employees should have. We are committed to reducing bureaucracy, speeding up processes and boosting employer engagement in apprenticeships.

We are also committed to supporting and improving the image of manufacturing and engineering, which several Members have mentioned. There is much mythology about manufacturing and engineering. I am sure that Members of all parties find when they go around manufacturing facilities that they are very different from the oily rag image of manufacturing that too many people still have. They are sophisticated places in which highly skilled workers work with large amounts of sophisticated equipment. That is why, with my responsibilities as Minister for Universities and Science, I am very pleased with the increase in the number of science, technology, engineering and mathematics graduates.

Another announcement just in the past week is that the university of Lancaster is reopening its chemistry department, which was closed in 1999, because of the increase in the number of students coming forward with A-levels in the relevant subjects and because the university believes that in our new regime, it will be able to attract more students as it breaks free from the quota controls of the past. We have secured further investment in skills that are related to the improvement in the image of science and engineering.

As has been mentioned, there is also the new Queen Elizabeth prize for engineering, launched by the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition earlier this month. We thank the range of private sector partners who have contributed to the endowment of the prize fund. There will now be a £1 million prize, awarded biennially by the Royal Academy of Engineering.

[Mr Sheerman]

The Minister mentioned £1 million and we have 1 million young unemployed people. Will he join my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (David Miliband) in his call for every young unemployed person to be given training and a job? Is there not room for such an imaginative proposal, which would boost manufacturing and everything else in our country?

[Mr Willetts]

With both the Work programme and the increase in the number of apprenticeships, we are discharging our obligation to young people. Of course, more can always be done and we are absolutely committed to doing everything necessary to help young people into jobs.

Let me conclude by assuring the House that the Government are committed to encouraging and supporting British manufacturers. We are determined to create the environment in which they are free to thrive and compete in a global marketplace. The points that have been made by hon. Members, and particularly by those who called the debate, are well made. The Government absolutely understand the importance of skills, innovation and R and D, and the importance of ensuring that the barriers to bank lending are torn down. All that added up makes it clear that we have a strategy for manufacturing, which will be at the heart of our agenda for rebalancing the economy. I very much congratulate hon. Members on their interventions, which I welcome.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 14th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

Yes. My hon. Friend refers to something that, in many ways, is the equivalent of the pupil premium in schools. The Higher Education Funding Council for England is now consulting on how best to deliver the money in future, but we have made it clear that it is very important to reflect the additional costs that under-represented groups face.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Is the Open university the only happy university at the moment? I note the 10% increase in the number of its students, but what about the rest? Most of the vice-chancellors I talk to are very unhappy about the destabilisation of the sector and cannot see their way forward.

[Mr Willetts]

The hon. Gentleman does higher education a great disservice. In my experience, vice-chancellors are looking forward to the challenge of attracting students and know that one in four students will be bringing their money to the university that they choose, as we push back the quotas. They also see that in our White Paper we envisage universities having 10% more cash coming to them in four years’ time than they have now.

Higher Education White Paper

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

This goes back to an earlier question. Let me make it absolutely clear that one of the proposals in the White Paper is to make it easier for employers and charities to sponsor additional places at university. That is an additional flexibility in the system. Already, 6,000 university places are sponsored by employers in that way. However, it is not our intention that these proposals be abused by people to purchase places at university that they could not achieve on academic merit.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister knows that this is the day of the launch of the higher education commission. All of us who care about higher education want to digest the White Paper, hope that it has green edges, and will see whether we can improve it. The Minister constantly talks about the student being in the driver’s seat, and about consumer satisfaction and student satisfaction. Our universities are made of other materials. Their values and principles come from their academic staff and long traditions. Getting the balance right is a difficult task. Please do not let us go just down the consumerist route.

[Mr Willetts]

There is a real dilemma here and I respect the hon. Gentleman’s raising it in the House. I believe that putting more power in the hands of students, introducing the choice that we put forward in the White Paper and recognising that the student is in many respects a consumer will not destroy the traditional values of higher education, but strengthen them. I think that the proposals will bring traditional, high-quality teaching and close academic engagement with students back to centre stage. We should not fear these forces. Respecting the autonomy of universities is the best single mechanism we have to drive the traditional high academic standards that we believe in.

Off-quota University Places

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Tuesday 10th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

I am happy to give the hon. Lady the assurance that she seeks. That is not the proposal that we will put forward in the White Paper.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Secretary of State accept that it was he who started this hare running? The minds of those of us who want to be fair to him have not been put at rest by what the Minister has said today. We do not want a twin-track or two-tier system. May I add that, as the Minister knows, many of the leading public schools in this country are charities?

[Mr Willetts]

The Secretary of State and I have publicly referred to this idea. I referred to it in a public speech to Universities UK and he referred to it in a speech to HEFCE. We both said that we were looking at ideas for off-quota places. We make no secret of the fact that we are investigating those ideas. I have also made it clear in every public remark that we are looking at employers and charities as the people who would sponsor such places.

Higher Education Policy

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Wednesday 27th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

No, I am going to make some progress because Members in all parts of the House wish to speak and I have a lot more ground to cover.

We have not only taken on Lord Browne’s proposals in the report commissioned by the previous Government as their way of reforming the finances of our education system, but tried to improve on those proposals. The crucial way in which we have done that is by improving the repayment terms for graduates. A very important feature of the new system is that instead of the repayment threshold of £15,000 that was left to us by the previous Government, we propose a threshold of £21,000. The only way in which people pay for higher education is as graduates repaying their loans, so the level of threshold and the amount of the repayment that they make is crucial. Under our scheme, a care worker graduating in 2016 with a £20,000 starting salary would repay nothing. Under Labour’s £15,000 repayment threshold, that care worker would have been repaying £37.50 a month. Under our scheme, an accountant graduating in 2016 with a £25,000 starting salary would repay £30 a month. If the repayment threshold had remained at £15,000, that accountant would have been repaying £75 a month.

The crucial figure that matters for young people thinking about the cost of their higher education is how much they will have to repay. Under our scheme, their monthly repayments will be significantly lower. That is why the Secretary of State and I are confident that these reforms are the right way forward and are genuinely progressive. We are discharging our obligation to future generations in exactly the way the shadow Secretary of State set out at the beginning of his speech. That is the crucial challenge and we believe that our reforms rise to it.

That is not just my view or that of the Secretary of State, but the view of bodies that have scrutinised our financing proposals. The Institute for Fiscal Studies said that

“the Government’s proposals are more progressive than the current system or that proposed by Lord Browne.”

The OECD endorsed the coalition’s policy:

“The increase in the tuition fee ceiling is reasonable and should pave the way for higher participation in tertiary education”.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Can the Minister quote any vice-chancellor of any reputable higher education institution in this country who has said that the Government’s record in their first year of office has been good for higher education in this country?

[Mr Willetts]

I have been at many events with university vice-chancellors at which they have all accepted that, given the circumstances that we inherited and faced with the policy options of reducing teaching grant, reducing student numbers or implementing Lord Browne’s proposed changes in student finance, we took the right decision. I am confident that we have improved on Lord Browne’s proposals by making the repayment threshold more progressive.

Let me quote someone who is not a vice-chancellor, but who is perhaps still treated with a degree of respect by some Opposition Members, namely Lord Mandelson. The new postscript to his excellent memoirs, which I commend to Opposition Members, states:

“When the university fee debate came up before the Lords, for example, there was a large part of me that felt I should weigh in.”

I am sure that there was. It goes on:

“It was I, after all, who had set up the Browne Review”—

the Labour party seems to have forgotten that—

“into what future changes were necessary to ensure proper funding for universities in the best and fairest way, for both them and their students. When I did so in November 2009 I assumed, as the Treasury did, that the outcome would have to include a significant increase in tuition fees. I felt that they would certainly have to double in order to offset the deficit-reduction measures that we too would have implemented had we won the election. The alternative would be a disastrous contraction of higher education.”

Those are the words of the previous Secretary of State, and I take them as an accurate account of what was in the minds of Labour Ministers when they set up the Browne review.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Willetts and Barry Sheerman

Thursday 3rd June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Willetts]

I know that my right hon. Friend has a strong interest in this subject, and I assure him that the Department is committed to improving the apprenticeship regime for craft skills. I have also already had a meeting on how we can improve the qualification regime so that specific qualifications in craft skills are properly recognised and funded—something that disappeared under the previous Government.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

T4. Why is this new Front-Bench team so reluctant to talk about manufacturing? Can we not start to tie up the start-up of new businesses that make things with our university sector? Is it not about time that there was yet another inquiry into doing something about expanding our manufacturing exports?