Higher Education: EUC Report

Baroness Garden of Frognal Excerpts

Thursday 11th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

My Lords, on behalf of the Government, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, for introducing this debate and express appreciation to her and the European Union Select Committee for all their work. The Government very much welcome its thorough report. It is pleasing that such disagreement as there is between the committee and the Government is essentially of detail and emphasis.

We are agreed that the Bologna process has had very positive effects since the declaration was adopted in 1999. My right honourable friend the Minister for Universities and Science, at the latest Bologna ministerial meeting in April, agreed to focus on three main goals in the face of the economic crisis: to provide quality higher education to more students, better equip students with employable skills and increase student mobility. The national mobility strategy required is currently being worked on by the sector, under the capable chairmanship of Professor Riordan, and the Government look forward to seeing it. We have had a number of references to that report from noble Lords.

The committee was concerned about recognition of our one-year master’s degrees, and the noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, brought this up. The Government continue to press, bilaterally where necessary, to ensure that the recognition that should be accorded under the Bologna process is given. Recent figures suggest that this problem is diminishing and the number of institutions offering one-year master’s courses is increasing, suggesting confidence in these degrees.

The committee noted that use of the European credit transfer system and the diploma supplement is mandatory in Scotland and considered it would be of benefit throughout the UK. We rightly prize the autonomy of our universities and this would be a decision for them. The Bologna process implementation report prepared for the ministerial conference shows that the rest of the UK has one of the best performances in Europe for implementing the Bologna tools. UUK figures show that use of the ECTS and the diploma supplement have increased significantly since 2009. As my noble friend Lady Sharp set out, there are difficulties for HEIs in this country accepting credits from other institutions, especially, but not only, within the Russell group.

The committee noted that the HE sector is global in character and saw value in the production of a strategy in this area. The European Commission will issue a communication on internationalisation of HE in 2013. The Government will examine it carefully, and agree with the committee that it must justify any new EU actions as adding value, and avoid duplicating what member states, and universities themselves, are already doing.

In this context the committee notes that there is increased competition from continental universities, and although it is too early to say what the effect of the new fee regime in England will be, the Government will continue actively to promote the strength of our HE sector to students. Several noble Lords have referred to the fact that continental universities are now offering degrees through the medium of English, so the language component has been taken away from those non-foreign-language-speaking students who want to study there. I assure the House that we encourage and prize the world-class reputation that our universities enjoy. Our reforms to higher education funding in England are progressive, with no eligible student paying upfront, with more affordable repayments and more financial support for students from lower income households. I refute the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Young, and the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, that fees will impact on cash-strapped students and parents. As we all know, repayments do not start until students become graduates and are earning at least £21,000 a year.

The committee rightly stresses the need to foster collaboration between universities and businesses to contribute to our future prosperity and the added value that various EU initiatives can give. In particular, the European Institute for Innovation and Technology and its knowledge and innovation communities have the potential to foster such collaboration. The Government will look closely at how existing KICs are doing that during the remainder of the present programme. For the new European innovation partnerships, it is very early to judge, but we will follow developments closely to optimise future performance. I note the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, about innovation and technology.

The committee welcomes the Commission’s proposal for a new integrated education programme, Erasmus for All. The Government agree, and my right honourable friend Mr David Willetts was pleased to support the partial general approach to the programme at the Education Council last May. We will do all we can to ensure that, as the proposal proceeds through the legislative process, the gains agreed are maintained.

Of course, as we are all aware, our aspirations in this field, as in many others, run up against the very difficult financial climate. The report wisely notes that any increases will be possible only in an EU budget in which reductions are made in other areas and overall restraint is achieved. The proposed Erasmus for All programme, integrating as it does the existing education and youth programmes with the new sport programme, is a good example of the sort of simplification and streamlining needed.

We agree with the committee on the importance of encouraging student mobility. To do so, the key questions are the language ability of our students, as the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, set out, and financial provision for mobility. On the latter, since the report was written, my right honourable friend Mr David Willetts has announced new arrangements to replace the Erasmus fee waiver in England. They allow English HE institutions to charge students who take year-abroad placements a tuition fee up to 15% of their maximum fee cap; give students access to a tuition fee loan to cover those costs; and provide a HEFCE grant to support institutions participating in overseas student programmes. For the first time, that support will extend to students from English institutions taking year-abroad placements outside the Erasmus scheme.

On languages, the report criticises our monoglot culture and the risk of complacency due to the increasing spread of English. The Government agree. That is why my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education has included languages in the English baccalaureate; the new national curriculum will for the first time make a foreign language compulsory at key stage 2; and his department is funding the CfBT Education Trust to raise standards of language teaching. Several noble Lords have raised concerns about the requisite number of qualified language teachers to meet those new demands. Work is under way to identify teachers to recruit and to encourage more people to come back into the profession to encourage language teaching.

Research published in March this year showed that 51% of state secondary schools have more than half their pupils taking a language in year 10, up from 36% when the previous Government left office—an increase probably helped by the language component in the English baccalaureate. Proposals for the English baccalaureate certificate include making a modern language compulsory at key stage 4. We would certainly hope that that would also become part of the national curriculum. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills classifies languages as strategically important and vulnerable subjects, which it has asked HEFCE to support; more than £14 million will be allocated to maintain capacity in SIVS this academic year. We are pleased to note the committee’s endorsement of the proposed revision of the professional qualifications directive. The proposed directive includes references to ECTS credits as evidence for minimum training requirements for seven professions. The Government support this approach and are seeking to ensure flexibility for both professionals and their regulators. The noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, said more on this and I will say a little more in a moment.

I will come on to some of the comments made in this debate, which has been wide-ranging. I apologise if I am not able to cover all of the points raised but I will of course write to noble Lords on those which I am not able to cover this evening. Further to mobility, the British Council, which delivers the Erasmus programme in the UK under contract to the Government, introduced a supplementary grant of €500 in 2011-12 for Erasmus students who are eligible for HE widening participation assistance in the UK. It is too early at the moment to tell how that has affected the take-up from these groups but we hope it will certainly help to widen both the diverse range of students and participation. Both the noble Baroness, Lady Young, and the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, mentioned widening participation and reaching out to those groups.

The noble Baroness, Lady Young, referred to the multiannual financial framework. It is vital that the next MFF is geared to fostering growth and competitiveness. Since those are underpinned by research and innovation, the Government agree that this area should account for a larger proportion of an EU budget that will increase by, at most, inflation in 2014 to 2020. The importance of R and D has been brought out again in a number of speeches this evening.

My noble friend Lord Bridgeman and the noble Lord, Lord Giddens, also mentioned outward mobility. BIS has tasked the higher education sector to consider outward HE student mobility generally, including the measures necessary to support the growth of UK participation in the Erasmus programme, and ensure that students from all backgrounds have the opportunity to take part. Again, it was raised in this debate how the numbers coming into this country are far greater than the number of our own students wishing to study overseas. Raising awareness of international experience in schools, as my noble friend Lord Bridgeman said, is an important aspect of this. I will get back to him on whether this is needed on the UCAS application form. I would certainly have thought that any personal statement would benefit from having a comment about international experience, because we know that is valued by employers and universities.

The noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, asked a number of questions. I will do my best to tackle some of them. She asked what was going to happen about EU students defaulting on student loans. The reply is that we are working closely with other member states and the European Commission to establish a means of strengthening ways of pursuing repayment. However, there has not been a major problem with other forms of loans to EU students. We are hoping that it will not present a great problem. It is a matter, of course, of working with other countries.

On the review of the directive and the recognition of professional qualifications, which the noble Baroness mentioned particularly in the medical field, we hope that that directive will help young graduates not to have to start again or to study for more years than is necessary to prove their professional competence. We shall obviously have to work with that directive as it develops to make sure that that is happening. I think that I have already mentioned the one-year master’s degrees, but on the professional directive we would like to ensure that the levels of education outlined are aligned with Bologna cycles, so that the training courses towards regulated professions do not aim for two differing benchmark levels. I would not underestimate the difficulties of trying to ensure that, throughout different countries, we have benchmarks measuring the same things across this range of professions.

On the master’s-level student loan guarantee facility, which my noble friend Lady Sharp mentioned, we agree with the committee that the loan guarantee proposal needs to be explored further and could potentially help UK graduate students, but once again we will need to monitor how this goes along to make sure that it is entirely effective.

A number of noble Lords mentioned universities doing as much as they can to enforce the teaching of modern languages. My noble friend Lady Sharp mentioned the University of Sussex, where languages were encouraged. The noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, mentioned UCL, which has insisted on a modern language module for all incoming students and, if they do not have a GCSE, UCL is providing courses to enable them to gain one. There are examples of other universities doing similar things. Aston, for instance, has a programme where all first-year students will be studying a modern language. There are a number of very innovative programmes within universities to try to ensure that languages are encouraged across the range of subject areas. I think that the noble Lords, Lord Judd and Lord Parekh, mentioned the importance of linkages across subject areas, not just for linguists but in science, engineering, technology, the arts, law, medicine and so on.

The noble Lord, Lord Giddens, also mentioned the barriers to research and academic careers for UK citizens, and the European Commission recognises that there are barriers for researchers and academics and is working with member states to tackle those barriers to develop the European research area to ensure that there is more openness and exchange within those areas.

The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, raised the matter of visas, as did the noble Lords, Lord Bilimoria, Lord Judd and Lord Stevenson. This has been a vexed question. I am destined to disappoint the noble Lord, Lord Hannay; I am sure that I will not fill the lacuna to his satisfaction regarding the areas that he raised. There are hopeful signs regarding the Government’s interest in fostering internationalism; for instance, just recently the Government announced that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office language facility would be funded with £1 million following the closure of the college in 2007, so there is an upturn on that front.

I assure noble Lords that the UK is most definitely open for business to international students. Genuine students who have the greatest contribution to make to the UK will continue to be welcomed. The aim as always is to get the balance right between providing a user-friendly route for bona fide students and education providers and deterring those who would seek to abuse the system. I share noble Lords’ concerns that we certainly seem to have got publicity rather skewed against that in recent times. We are working very hard to try to redress that position and to encourage overseas students to come. Conversations continue with the Home Office and UKBA and the student visa people to try to ensure that we encourage students to come here. As the noble Lord, Lord Judd, pointed out, it is not just a matter of economic benefit to the UK from students; it is also the matter of international relations, the fostering of friendships across different cultures and countries, which is of such vital importance today.

The noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, commented that he was not impressed by the trend of universities to issue statements of all-round achievement alongside the academic record and guides. We understand from employers that they are interested in other characteristics of graduates as well as their academic grades, and many UK universities have adopted the higher education achievement report, which provides a much deeper record than the standard academic report. The Government encourage that development.

The noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, commented on the importance of linguists generally and concerns about the shortage of interpreters and the impact that that has. I commend the work in this respect of the Chartered Institute of Linguists, to which I spoke last week, which performs a vital role in trying to ensure that standards are maintained in all branches of linguistics.

I have given the assurance on key stage 4. That is going to continue. The noble Baroness’s idea that there should be a cross-cutting Minister covering languages in all departments is an interesting one. I will need to get back to her on that; it might not be wise for me to make a policy decision at the Dispatch Box this evening.

The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, commented on the benefits of EU research collaboration and research mobility, and we would certainly agree that that is of enormous benefit. We are working with the European Commission and other EU partners to increase such collaboration where appropriate through the European research area initiative. The noble Lord, Lord Parekh, talked about joint and double degrees, as did the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, with a mixture of different universities delivering together. These already exist, with the development of joint programmes supported through the EU education programmes, and are strongly encouraged in the Bologna process, but it is indicative of the fact that they are worthy of more support than they have at the moment.

The noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, reminded us that India was closing down its universities long before Oxford and Cambridge were even thinking of opening. I also mention that there are BIS-funded projects for sending students to India and China to find out more about those cultures. They are very popular. Applications are way in excess of the number who can go. On the financial arrangements available to EU students, they are eligible for loans but not for maintenance grants.

I will have to write to the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, on the detail of the U-Multirank. The Government concur with the report’s finding and with the concerns that she raised. It is important that there is clear information and guidance for students on higher education institutions, but there are concerns about the usefulness of university league tables and rankings systems. The noble Baroness pointed out some of the difficulties of rankings systems for universities. There are also possible concerns about the cost. The Commission is running a trial scheme with a limited number of countries on this, and we will possibly wait until that trial is reported. I shall try to find out about the costs for the noble Baroness. I do not know them at the moment.

The noble Lord, Lord Judd, mentioned the multinationalism of universities and that social science is as important as physical sciences. I think we all agree that the revival of intellectualism and the ability to think our way out of problems are of key importance in the times in which we live.

I am conscious that I have not covered all the points that have been raised in the depth that I would like. I will read Hansard and try to come back to noble Lords on the points that have not been covered today. I commend the influential reports of the EU Committee, which are very welcome. Once again, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, the members of the committee and all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate. We have had productive and incisive contributions that will help to shape government policy in a field that is not only crucial to our economic future but helps to promote good international relations and opens opportunities for students of all ages.