Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Chris Williamson and Sam Gyimah

Monday 14th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)]

3. What steps his Department is taking to tackle the decreasing number of part-time and mature students in higher education.

[The Minister for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation (Mr Sam Gyimah)]

Part-time participation in higher education is absolutely important to making higher education accessible to everyone and promoting lifelong learning. We have adopted a number of measures to support part-time and mature students. For example, next year part-time students will for the first time ever be able to access full-time equivalent maintenance loans.

[Chris Williamson]

The Minister will be aware that since the Government tripled tuition fees to £9,000, the number of part-time student applications has fallen by a staggering 59%. Even the former Universities Minister David Willetts has said that that is a disaster. Will the Minister take this opportunity to apologise to a whole generation of would-be part-time students and outline in a little more detail than he just gave what steps he is going to take to reverse this awful trend?

[Mr Gyimah]

The hon. Gentleman is right to identify the downward trend in part-time students, which actually started before the tuition fee changes. The Prime Minister has announced a review of post-18 education and funding, which will look into, among other things, flexible, part-time and distance learning, as well as commuter study options, to boost the options available to those who want to pursue such a course of study.