Business of the House (Thursday)

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Wednesday 8th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Kevan Jones]

I think we have seen an historic moment tonight, Mr Speaker. I did not think it was possible for you ever to be wrong. The way in which you handled that is a credit to you.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

Has my hon. Friend considered this matter in the historical context? The last time we had such a considerable change to the funding system for higher education was in the 1940s. The Education Act 1944 was considered by many people to be the key reform in higher education and it was debated for a full year before the 1945 election. Has my hon. Friend taken that into account in considering his remarks tonight?

[Mr Jones]

I do not really want to go back to 1945, but I shall make some references to the Higher Education Act 2004 that are relevant to the time that has been allowed.

I want to ask the Leader of the House about the change that happened this week, from allowing three hours to allowing five. The motion was not moved last night and two hours were added to the debate. I think that everyone welcomes that, but it still gives inadequate time to cover the points that we have to make in the debate tomorrow. Whether that was another great concession wheedled out of the coalition by the Liberal Democrats I do not know; I am sure that if it was, we would have heard about it by now.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jones]

It was. They are obviously spending almost more time in private discussions than they are willing to allow the House to debate the matter.

[Helen Goodman]

I do not know whether my hon. Friend has calculated this, but had the proposal gone through a normal legislative process, we would probably have had 170 hours’ debate. We are to have precisely 3% of the amount of time that we would have had. Has he also noticed that the motion before the House this evening specifies when the matter will be debated, Thursday 9 December, and has—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Lady must resume her seat. It is absolutely understandable—I have said this so many times—that Members look behind them when they think they are addressing a colleague behind them. The hon. Lady must address the House. Secondly, the intervention is rather long, and I feel sure that it is coming to an end. In fact, I think it has probably reached its end, has it not?

[Helen Goodman]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Yes, I think it has.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Farrelly]

I hope that it will not take 5% of five hours to persuade the Liberal Democrats to join us in asking for more time tomorrow.

The evidence from the UK needs to be properly considered as well, including the evidence on price sensitivity. And the Government have not explained the evidential base on which their policy is based. We need time to fathom that.

[Helen Goodman]

I would not wish to make a political point, but does my hon. Friend agree that the Leader of the House might have been influenced by the fact that the statistics for applications from UK-domiciled students for undergraduate courses at the colleges of Oxford university show that 10 times as many come from Hampshire as come from County Durham?

[Paul Farrelly]

My hon. Friend has put her point firmly on the record, and I hope she will get the opportunity to expand on it if she is called to speak later in the debate.

There are a great many documents from institutions in the UK that have been looking at the effect of fees on participation, and we really need the opportunity to debate them. One such document, an interim impact assessment on higher education funding, shows that, according to the evidence on price sensitivity, a £1,000 increase in fees reduces participation by about 4.4 percentage points, yet here we are, facing a £6,000 rise, which would imply a reduction in participation by a quarter. We need time to look at all that evidence, which the Government have not been forthcoming in producing to back up their plans.

The Deputy Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg) has placed great emphasis on social mobility. He has even stated that these proposals will increase social mobility, and we need time to be able to cross-examine that view and to see the evidence for it. We also need time to give an airing to all the views of the young people that have come to us from across the country, e-mail by e-mail. We need more than five hours to do that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Helen Goodman]

Another consideration—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I must ask the hon. Lady to face the Chair.

[Helen Goodman]

Another consideration is the impact on universities of excluding able young people who simply cannot afford to go to the best universities. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is not just bad for the young people but bad for the universities? Will there be time for us to discuss it?

[Paul Farrelly]

I do agree, and I have already said that we will not have time to discuss the ins and outs and the evidence base of the national scholarship fund. We are told that 18,000 to 20,000 students might be helped, but we have not been told where those figures come from.