Higher Education White Paper

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement on higher education made earlier today in another place. This White Paper is the third policy initiative in higher education in recent months, but instead of bringing forward policies to enhance and extend a higher education system which is the envy of the world, the White Paper is nothing more than a hastily put-together rescue package for the department, sheltering behind some vacuous notions of competition and quality.

The truth is that, having taken the disastrous decisions to cut teaching budgets, to cut funds for investing in research, to cut science funding by 10 per cent in real terms over the CSR period, to curtail overseas student visas and to open the way to make university three times more expensive for students than it is at present, the Government have created a funding hole in the higher education budget estimated to be at least £600 million and perhaps as much as £1 billion.

We do not believe that the measures outlined today will put higher education back on a sustainable financial footing. It is surely just wishful thinking to assert that privatising higher education and switching to a higher education voucher system—one of only four in the world—will ensure that student demand is satisfied, that teaching and learning quality is maintained or improved and that research activity is preserved.

The simple truth is that this White Paper has one limited aim, which is to drive down the cost to the public purse of running our higher education system. The direct effect will be to reduce the unit of resource for teaching and hence reduce quality and further reduce the flow of good, qualified graduates into the workplace at the very time we need them most.

In the Statement the Minister mentioned that the Government wanted to take steps to improve social mobility, but the only mechanism mentioned is the plan to strengthen the Office for Fair Access. On demand, the White Paper says that the Government adhere to the Robbins principle, but it is “Subject to expenditure constraints”. I really do not think the Government can have it both ways. Either all students with the aptitude who wish to enter higher education may do so, or they may not. Can the Minister confirm that the Robbins principle is now defunct?

On social inclusion, children within the wealthier sections of society are three times more likely to go to university. Very few pupils on free school meals get three As so they are effectively excluded from applying for the selective universities. How exactly will the proposals in the White Paper boost the number of those from disadvantaged backgrounds going to university, when this is a requirement on institutions, not on HEFCE? There are also regional differences. For example, pupils in north-east schools are far less likely to go to university than those living in the south-east. Can the Minister point to measures that will redress this imbalance?

I turn to some of the more detailed comments. As the Minister said, universities will be able to expand the number of students they take who have AAB grades or better. It is well known that 50 per cent of those who get AAB grades or better are actually from private schools or grammar schools. In practice, virtually all students with AAB grades on entry can already get a university place. This proposal therefore ignores the many equally talented would-be students who do not go down the traditional A-level route, and ignores those from disadvantaged backgrounds. I am advised that the Institute of Physics has already warned that this measure may deter study of the sciences or maths at A-level. Is this a fair outcome?

The Government are going to cut student places at most universities. The places will be put into a central pot from which universities will have to bid for any extra places they want to offer. On what criteria can these bids be judged, other than by their value or cheapness? Of course, in future years, the Government can put more and more places into the central pot, depending on budgetary pressures at that time. It may be worth pointing out that this approach was tried in the early 1990s and resulted in a near-catastrophic reduction in funding per student. We fear that that might be the case this time around.

The proposal to offer loans to students attending private universities shows that the Government have no real concern for the health of the public universities, which are an integral part of the nation’s infrastructure in a way that private institutions are not. There is surely a lesson to be learnt here from the United States, where private universities got rich at the expense of the Government, despite a shocking record on student achievement and employability.

The Government’s higher education plans are unfair, unnecessary and unsustainable. The proposals in the White Paper are a direct response to the black hole in the Government’s higher education budget that was caused by their earlier policy decisions. To encourage economic growth, most of Britain’s competitors are increasing funding for their higher education and research budgets. The Government’s proposal will mean that English universities will have among the highest fees of any public university system in the industrialised world, while being among the worst in terms of public funding. At heart, this White Paper is about depressing demand for higher education and about putting unreasonable competitive pressures on many of our most-admired public institutions. It is already clear that a whole generation of students may suffer because of the Government’s miscalculations and their need to find ways to restrict access to the higher education that people want.