Higher Education: Funding and Student Finance

Lord Winston Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Wilcox]

I am told that we are going to consult on this in the White Paper. Browne recommends allowing student numbers to grow. The current package should enable student numbers to be broadly maintained. However, we do not believe that we should set unsustainable targets for growing HE student numbers. This risks perpetuating the idea that the only positive option for an 18 year-old is a three-year academic course at university. We think that we should be concentrating more on breaking down barriers between academic and vocational education so that an apprenticeship and various other courses are considered as valid as a degree. As I say, we will consult on this in the White Paper.

[Lord Winston]

My Lords, I declare an interest as chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University. As I speak, thousands of students from both universities in Sheffield—Sheffield Hallam is Mr Nick Clegg’s constituency—are demonstrating against the Government’s plans. Will the noble Baroness be kind enough to tell us what plans she has as a Minister to engage students who would never have gone to university had they belonged to a previous generation as regards the fairness and acceptability of the Government’s plans for the funding of universities?

[Baroness Wilcox]

There is no doubt that there has been a big gap in recent times between universities and schools as regards careers advice and communication. We are committed to ensuring that students and their families know exactly what is available to them. As the noble Lord knows, I was for many years chairman of the National Consumer Council. Very often, the thing that constituted a barrier for people in this area was language. Often they did not understand exactly what was going on.

It is very important that we get universities to push back into schools—as they will—to ensure that schools well understand their requirements. We will get the business community to explain what qualifications it requires students to gain at university, or whatever other form of further education they are hoping to take part in. We are already starting to determine how we can best communicate what this change means and how empowering it will be for students. They will be able to ensure that they get the courses they want.

Universities will start to improve not just their academic performance but what they offer students to prepare them for life after higher education. After all, some students will be older, some will be younger and the way that all this is explained, and the way that we get it out there to the students, really requires a new look. We are excited about having the opportunity to do that.