Higher Education and Research Bill (Seventh sitting)

Roberta Blackman-Woods Excerpts

Committee Debate: 7th Sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 15th September 2016 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation. It appears that in this case, among the myriad information sent, this document was sent.

[Dr Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Hanson. I found the document on the Department for Education’s website, but it was quite difficult to locate. I checked and rechecked and I certainly did not receive it via email. However, the clarification this morning has been incredibly helpful and I am sure we will be able to access documents more readily in future.

[The Chair]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady. Whether Members received the document or not, the Minister’s intention was to send it. As explained, the normal practice is to give advance notice of any documents that are referred to in Committee. We can leave it at that if Members are content.

Clause 10

Mandatory fee limit condition for certain providers

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

I beg to move amendment 177, in clause 10, page 6, line 28, at end insert—

“(c) in respect of condensed courses or innovative methods of delivery, where the number of applicable years of a course is reduced from normal three year period.”

This amendment would allow fees for a 3 year degree to be charged over 2 years to allow for greater funding flexibility.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship again, Mr Hanson. We might be in for another hot day in more ways than one. I stress at the outset that this is very much a probing amendment. The Minister will be aware that we received some evidence, particularly from private providers but also from others, that universities have not been as innovative as they could be, particularly with regard to course structures and methods of delivery. One of the reasons MillionPlus and the University Alliance gave for the lack of innovation was that the fees and loans structure is too rigid and does not allow universities the flexibility they need to be able to offer, for example, a three-year course over two years. Does the Minister think that is an accurate assessment of the current fees and loans regime? If it is, what does he think can be done to make the regime much more flexible, to enable universities who want to encourage more part-time and mature students with different modes of delivery to provide that?

[Joseph Johnson]

I thank the hon. Lady for tabling the amendment, because it gives me a chance to express our support for her underlying intention to encourage more innovation and a wider variety of provision in the sector. As I have indicated, the Government are wholly in agreement on the need for that and we are actively encouraging it in all our reforms of the higher education system. We do want to encourage more accelerated and flexible provision—in fact, that was a specific manifesto commitment at the 2015 election.

The Bill, as we have discussed before, will help us towards our goals by levelling the playing field for high-quality new entrants, making it easier for new specialist and innovative providers to enter the sector. Accelerated degrees are a particular strength of new and alternative providers, and they will help us to ensure that students can access learning in the form that suits them. I can give a few examples: Buckingham, BPP, Condé Nast College of Fashion & Design—it gave evidence before us—and Greenwich School of Management are all the kinds of newer institutions that offer students the opportunity to complete an honours degree over two years, meaning that the student incurs less debt and can enter the workforce more speedily having completed the same amount of study.

We are determined to do more to support flexible provision and that is exactly why we issued a call for evidence earlier in the summer, seeking views from providers, students and others. That resulted in more than 4,000 responses, the vast majority of which, as the hon. Lady may expect, came from individual students. We were delighted to see that level of engagement. Many of the students expressed an interest in exploring the idea of pursuing an accelerated degree, so, as she identified, this is clearly an important issue.

We certainly sympathise with the underlying intention of the amendment. We believe the Bill will help ensure more students are able to choose to apply for accelerated courses. We are currently analysing the full range of the many responses we received to our call for evidence. I assure the hon. Lady that we expect to come forward with further proposals to incentivise the take-up of accelerated provision by the end of the year. On that basis, I ask her to consider withdrawing her amendment.

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

That was a very positive response from the Minister, although he did not clarify whether we might get something at later stages of the Bill or whether it will come after the Bill has completed its passage through Parliament. I am reassured that the Government are looking to see what they can do to help not just new entrants, but all universities to deliver their courses more flexibly. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

[Joseph Johnson]

I beg to move amendment 29, in clause 10, page 6, line 36, after “means a” insert “higher education”.

This amendment and amendments 30 and 31 ensure that the courses which can be subject to the fee limit registration condition in clause 10 are confined to higher education courses - but excluding postgraduate courses which are not courses of initial teacher training. “Higher education course” is defined in clause 75(1) as a course of any description mentioned in Schedule 6 to the Education Reform Act 1988.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gordon Marsden]

When I referred to a major increase, I was not commenting on the specifics of the percentage; I was talking about the fact that it will affect all students. Neither the Minister nor, as far as I am aware, anyone from his Department has seen fit to comment on the issue, but over the summer a number of universities have taken the confirmation in the written statement as a green light to put up fees not simply for those who enrol in 2017-18, but for those who already have a loan. There was some discussion in the media—again, I do not think the Minister took part in it—about whether, for example, a reference to the potential for fees to go up on the University of Exeter’s website constituted a good enough broadcasting of the issue. This will have a retrospective impact on students at a number of universities, and it has come about on the back of the way in which the Minister chose to announce the process.

If I remember correctly, when the Minister and his colleagues were pressed on the process, they said that they were doing it in accordance with the requirements of previous legislation. It is curious—I put it no more strongly than that—that when it suits him to smuggle a measure out in a statement on the last day of term, he prays in aid legislation that is more than a decade old, but when it comes to this thing, it is referenced in the context of the main Bill but without our being told anything more about the teaching excellence framework that will enable fees to go up.

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

My hon. Friend is making a very important and powerful point. Does he agree that the situation is becoming even more complicated because now, we understand, there will be a link between fee increases and the TEF results, but the Government are not being clear about what the uplift in fees can cover? One would assume, as there is a link between the TEF and the fee level, that it would be to support the quality of provision within institutions, but we understand that that uplift in fees might be used to fund secondary school education, requiring students to fund not only their own education but that of secondary school students.

[Gordon Marsden]

My hon. Friend, indefatigable as ever, makes an excellent point. I will not dwell on the issue to which she refers. It was part of the substance of the Prime Minister’s speech, and a lot of it was in the statement made by the Secretary of State for Education the other day, so I will not go into any detail on it other than to observe that my hon. Friend is absolutely right: if universities are to take on a significant, major role—there can be lots of discussions about how that is done, the value of it and all the rest—inevitably that is another element that will call upon their resources.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

There is nothing in schedule 2 to suggest that as there is now a link between teaching quality and fees the additional fee income will be used to further enhance teaching quality. Will the Minister deal with that point?

[Joseph Johnson]

Such incentives will play a powerful role in rebalancing universities so that they focus more on teaching than ever before. We do not have marginal funding allocated towards teaching in our funding system for universities at the moment and this will be a powerful driver of change in that respect.

It is right that only providers that demonstrate high-quality teaching will be able to access tuition fees up to an inflation-linked maximum fee cap. We expect the TEF to deliver additional income for the sector of £16 billion by 2025 and it will also allow providers to reinvest in teaching methods that work. As the Sutton Trust said,

“we need to shake the university sector out of its complacency and open it up to a transparency that has been alien to them for far too long. It is good that they are judged on impact in the research excellence framework, and that the teaching excellence framework will force them to think more about how they impart knowledge to those paying them £9000 a year in fees.”

The fee link has been welcomed not just by individual vice-chancellors but by the sector. The hon. Member for Sheffield Central challenged me to reference a body representative of the sector and I am very happy to do so. Universities UK said:

“Allowing universities to increase fees in line with inflation, on the condition of being able to demonstrate high-quality teaching through an effective TEF, is a balanced and sustainable response to these two objectives.”

Let me reassure the Committee that, as I set out in the White Paper, our proposed changes to the fee limits accessible to those participating in the TEF will at most be in line with inflation—fee caps will be kept flat in real terms. Let me also reassure the Committee that, should the upper or lower limits be increased by more than inflation, which is certainly not our intention, it will require regulations subject to the affirmative procedure, which require the approval of Parliament. That is in line with the current legislative approach to raising fee caps and we have no desire to depart from those important safeguards, so Parliament will therefore continue to retain strong controls over fees.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gordon Marsden]

I beg to move amendment 168, in clause 13, page 8, line 12, at end insert

“and which must include information about how students will be protected from any reasonable financial loss if an event specified by the OfS were to occur, in particular the closure of a course or a higher education provider.”

This amendment would ensure that students are protected from reasonable financial loss if their provider or course closes.

In the interests of allowing a little light as opposed to heat into the proceedings, and given the nature of the hour, I do not intend to speak at great length to the amendment, although I will raise some broader issues when we debate a subsequent one. Again, I draw on what my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North said in the previous debate about the challenge to the Government to recognise the interests and concerns of students, which is what the amendment is designed to do. So that Members are in no doubt, clause 13 relates to initial and ongoing registration conditions, and the amendment would insert a very important additional condition.

We have heard a lot about transparency in the Bill, and about how things can be put forward and on the record, and early in Committee we had some debate about the nature of documents and all the rest of it. However, that does not relate to one of the most crucial things that students will want to know, in particular those who are attending new providers—a subject for further debate. There is nothing wrong with being new, and on Second Reading the Minister scratched very hard for precedents going back to the 1820s and 1830s and talked about cockney universities that are now world-beaters, such as University College London and King’s College London. He was right and, as an historian, I praise him for referring to historical precedent. Sometimes, however, it can be stretched a little too far, and on that occasion I think either he or his team did so.

Nevertheless, new providers have to show their bona fides and students must have confidence in them. My amendment is designed to make it easier for them to have that confidence. Student representatives are extremely concerned about the lack of detail of what would happen if things went wrong—and in life things do go wrong. Things might not go wrong in the Conservative manifesto, but they go wrong in life, and then have to be addressed. In this modest amendment, I am suggesting that the clause should include some information about how students will be protected from any reasonable loss if an event specified by the OFS were to occur, in particular the closure of a course or a higher education provider. That is the more difficult and detailed stuff, not the principle or the fine-sounding words that can roll off the Minister’s tongue.

This is a probing amendment and I am not asking for it to be included in the Bill, but we want to hear a lot more detail from the Minister throughout our deliberations if we are to be convinced that his safeguards for students are adequate.

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

I merely want to emphasise to the Minister the extent of NUS concern about this issue. I met NUS representatives recently, and they understood that the Bill allows for new entrants into the sector and creates a registration system, which means that in future some institutions might fall foul of that system. The NUS does not have an issue with that, but with what protection there would be for students if a course closes or if the institution itself closes.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South said, this is a modest amendment, but it seeks to put something on the face of the Bill to include information about how students will be recompensed if their course or institution closes. Furthermore, NUS anxiety is based on experience of course closures, in which it has taken a long time for students to get their particular issues sorted out, such as transfer to another institution or on to another course. What reassurances can the Minister give to students who are really worried about that matter?

[Joseph Johnson]

I am happy that we are back on more consensual aspects of the Bill, and we share all the hon. Members’ interests and concerns in that respect. I am extremely keen to use this opportunity to set out our intentions for student protection plans. I hope that the Committee members found it helpful to read the explanatory note that we put out yesterday, although I appreciate that they will not have had much time to look at it. It is, however, available for their further perusal.

Student protection plans are not a new concept, and some providers already have them. The current approach across the HE system, however, is entirely voluntary, and coverage is far from consistent across the sector. What the Bill does, importantly, is give the office for students the power to require registered providers to put student protection plans in place. All approved providers and approved fee cap providers in receipt of public funds will be expected, regardless of size, to have a student protection plan approved by the OFS. That is new, and the measure has been welcomed by the NUS in its written evidence to the Committee. I have met the NUS on a number of occasions. If it has continuing concerns, following our publication of this preliminary clarifying material, I would be happy to meet again to discuss how we can go further, if necessary.

The plans as we have set them out will ensure that students know from the outset what kind of support would be offered to them if a course, campus or institution was at risk of closure, or if some other material change at their provider left them unable to continue their studies. Providers will be expected to make contingency plans to guard against the risk that courses cannot be delivered to students as agreed. Those plans will be proportionate and in line with the risk profile of the provider. We expect the OFS to require student protection plans to be implemented before a provider’s financial position becomes unsustainable. They will be triggered by material changes, to be specified by the OFS in guidance. The guidance will also provide further details on what the OFS expects to be covered in a plan and we expect that that will be subject to full consultation by the OFS. As a result, the Bill rightly does not prescribe the type of events or mitigations that should be included.

I can reassure Members that we fully intend for student protection plans to set out information, options and any remedial actions students can expect in any event where a material change occurs that could affect their continued participation in study. That is an important step forwards in the protection of the student interest in higher education. I therefore respectfully ask the hon. Gentleman to consider withdrawing his amendment.