Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the financial cost of the covid-19 outbreak to universities.

Higher education (HE) providers have faced a period of significant risk to their financial sustainability and continue to face challenges. The government has provided funding support through various support schemes and has maintained regular contact with the sector to understand the ongoing impacts and changing landscape of financial sustainability in the sector.

I work closely with the the Office for Students (OfS) who are responsible for monitoring provider financial sustainability. The OfS report dated 8 June 2021 shows that the overall financial position of the registered HE provider sector remains sound, with generally reasonable financial resilience, despite the many operational and financial challenges arising from the COVID-19 outbreak.