Question to the Department for Education:

To ask His Majesty's Government how many students wishing to study (1) ancient history, and (2) classical history, at university were prevented from doing so as a result of a reduction in places in each of the past three years; and what assessment they have made of the future of these subjects as university courses.

The Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) collects and publishes data on student entrants across UK higher education (HE) providers. This includes data on students entering courses in different subject areas, categorised using the HE Classification of Subjects system. Counts of entrants across all subjects from 2019/20 to 2022/23 are published in Table 52 of HESA’s Student Data, which are detailed below and can also be found here: https://www.hesa.ac.uk/data-and-analysis/students/table-52.

The department does not hold information on the number of university places available for each course. We are unable to assess the extent to which the decline in entrants was linked to the reduction of places.

English universities are independent, autonomous institutions and are therefore free to choose which courses they run. Quality is assessed by the Office for Students, the regulator of HE providers in England.