Higher Education Bill

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 5:04 pm on 19 April 2004.

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Photo of Lord Wakeham Lord Wakeham Conservative 5:04, 19 April 2004

My Lords, I am extremely pleased that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Portsmouth fought his way up from Portsmouth to make his contribution today. We always enjoy listening to him, and today was no exception. I declare an interest as the chancellor of Brunel University, but the views that I express are mine and not necessarily those of the university. I did not go to university and was lucky enough to get my first honorary degree just before my eldest son got his first real degree, which kept a certain amount of peace in the family.

I spoke at some length during the debate on the Queen's Speech in favour of the principle of top-up fees; I shall not repeat those arguments. The two major things wrong with our universities are, first, that they are short of money; and, secondly, that too much of it comes from the Government. There is a lot wrong with the Bill, as I thought my noble friend Lord Forsyth hinted at in some of his remarks earlier. However, so far as I am concerned, it is the only show in town, so despite its imperfections it would be better on the statute book than not. My own university will be some £30 million a year better off when the scheme is fully in operation.

I hope that noble Lords will not take it amiss if I concentrate my few remarks on what I believe to be the shortcomings of the Bill. First, there is a clear division among vice-chancellors and universities on the principle of top-up fees. Some want nothing to do with them; some can live with the proposals in the Bill but do not relish them; and some would like the Bill to go much further and give universities the real freedom to charge higher fees if they think it best for the university and its future. I favour the more flexible approach, but I would advocate as much freedom as possible for each institution. The Bill does not go far enough in creating a market. Some new universities object to variable fees. They are concerned that older universities may be able to charge more than they do. Exactly how it helps new universities to keep the old ones poor is not at all clear to me. The problems with a fixed fee are that there can be no discounts even when universities want to provide them; that there will be no price signals by which students can trade off cost against quality; and that the Bill will charge students of new universities too much and Oxbridge students too little.

The second problem is that few like the Office of Fair Access. I would much prefer to see universities set up their own system of self-regulation. Everyone wants a fair system of admission; that is not controversial. The problem arises as to what is fair. It arises equally whether the system is statutory or, as I would prefer, self-regulatory. The main principles that I would expect to see in any system are that the Government should have no part in the admission of students, and that each student must be looked upon as an individual and not as some sort of representative of a social group. Although academic success is obviously a key indicator, it cannot be the only one. A brilliant student who becomes very ill before the year of applying or a young person who loses his or her parents at that crucial time are obvious cases, but it is not hard to think of others. Some say that a university should not know the school of an applicant; I am not sure that that is fair. A slightly lower performance by a student from a poor school is at least as likely to be on a par with a slightly better performance from a student from a very good school. So long as those matters are dealt with on an individual basis and not on a social group basis, those are factors that I would like taken into account.

However, there is another way of looking at these matters. Students will pay more for their education and are entitled, in simple terms, to better service from universities. I am in favour of universities having autonomy, but with that comes accountability. They should make their admission policies explicit and clear. They should provide a feedback service, particularly to unsuccessful candidates. But, more than that, universities should tell prospective students what they want to know—the range of marks that are acceptable, the dropout rate on different courses and the job prospects after graduating. University admission tutors should be properly trained in interview techniques. I am told that some are good but that others have no training and look on the job as a chore. Universities need to give some serious thought to the reliability and validation of interview procedures.

That does not apply only to admission policies, however. Some universities have special entrance exams. Those and related matters incur a cost, which may well be a disadvantage to a poor student. Universities collectively might look at that problem. Those matters are important and the basis of why I would prefer a system of self-regulation based on a code of conduct which is clearly published and available for all to see.

I would very much like to see the Bill on the statute book, but there are one or two things that could be improved.