Clause 30 - General duties of relevant authority

Part of Higher Education Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 9:45 am on 4 March 2004.

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Photo of Graham Allen Graham Allen Labour, Nottingham North 9:45, 4 March 2004

Thank you for that guidance, Mr. Gale. I was starting to stray—even in my second sentence.

We are considering how the market works. I will not revisit our earlier debates. We accept that there is a market, but how perfect is it and how can we make it work? I think that it is deeply imperfect. Opposition Members sometimes use the term ''social engineering'' as a pejorative expression, as though, if there is any intervention or regulation, some social engineering is going on. An imperfect market, by definition, socially engineers a different outcome to that of a perfect market. For example, when kids of five or six are given IQ tests, regardless of background, some of them will be shown to have a high IQ, and others achieve will lower scores. When those youngsters are tracked, those of high IQ from working-class backgrounds cross over with those of lower IQ from middle-class backgrounds because, as they go through school and receive good parenting, their environment changes and they are tested, challenged and supported, as perhaps

other working class kids are not. That crossover has been demonstrated, and I hope that that is generally accepted in the Committee.

That is social engineering; the social circumstances of those children are such that even bright working-class kids are starting to be denied the chances that perhaps a perfect market—whether in parenting or schooling—might create for them. The first point that I want to make in reply to the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell is that social engineering starts at an early age. Attempting, rather feebly, some regulation at a later point might well be insufficient. It certainly does not deal with the root of the question. The hon. Gentleman and I may agree on that.

Social engineering takes place at all points. What we are trying consciously to do is bring in regulation through OFFA to bring about a little rebalancing, not by denying anyone the right to go to university—I have to be a little sharp with the hon. Gentleman, whose party's policies would reduce the number of youngsters going to university—but by making sure that those who are able can get to university. That is important.

Of course there are vice-chancellors—even my good friend Sir Colin Campbell of Nottingham university—who would like light-touch regulation. Many of us would like spending on health, education and policing without taxation. What a wonderful world that would be. However, that is to close our eyes to reality. Light-touch regulation will not enable us to make progress.

I draw succour from the hon. Gentleman's opening remarks: he wondered about the consequences if what is proposed does not work, and where we will be in 10 years. My reply is that we are now 40 years on from the first statistic that demonstrated that about 20 per cent. of working class kids go to university. As I mentioned in my first contribution in Committee, that figure has stayed static for those 40 years. There has been little progress on that percentage.

A light touch has been tried. Four decades of effort has been expended on that approach. Any Government—of whatever political party—who find that statistic unsatisfactory must deal with the question.