Exiting the EU: Science and Research

Debate between Lord Johnson of Marylebone and Jim Dowd

Monday 19th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Joseph Johnson]

Whenever I get the chance, I reiterate that we welcome international students and value the contribution that they make to our universities and our economy. I am pleased to be able to repeat that there is no cap on the number of international students who can come and study here, and there is no plan to introduce one.

It is important that we make it clear that EU students continue to be able to access our loan book and come here to study on home fee status, just as domestic UK students do. The Government have been very quick to make that clear to students applying in 2016-17 and to those who will be applying in 2017-18. We will decide the policy for the 2018-19 academic year in plenty of time for the start of that application process.

[Jim Dowd (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

May I come back to the point raised by the hon. Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael), the Chair of the Select Committee on Education? Non-EU nationals may be more reluctant than they were to come to this country for as long as our international relationships with the rest of the EU remain unclear.

[Joseph Johnson]

As I have said, we want to encourage international students to come to the UK. They bring enormous benefits to our universities and to our economy, and we have no plans to introduce a cap. We have a great higher education system, and the fact that we attract the second-largest group of international students of any country testifies to the quality of our institutions. That will continue after Brexit.