Higher Education and Research Bill

Baroness Brown of Cambridge Excerpts

Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Monday 6th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mackay of Clashfern]

My Lords, I strongly support the amendment. I just hope that in due course the Minister will be able to go a little further—but the amendment is very much in the right direction.

[Baroness Brown of Cambridge (CB)]

I, too, support government Amendments 3 and 172, which take a significant step towards ensuring collaboration between UKRI and the OfS. I will briefly declare my interests: Universities UK provides me with some research support; I am an honorary fellow of Murray Edwards College and a Title E fellow at Churchill College, Cambridge; I am a former vice-chancellor at Aston University and an adviser to the vice-chancellor at Cranfield University; and I chair the Sir Henry Royce Institute for Advanced Materials at Manchester University and STEM Learning Ltd, a not-for-profit company owned by a consortium of UK universities.

I thank both Ministers—the noble Viscount, Lord Younger, and the noble Lord, Lord Prior—as well as the Bill team for listening and responding to our concerns in this area. These amendments are very positive. However, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, said, some further clarity is needed on some key issues of collaboration between the Office for Students and UKRI. As an example—the one that the noble Viscount mentioned—in a recent note the University of Cambridge highlighted that, while UKRI would be consulted on the awarding of research degree-awarding powers, it is not, apparently, part of the process of varying or revoking such powers—or, indeed, identified in the appeal process. So I urge the Minister to clarify when we come back to this discussion later on Report that any decisions and processes related to RDAPs should indeed be joint decisions or actions between the OfS and UKRI.

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[Lord Desai (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to support the amendment that the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, put forward, as well as his argument. There is a problem with getting universities together, because they very proudly differentiate themselves from each other. One thing about British universities, where I have worked all my life, is that they do not want to permit student transfer between them. It is almost impossible for a student to do one year in one university and then go to another one, because the courses are not comparable and there is no system of scores or grade points. It will take a special effort to create a group spirit among English higher education providers, especially the old ones, although the new ones will be better. The suggestion made here about creating this collegium of former students or graduates may actually be very helpful now that we have the instruments to do that. Their experience may be able to tell us how to improve the interrelationship between universities, so we can present a united front regarding the quality of English higher education.

[Baroness Brown of Cambridge]

My Lords, I rise in opposition to Amendments 12 and 13, which are in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. In doing so I thank him for raising a very important point, but I suggest that we already have a very effective mechanism for doing what he wishes to see happen, which is the British Council. I urge the Minister to ensure that the British Council is properly funded to undertake talks of this sort in the future.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I have signed this amendment and all the others that make up this package, which is a substantial one; we should not underestimate the impact it will have. It is a most significant move for the Government to recognise the pressure of institutional autonomy right across the sector. It would be hard to overstate the impact of this coming together of the whole House with the Government to create an intervention in this area. We welcome it.

It is important also to recognise that the concession made was not just rearranging the existing wording—we acknowledge that the Bill already had a lot about institutional autonomy. Making not simply the OfS but the Secretary of State responsible for having regard to the need to protect institutional autonomy is a much more powerful approach. We should be cognisant of that as we accept the amendments.

It is important also to recognise that there is a gap. Although it has been pointed out that the UKRI is not a regulator in the same sense as the OfS, we will later move an amendment that proposes that the UKRI also have regard to institutional autonomy because there will be joint responsibilities in relation to research degrees, but also because these bodies will be operating with the same funding group—obviously, a smaller one in the case of the UKRI; nevertheless, it is important that we have equality of arms.

This has been a very successful case of trying to get a better Bill from what the Commons presented us with. It is a better Bill as a result of this intervention—of course, there is more to come. We should acknowledge that the leadership of the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, and the support that he and I received from the noble Baronesses, Lady Wolf and Lady Brown, and the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, from the Liberal Democrats, has been instrumental in persuading the Government that they should take account of this issue.

In bringing attention to the need for new providers in Amendment 5, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, has done us a service by ensuring that we think not only of existing arrangements within the sector but new entrants. It is important that we pick up the theme behind his amendment and ensure that it is properly regarded as we proceed.

In concluding, I hope we can have the Minister’s assurance that all the amendments in this group will be taken as consequential if the lead amendment is passed.