Universities: Contract Cheating

Lord Storey Excerpts

Wednesday 11th July 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Storey]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they are taking to ensure that every university in the United Kingdom is taking action to prevent contract cheating.

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

My Lords, contract cheating is unacceptable. It devalues the work of those students succeeding on their own merit and undermines the reputation of the sector. That is why the DfE worked with the QAA, Universities UK and the NUS to publish guidance last October to help providers tackle this issue. We have given the OfS power to take action if providers are complicit, including imposing fines or, ultimately, deregistering providers—the highest possible punishment.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

I thank the noble Viscount. He will know that essay mills and contract cheating are part of a billion-pound worldwide organisation, with dozens of companies registered at Companies House. He will recall that in debate on an amendment of mine to the then Higher Education and Research Bill the Government agreed that, if this matter could not be dealt with by voluntary means, they would consider legislating. What issue would bring that legislation about?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

I concur that in the passage of that Bill we did not discount the idea of legislating, but we are firmly of the opinion that we should look at the non-legislative approach. I know that the noble Lord is a key member of the academic integrity advisory group, which is doing some good work in conjunction with the QAA to look at the whole area of cheating. It is of course a fast-moving process because much cheating can be done over the internet.