| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
Madam Speaker: Order. It is about time I heard a question to which the Secretary of State can respond.
Mr. Sheerman: I was just coming to one, Madam Speaker.
Madam Speaker: The hon. Gentleman has already done rather well, and time is pressing. Secretary of State.
Mr. Blunkett: I agree with my hon. Friend's last point, which I shall treat as a question. In my hon. Friend's own area, the West Riding, Alec Clegg got more students from
the schools into university during the 1960s and 1970s than manage to get there today. Given the expansion in higher education since then, that is a disgrace.
Mr. Ian Bruce (South Dorset): The right hon. Gentleman may wish to know that the former Government did not introduce 100 per cent. loans because Back Benchers refused to accept that that was achievable--politics is the art of the possible. Will he confirm that a student today can take out a loan of £1,500 a year during a four-year degree course, and will have to pay back £6,000; whereas under his proposals, for a maximum loan of £4,500 over a four-year period, that student would have to pay back £18,000?
Mr. Blunkett: No, we should compare like with like. The figure is £10,500, on the exemplifications that we have at the moment--with that codicil added because the trigger amounts make a difference to the repayment amounts and hence to the long-term debt.
Mr. John Cryer (Hornchurch): I fail to see how these measures will widen participation in higher education, mainly because they mean an end to free universal higher education--an idea for which the Labour party and the Labour movement fought for decades. The proposals mean young people taking on large debts early in their lives.
Does my right hon. Friend agree that the proposals will lead to a division between universities and colleges? Some will offer bargain-basement courses to poorer students, while the better-off universities such as Cambridge, Durham and Oxford will charge high fees.
Mr. Blunkett:
It is precisely to avoid that problem that we are bringing in this system instead of top-up fees, which universities claim they have the freedom to introduce willy-nilly under current law. So the truth is the very opposite of what my hon. Friend fears. The idea that graduates, who earn at least 20 per cent. more than their counterparts who are non-graduates, are poor does not hold water. We should save our tears for those who, for donkeys' years, got up at 5 o'clock in the morning to do cleaning jobs so as to pay the taxation that allowed some of us to do very well indeed.
Mr. Ian Taylor (Esher and Walton):
Sir Ron Dearing's report seems almost as radical as many of us had hoped. The Secretary of State is to be congratulated on grasping some of its radical aspects, including the deferred contribution of students to tuition fees.
Will the right hon. Gentleman give us a little more information on other crucial aspects of the report, such as research expenditure and contributions to infrastructure expenditure? Does he agree that universities are and should be available to all, but that it is equally important to establish internationally recognised scholarship and research? Does he agree that certain universities
and departments will have to make a great deal of effort and will require extra resources if they are to stand up to international competition?
Mr. Blunkett:
I am tempted to just say yes, because I agree with that point entirely. There is certainly a crisis in terms of equipment and the capacity to undertake research, and in terms of the buildings themselves. Sir Ron recognises that. We intend to deal with it in the White Paper on lifelong learning. I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's comments; I sincerely hope that the shadow Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Charnwood, will acknowledge the genuine feelings and commitment of his own Back Benchers.
Lorna Fitzsimons (Rochdale):
It is important for us to clarify several points. First, does my right hon. Friend agree that the current system is one of the most inequitable that we have, which is why the high-street banks refused to administer it when the previous Government tried to negotiate for them to do so? Secondly, will he make it clear that we do not have free universal higher education, as some people in the House and outside the House would have us believe, because Open university students, part-time students and further education students have always paid fees? Thirdly, will he tell the House that the crucial part of Dearing is, as I understand it, building a much needed bridge over the gap between further education and higher education, to give meaning to the principles that we have enshrined, on quality, access and fairness?
Mr. Blunkett:
I agree entirely. We have tried to make it clear that there has been a misunderstanding, in that some people have taken young, full-time students entering at the age of 18 and 19 to be the norm. Now, more than 50 per cent. of students are mature and a third of students--half a million--are part time. Adult further education students not below the age of 19--there are 2 million of them--have had to pay. To put it in context, I believe that this is the final break with the welfare state that invested in the better-off at the expense of the worse-off.
Mr. Dorrell:
This afternoon, several hon. Members on both sides of the House have asked the Secretary of State a question, the answer to which would be of real interest to everyone looking at this subject from outside, but which he has not yet given. How much money does he expect the tuition fees that he proposes to raise, and how much of that will find its way directly to universities?
Mr. Blunkett:
By 2002, £650 million on the present accounting basis; £1,700,000 on resource accounting, which is being examined by the Government.
Madam Speaker:
We now move on. I know that I have a point of order from Mr. Gorrie.
4.26 pm
Mr. Donald Gorrie (Edinburgh, West): On a point of order, Madam Speaker. My concern is that I discovered that the Scottish press had been enabled to get hold of copies of the Dearing report at 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon. The report was embargoed until this afternoon. I have no doubt that equal opportunities were given to the London and English press. I do not object to members of the press having an advance copy so that they can write a sensible article about it; I am suggesting that Members of Parliament are equally trustworthy and that we could get embargoed copies, so that we could make intelligent comments and so that when, for example, I am asked to speak--[Interruption.]
Madam Speaker: Order. I am interested in what the hon. Gentleman has to say.
Mr. Gorrie: In my case, the Scottish media are interested in a Scottish reaction to the Dearing report. They had copies of it and I did not, which seems to be unreasonable. I suggest that, in future, Members of Parliament should be regarded as being as trustworthy as journalists and should be given embargoed copies of such documents.
Madam Speaker: I have a great deal of sympathy with the hon. Gentleman. It is intolerable when a Member of the House is asked questions by a journalist about the contents of a Government document that has been made available to that journalist on an embargoed basis and is not available to the Member.
Let me say to the hon. Gentleman, who is new to the House, that it has been a long-standing and accepted practice that advance copies of Government documents are issued to the press on an embargoed basis, as he says himself, in order to assist them in their subsequent reporting. The terms of the embargo do not permit the press to make other use of the document in advance of its availability to the House.
It seems to me from what the hon. Gentleman has said that in this case, the terms of the embargo have not been respected. That will no doubt be as much a matter of concern to the Secretary of State as it is to me. Ministers are being let down by the press when they do not respect an embargo. It happened with the previous Government; it is now happening with this Government. The Secretary of State will no doubt wish to consider the implications of this incident for the practice of advance release on an embargoed basis. In any event, he might consider what action should be taken in respect of the journalist concerned.
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow):
Further to that point of order, Madam Speaker. Do you intend to bring your statement to the attention of the Secretary of State for Scotland? Tomorrow's publication of the devolution White Paper could be the litmus test of what you have said to the House.
Madam Speaker:
I hope that those on the Government Front Bench, whose job it is to bring my remarks to the attention of Secretaries of State, will do precisely that.
Mr. Tony Benn (Chesterfield):
Further to that point of order, Madam Speaker. First, may I welcome the strong
Yesterday, the No. 10 press office gave a full briefing that a new Cabinet consultative Committee was to be set up, that Opposition Members were to be on it, and that they would be subject to the Official Secrets Act. No statement was even due to be made today on the matter. Whether the idea is good or bad is a matter for the parties concerned, but it greatly affects the position of the House of Commons, where there are really only two categories of Member: Ministers who represent the Government; and Members of the House who are members of the legislature. If the Government can co-opt members of the legislature and give them private information on a wide range of issues, are they any longer an Opposition able to enjoy the rights of opposition? That is the point that I want to make. I am not talking about the merits of the matter, but simply saying that we now have a semi-move towards a coalition, even though we are told by the No. 10 spokesman that this does not involve collective Cabinet responsibility for Liberal Democrat Members who are invited to serve on the Committee.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |