Select Committee on Education and Employment Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1100 - 1119)

WEDNESDAY 26 JULY 2000

BARONESS BLACKSTONE, MRS VANESSA NICHOLLS AND MR MICHAEL HIPKINS

  1100. As you say, the University of Oxford and, indeed, Cambridge, we have heard on a separate occasion, have their own programmes. Is it therefore necessary for the Government to skew its funding in order to require universities to go down this route?
  (Baroness Blackstone) It is not a matter of skewing funding to require universities to go down this route. I think it is a matter of providing universities with the resources that they need to do the outreach work that I was just describing, to provide for the summer schools and, indeed, to pay for the additional costs that there may be for recruiting students who do not come from family backgrounds where there is a tradition of going into higher education. For example, they may need a little more pastoral help when they arrive, it is that kind of programme. I think it is very important that we make it easier for universities to do the good job that they all want to do in this respect.

  1101. Just to be absolutely clear about this, the core funding for the universities as set out two years ago is not being changed now, the money going for access is not being taken at the expense of the programme whereby universities are required to have one per cent of efficiency savings a year?
  (Baroness Blackstone) Just on that last point, under the spending review this time we have been able to say that universities will not have to make a one per cent efficiency gain for the first year of that spending review. I think that is a very important change after ten years of very significant reductions in unit costs, a 36 per cent reduction between 1989-97. No, this is additional funding, this is not in any way reducing core funding.

  1102. That last sentence is very helpful because I know from the Vice Chancellor of the university in my own constituency that many out there are not aware exactly what their situation is following the Comprehensive Spending Review and I think you are the only Minister in the Department to answer questions on funding between the Chancellor's announcement last week and the return of Parliament in October. Do you not regret the fact that there is no education statement on the CSR?
  (Baroness Blackstone) I am sure that most Vice Chancellors are absolutely clear of what the position is, it is set out in the spending review. I am surprised that the Vice Chancellor in your constituency is not. I would be very happy to write to him and to set out very clearly what the position is. If I could just say in very general terms, over the four year period of the last spending review and the first year of this one, we have been able to provide more than one billion pounds of extra funding, an 11 per cent increase in real terms. We have added in an extra £100 million for the first year of this spending round, which is also the last year of the previous one. That is on top of the one billion pounds extra that was announced for research a week before the Chancellor's announcement. This is a very substantial improvement in the position of universities' funding.

  Chairman: I have got to share the time out very carefully because it is very restricted now, Gordon.

Mr Marsden

  1103. Thank you, Chairman. Minister, on that last point most Members of this Committee are delighted that the Government has been able to match the increased funding for access with the ending of the efficiency cuts in the units of resource, I think that is a key signal that is obviously being sent out. I would like to ask you about overall policies for widening access. When HEFCE came before us they talked about their programme for widening participation and said it was not designed to induce wholesale transformation of actual institutional missions across the sector. Do you think that all universities should promote wider access?
  (Baroness Blackstone) Yes.

  1104. If they do that is there not a concern that that particular mission, particular excellence, that the Chancellor, the Secretary of State and others have spoken about, will be jeopardised?
  (Baroness Blackstone) No, because I do not believe that widening access should in any way jeopardise standards and quality. It is very important that we should maintain high quality in our universities but I think you have seen the figures from the Sutton Trust which show that in the top dozen or 13 universities—the ones it has listed—they could do better with respect to access programmes. Many of them do not reach the benchmarks that HEFCE would expect that they would on the basis of the calculations that have been done. I think this should be a programme for all universities. I certainly do not think it should be confined to the top research universities, they all have a duty to reach out to those young people and, indeed, mature students—we must not forget mature students because that is a very important route from the point of view of widening access—and recruit them.

  1105. I am glad you have raised the issue of mature students because a significant proportion of mature students come into higher education via a further education background and that, of course, is increasingly true of students in the 16-19 age range as well. One of the ways in which access and participation may be impeded is through lack of recognition of qualifications, lack of portability, if you will, between one sector of education and another. Given that further and higher education in many ways seem to be eliding into each other at a very rapid rate, are you satisfied that universities are doing enough themselves to promote recognition of qualifications and thereby enabling those students who come from the sort of background that you have described more easily to access higher education?
  (Baroness Blackstone) Let me make a point about FE first. Both David Blunkett and I feel very strongly that it is important that FE should not be left out in the new access programmes that are now being promoted. I think there has been a tendency in the past for universities to think about linking up with local schools. And if they are not in an inner city, going to a city that is not too far from them, and making those links. It is really important that they make the links with the FE sector too. After all, as you have rightly pointed out, nearly 40 per cent of 16-19 year olds taking A level and equivalent courses are actually in the FE sector, so I do feel very strongly about that. I think that is now being recognised and more is now being done in that area. On the point about qualifications, I think that universities have become hugely more flexible than they were, perhaps, 10 or 15 years ago in recognising a wider range of qualifications, especially as far as mature students are concerned. With the establishment of the access programmes, that are specifically geared to helping mature students who do not have any relevant qualifications, there are now substantial numbers of very good mature students who come into higher education by that route who do not have any qualifications of a conventional kind and many of them do very well.

Mr Marsden

  1106. We have a problem with the University of Oxford. They came before this Committee and gave evidence and they were questioned about the UCAS tariff—which many of us believe is a step in the right direction—and they told this Committee, quite bluntly, that they did not intend to use the UCAS tariff, at least not for the time being. Is that not an impediment to access and wider participation?
  (Baroness Blackstone) I do not think that using or not using the tariff itself may be an impediment to access. I am delighted when I hear that most universities are going to make use of the new tariff. It is a matter for them to decide how they want to assess students who apply to them. It is one of a number of different tools that can be used. I can certainly envisage a situation in which a university decided that the tariff system, where you tot up points and then reach a total and see how students compare, might not be the one that they would want to make most use of. They might want to look at a whole range of individual qualifications, plus other qualities that students might want to possess to do really well in particular courses that they are offering.

  1107. To interrupt you on that, the dilemma—I accept the point you are making—with that is that the more complex the system the more difficult the problems with "transparency" and "fairness" which have been at the root of much of the discussion and controversy in recent months.
  (Baroness Blackstone) I certainly think that admission systems need to be transparent. I think that every university needs to set out quite clearly, department by department, what kinds of qualifications and, indeed, qualities they are looking for when they are recruiting students, so that students in all our schools and our FE colleges and sixth form colleges know what to expect. If they do not do that, how can they possibly tell where they can apply to and expect that they have some chance of getting a place.

  1108. You talked about the access funding and how it is going to be delivered. The whole thrust of what you said, and what the Government has said over recent months, has been to be more targeted in these sort of initiatives. Will you target access funding specifically to benefit those groups from the FE sector and the mature students, whom you described?
  (Baroness Blackstone) We have already said that we will be providing opportunity bursaries not just for young people but also for mature students. We have a new system for providing mature students with a genuine access bursary rather than the student arriving and then having to go to an access fund later. What we have done is to divide the access funds that we have provided—which, incidentally, next year will be four times greater than when we came in in 1997—between a hardship fund, on the one hand, where people can apply if they get into financial difficulty once they have arrived, even, perhaps, in their final year, and support, which they are aware they will get right from the beginning through a genuine access bursary, of the sort that I have just set out. I think that mature students have benefited very substantially under the new arrangements that we provided for student support, because we are now able to target them in a way that never happened before. Perhaps the most important way we are targeting mature students is providing loans for part-timers. This has never happened before. In my previous job I went to successive Secretaries of State and said, "Part-time students are the one group who get no help whatsoever. They are taking the hard route. They are doing a job. They are coming in the evening. They are working at weekends. They pay their taxes, but they get nothing". I am really delighted that this Government has been able to rectify that.

  1109. Minister, the first letter I sent to you after the 1997 election was precisely on that subject, and I share your delight.
  (Baroness Blackstone) I think it was.

Chairman

  1110. When the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford came here he said he needed about £1 million a year in order to professionally do the job of trying to broaden access. How far towards that million is he going to be now?
  (Baroness Blackstone) I cannot comment on how much individual institutions are going to get. What you just said proves my point, that all institutions do want a little additional help to make it possible to really, really put the effort, time, energy and the people into making access a reality; access for students who have not previously come to university.

Valerie Davey

  1111. My apologies for not being here at the very beginning. The curriculum for 16 to 19 year olds has had a welcome change, it has been broadened and extended. In particular, starting this September, there will be the AS Levels but also the vocational A Levels and, indeed, the advanced extension papers. First of all, will that, as I am sure the Government intended, ensure that more young people get the qualifications that they want to enable them to go on to further and higher education or will it, in effect, mean that only those schools which can provide the extra support for those additional courses will enable the youngsters to progress? Secondly, how much preparation has the Government overseen at university level in preparation for these new courses being matched by the requirements at university when they arrive?
  (Baroness Blackstone) Let me just begin with the reforms to the 16 to 19 year old curriculum and examination system. We came into Government with a manifesto commitment, as you will remember, to move away from the rather narrow and very specialised provision that we have been making for a long time for 16 to 19 year olds. People have wanted this reformed for many, many years. Higginson made proposals which were rejected by one of Margaret Thatcher's Governments. I am delighted that at last we have a broader curriculum for young people to study, and I think it will be hugely to their benefit. I am also delighted that on the basis of an initial evaluation of what is happening it looks as if the take-up of a broader range of subjects is going to be very considerable. I am not worried that schools are not going to be able to do this. Schools and the teaching profession have wanted to do it for a long time. They are geared up to doing it and they will be able to. They have the additional resources, we put a lot of extra money into schools across the board to make it possible for them to do this. As far as the university end is concerned, I am also very pleased. All our evidence is that universities are going to look at a broader range of qualifications. They are going to take into consideration the number of subjects that a young person is doing, look at their AS Level results as well, of course, as wanting to look at what the final outcome of the student's performance is when they have completed the whole programme. What I cannot do, because it is not the job of ministers or the job of Government, is to interfere in what universities actually teach in relation to what students have done before. That is for them. I have no doubt that they will be responsive to those changes.

  1112. The evidence we have had is very mixed. Again, the universities are claiming that the papers they are sending out to young people take account of the new qualifications, whereas the Secondary Heads' Association and people at the school base see very little evidence so far. There is need, if you can in any way, to encourage universities to be rather quicker in anticipating these changes in the material they are sending out.
  (Baroness Blackstone) I have been. Each time I have spoken at CVCP events over the last 18 months I have drawn attention to these changes and I asked that vice chancellors discuss them with their admissions officers and make sure they are fully aware of them.

Chairman

  1113. Minister, I am conscious of the shortness of time, this is, as you know, an all party Committee and Stephen O'Brien—who sends his apologies, who was here yesterday but could not be here this morning—has asked me to ask this question, "To your knowledge, did the Chancellor of the Exchequer or anyone on his behalf have any contact concerning access with DfEE and/or Oxford University prior to his attack on Oxford University towards the end of May this year?"
  (Baroness Blackstone) I really do not know how much contact he had with my colleagues. I am really not sure that that is an appropriate question for me to answer here.

Mr St Aubyn

  1114. Can we ask the Minister if she would like to write to us on that?
  (Baroness Blackstone) I really have nothing more to add to what I just said.

  1115. After consulting with your Department could you advise us as to whether the Chancellor—
  (Baroness Blackstone) I do not honestly think that internal discussions between different Cabinet ministers are something that I ought to be relaying to this Committee. I do not know what conversations took place between the Secretary of State and the Chancellor.

  Chairman: I think we have fulfilled our duty. I am going to move on.

Mr Foster

  1116. The CVCP Working Party on University Admissions was looking at the post-qualification application system. It failed to reach agreement on that. We have been told in evidence that the Russell Group of universities were particularly reluctant to adopt a post-qualification application system. What is the Government's view on this?
  (Baroness Blackstone) Of course there are lots of advantages to having a post-qualification system. It would make it simpler. It would mean that students were absolutely clear when they made their application what grades they had and what they, therefore, could offer to a university that would provide a better basis for them making their application. In principle there are lots of advantages. The practicalities are very difficult, and the Government recognises that. I think this is a matter for the sector to work out and discuss with the FE colleges and with the schools. This is not an issue that is going to go away and I believe that further discussions are very likely to take place. I would encourage such discussions. I really do understand how difficult it is because of the time constraints involved.

  1117. One of the problems that was highlighted with not adopting the system was the constraint to the school academic year and the university timetables for the start of their academic year. Is the Government in a position to help facilitate any movement or offer any help to make the system more flexible so that PQA could be adopted?
  (Baroness Blackstone) There are huge issues involved in very big changes of that sort. At this stage I really would not want to—when all of those issues have not been adequately considered and studied—make any predictions as to what might happen.

  1118. Would you accept that the Government would look favourably on a PQA system if it were to be adopted with the agreement of the sector?
  (Baroness Blackstone) I think it would have to have the agreement of all three sectors, the school, the FE and the HE sectors.

  Mr Foster: Thank you.

Chairman

  1119. One of the things that rather intrigued us when we heard evidence from Professor Wiliam from King's College was he said there was no relationship between ability and social class. Knowing of your background in social science, like mine, I wonder whether you agree with his statement and, if you do, is that the sort of view that you would base the present policies on access on in the Department?
  (Baroness Blackstone) At present about 80 per cent of the children of professional and managerial groups go on into higher education and only about 17 per cent of the children of lower socio-economic groups go on to higher education. I do not believe that is a reflection of differential ability between the two groups. It is a reflection of all kinds of environmental factors and different levels of opportunity, support, and so on, that social scientists have been studying for a very long time. It is interesting that when you and I went to university in the early 1960s the proportion of girls going into higher education was less than half of what it is today, it was under a quarter. Today it is over 52 per cent. The fact that there was such a big difference in the early 1960s had nothing do with differences in ability but it had much more to do with differences in opportunities, social expectations, and so on. I suspect that the same is true for young people from different social class backgrounds.


 
previous page contents next page

House of Commons home page Parliament home page House of Lords home page search page enquiries index

© Parliamentary copyright 2000
Prepared 6 September 2000