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22 Jan 2003 : Column 315—continued
Mr. Clarke: I am glad to tell my hon. Friend that I have studied every detail on that website, and can give
her some assurances. None of our Ministers and no member of our Department talked to BBC Wales, nor did the Secretary of State for Wales or his Department, nor did the Welsh Executive or its Ministers. After the usual whizzing round for the leak, which is always extremely entertaining, I am now assured that the three bodies that I talked to—the Welsh Executive, the Wales Office and ourselves—are not the source of the leak. The factual situation is not what has been reported on the BBC Wales website, but what I told the House in response to the question asked by the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Mr. Willis).
Alistair Burt (North-East Bedfordshire): Does the Secretary of State not accept that there is a significant difference between providing incentives to universities to widen access, which is the present situation, and threatening them if they do not? Does he not fear that the lack of trust in universities that the appointment of the regulator implies will fundamentally affect his relationship with universities, particularly when discussing academic freedom in future?
Mr. Clarke: The concerns raised by the hon. Gentleman are important, and I have discussed the issue with many vice-chancellors. Most vice-chancellors accept and understand the situation, and realise that they have to sort out the massive flaw or damage besmirching the university expansion that has taken place since 1990, and want us to help them to do so. I predict that universities will approach the change positively and constructively, but we are determined that those that decide not to do so will be subject to a full range of sanctions prohibiting them from increasing fees.
Mr. Gordon Marsden (Blackpool, South): My right hon. Friend is to be commended on seeing off the wilder ambitions of some of the Russell group universities to inflate top-up fees and restrict research study and awards. He emphasised that the core of his argument is about access for first-generation students, so does he accept that many will regard £1,000 as a barely adequate starter grant? Will he give an undertaking to the House that that figure is not fixed in stone? Will he review it regularly and lobby his right hon. Friend the Chancellor for extra funding to increase it to a significant premium?
Mr. Clarke: I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. We are conducting an assessment of student maintenance costs to get a true picture of the costs involved. As I said in the White Paper, we will go into the next comprehensive spending review ready to discuss the questions that my hon. Friend has raised.
Dr. Evan Harris (Oxford, West and Abingdon): The Prime Minister's old university in my constituency needs two things—better funding to compete in a global market and more applications from people from poorer backgrounds. Although the Secretary of State is doing a lot about that, does he not accept that he has created an impossible dilemma? If universities use the top-up debt mechanism to try to get funding, they will lose applications, but if they do so, the regulator will not
allow them to use the top-up debt mechanism to raise funding. Has the Secretary of State not created a lose-lose situation?
Mr. Clarke: No, if the hon. Gentleman talks to his vice-chancellor, he will find that his view is closer to mine than his.
Mrs. Anne Campbell (Cambridge): I welcome much of what my right hon. Friend has said. What inducements can a world-class university offer a student from a low-income background to accept a place at that university rather than one where their debt may be £9,000 less at the end of the course?
Mr. Clarke: First, I appreciate my hon. Friend's particular constituency interest—she has argued consistently on these points. Good-quality education and good job prospects at the end of a course must remain the key issues that drive our policy, but I anticipate that universities, including the one that she represents, will develop bursary schemes and so on or provide additional assistance. Our aim in establishing an access regulator and providing money for access for people from disadvantaged backgrounds is to increase university resources in that area, both in the current system and any changed system that may be introduced.
Mr. Michael Jack (Fylde): It is a sad day when a former president of the National Union of Students, to obtain the Chancellor's 30 pieces of silver for his policy, has to make life more difficult for poorer students. The Department for Education and Skills suggests that the nation's rate of return from investment in higher education is roughly double the discount rate used by the Treasury. If the rate of return is so great, why was it not possible to deploy more public funds to deal with top-up fees?
Mr. Clarke: Figure 3 on page 18 of the White Paper shows that there were slashing cuts in spending per head on universities under the previous Administration, including during the period when the right hon. Gentleman was a Minister at the Treasury. The Chancellor's commitment, which I announced today, to a 6 per cent. year-on-year real increase in university funding is not only better by a long way than anything achieved by the universities during the period when the right hon. Gentleman was in office, but is a sound basis on which universities can plan for the future and deal with the issue. The right hon. Gentleman is foolish if he wishes to demean that. He should ask the question that Labour Members and I are asking—if universities are to get that cash, how can they use it to achieve the ambitions that we have set out?
Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme): Access is a problem, so I shall ask my right hon. Friend a simple question—why cannot we have incentives to improve access without divisive and differential top-up fees and different prices for different universities?
Mr. Clarke: My hon. Friend may disagree, but the core issue, as I have told him before in the House, is that we have to acknowledge that it is necessary, even on the basis of the generous settlement that I have announced,
to put still more money into universities for teaching undergraduates as well as continued professional development and research. We have to look at who should provide that money. It is fair to ask whether people who get no benefits from the state after 16 because they have left the education system and are taxpayers for the rest of their lives should continue to be the sole source of funding for students. I think that students should make a contribution, but there is a legitimate discussion to be had about how much they should pay. To suggest that they should not contribute at all, however, is mistaken.
Mr. Roy Beggs (East Antrim): The Secretary of State will be aware that a large proportion of Northern Ireland students enrol in English universities either through choice or because they have not achieved the entry grades for Queen's university or the University of Ulster. Household incomes are much lower in Northern Ireland than in Great Britain and many students will fear the threat of incurring large debts. Will he seek to persuade the Government to increase the number of university places in Northern Ireland and to provide proper research funding to our Northern Ireland universities? Will he monitor closely the impact of his proposals today on the future enrolment in English universities of Northern Ireland students?
Mr. Clarke: The financial and educational relationship between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK is complicated, as the hon. Gentleman knows better than I do. I am discussing with the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how we might work in these areas. Whether the Stormont Assembly returns or the Secretary of State remains with his current responsibilities, it is important for the Administration in Northern Ireland to make a commitment in the ways that I have been describing. I can see that some colleagues share that view. I commit myself, in case it is of any help, to discussing with the honourable Gentleman's party, and colleagues in Northern Ireland above and beyond the Secretary of State, how we might work together in these areas.
Mr. Kevin McNamara (Hull, North): Is my right hon. Friend aware that my parents were on national assistance, and that with my three brothers, we had full maintenance and full university fees? Had my parents or I been faced with the prospect of having a very large sum to repay almost immediately after leaving university and its effects on having a family or mortgage, we would have regarded his proposals as an increased detriment to access by the poorest people. Is not the answer something that has been mooted but barely debated today: if people who graduate make the most money, they should pay the most tax in a graduate tax over their lifetime in employment? It is the fairest way.
Mr. Clarke: I want to make two points. I acknowledge the debt issues, as I have done in responding to a number of hon. Members. It is important also to acknowledge—I hope that my hon. Friend will do so—that as the proportion of the population going to university expands, significantly different issues arise. The issues in respect of 6, 7, 8 or 9 per cent. of people going to university are different
from those in respect of an intake of 43, 45 or 50 per cent. On those issues, my honourable Friend should acknowledge that there is a need to look again at that system.On the overall issues that my hon. Friend raises about the question of the extent to which funding can be provided through general taxation, whether through a graduate tax, income tax or whatever else, that is a matter for the Government as a whole. The issue that is distinct about the fee approach is that the money goes directly to the university rather than being translated through the Exchequer.
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