| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
11 Apr 2003 : Column 557—continued
12.36 pm
Mr. Eric Joyce (Falkirk, West): The Government's commitment to increase spending on higher education by 30 per cent. over the next four years—a high level of investment—naturally requires the sector to adapt itself appropriately for the challenges of the 21st century. Some of the proposed changes, it is fair to say, have caused disquiet in some quarters. Today I should like briefly to address two issues hotly debated within the higher education sector at the moment. Some of the objections and arguments put by vested interests within the sector look, given the academic provenance of those putting them, to be based on surprisingly weak grounds.
The first issue is student funding. The Government intend to allow higher education institutions to charge top-up fees of up to £3,000 per year, subject to a number of caveats, including sound access arrangements. I attended a meeting the other day at which some higher education professionals argued that that would create an elitist system of education in the UK. That is an odd argument, since it is clear that our system is already elitist—certainly more elitist than that of the United States—in terms of access by less well-off students to what are considered the best universities. However, our system is pretty haphazard in its elitism.
Elitism based on high national standards is surely a good thing because it is only by such high standards that we will compete with the best in the world, but an elitism based on social class or simply being in the loop is regressive and corrosive. We all know people who attended public schools and achieved quite good A-level results: they were hardly the brains of Britain, but went
on to Oxford and Cambridge. On the other hand, many of us also know people from less well-off backgrounds who attained equally good A-level results—in some cases, fine ones—who did not go on to any of our most famous institutions. It is certainly the case that people from state schools sometimes fail to set their sights high enough. That may sometimes be caused by a lack of confidence, but, equally, too few high-grade universities have done enough until now to widen access. It is good to see universities such as Bristol leading the way today.It is worth noting that many people in the HE sector who complain about elitism per se are particularly good at getting their own children into the elite institutions. We should also be aware of the attempts by the Headmasters and Headmistresses Conference schools, which have given Bristol university such grief recently, to ensure that the current strong correlation between social class and access to elite institutions is maintained. It is touching that HMC schools have chosen to highlight the importance of structured interviews and transparent admission procedures over the last couple of months, especially as they have kept quiet about how successful they have been over the years at getting students into Oxbridge and elsewhere on the nod, by knowing how the system works.
What is panicking those schools is not any lack of fairness on the part of universities such as Bristol, but the reverse. The fact is that while the Etons and Harrows have traditionally produced—and still do produce—the academic goods, many of the schools further down the HMC pecking order are aware that their local state schools are now achieving better results than they are, so they face a potentially eroding client base. The fact is that the new access regulator, combined with the reintroduction of grants for the least well-off third of higher education students will, over time, transform the look of some of our best institutions. There will, of course, still be places for public school girls and boys who perform to the highest standard, but greater fairness means that there will also be far more kids from much less well-off backgrounds, which will in turn ensure that standards, even at the best institutions, continually get higher.
The second issue that I should like to cover is, to use the vogue term, mission. I was lucky enough to visit some higher education institutions in China a few months ago, and it is striking that the Chinese Government are investing an enormous amount in 10 or so research institutions. The US already has a higher education system that ensures that some higher education institutions have teaching missions and others have research missions. That is their focus—teaching on the one hand; research on the other. To a large extent, they have been decoupled. That pattern is being repeated across the world, and it is time for us to recognise that we have to go the same way.
The expansion of the HE sector during the 1990s was a great achievement, particularly given the declining per capita resource that institutions had to deal with. However, much of it was done under the assumption of a tight institutional linkage between teaching and research. Where that works, it can lead to great results, but where institutions lack the necessary capacity, but try to conduct research all the same, results can be very patchy. Conversely, only a small minority of academics in our higher education institutions have a formal
teaching qualification, and while standards are now improving it is far from true that all institutions with excellent research reputations have equally good teaching reputations. Moreover, it is fair to say that many of our best researchers lack the potential to be particularly good teachers, and perhaps some of our best academic teachers are not personally designed to be world-class researchers. That is why we need to inject coherence into the system to enable some institutions—and departments, in larger institutions—to turn out fine professionals, and others to turn out research of the highest order that is able to compete with the best that is produced by the Americans, the Chinese and other nations who will press us so hard in the years ahead.Above all, those of us with an interest in, or who work in, the HE system must have a sense of realism about the order of competition that we face from abroad and about how poor access arrangements to date have led to a broad system that is both insufficiently fair and extremely inefficient in terms of exploiting our national talent for best results. It is of the utmost importance that we aspire to all higher education institutions being fit, to world-class standards, for their respective purposes.
12.42 pm
Mr. Hugo Swire (East Devon): I declare my interests in the Register in the usual manner.
Having sat through this morning's Budget debate, I am amazed by the complacency of some Labour Members. As my right hon. Friend the Member for South-West Surrey (Virginia Bottomley)—who is no longer in her place—said, it is interesting to speak a few days after the Budget so as to have seen not only the reaction of one's constituents, but what the commentators on the news and in the broadsheets say. It is perfectly clear that the lustre has come off the Chancellor as far as they are concerned. They no longer describe him as a prudent Chancellor—indeed, there is some suggestion that he is taking a risk by gambling on growth, which sits uncomfortably with what he has been trying to achieve over the past six Budgets.
Whereas previously there was a credibility gap in what the Chancellor said, there is now, more worryingly, a fiscal gap. That is clear before one goes through the Red Book to examine the off-balance sheet accounting of private finance initiatives, which is an extremely worrying development. We know from the figures that borrowing this year is £27 billion—more than twice the £13 billion that the Chancellor forecast just 12 months ago. Over the next five years, the figure will be £118 billion. That is £88 billion more borrowing over the past five years than was originally planned. That cannot all be put down to the current war in Iraq or to the international situation in general. Of course, we have to make provision for the war, as we have to make provision for the UN's rebuilding of that country. I earnestly hope that any funds that we provide will be channelled through the UN and other agencies and not through the European Union, where so much overseas aid money has been spent wastefully.
People up and down the country are paying more and more tax. A typical family man pays £568 more than he did before. Judging from the groans of the hon. Members opposite, that point has been made before. However, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks
(Mr. Fallon) said, one would need the unswerving conviction, or delusion, of Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, the Iraqi information Minister, to believe that the Chancellor's pillars of prudence are still standing and that the economy is in good shape. A total of 78 per cent. of independent forecasters on the Treasury's own panel think that taxes will now have to rise by between £5 billion and £8 billion by 2006.Where has all the money gone? Where is it disappearing? My right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood) rightly referred on Wednesday to the boom and bust of the telecoms tax that was due to raise £22 billion. This morning, we have heard again about the £5 billion raid on pensions. The truth is that, from this April, £50 million an hour will be being spent by this Government—£14,412 a second. People are simply not seeing a corresponding improvement in the quality either of public services or of their lives.
Geraint Davies: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Swire: I will make some progress, if the hon. Gentleman will allow me.
I was interested by what my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire (Sir Michael Spicer) said earlier about the euro and the five tests. If ever any evidence were needed that a one-size-fits-all interest rate is not suitable for this country, it is being seen now. We have seen weak demand and weak growth in the EU; the tight constraints imposed by the European Central Bank; high and rising unemployment; and the appalling costs of red tape and social regulation. There is growing evidence that the Chancellor at any rate now realises that to join euroland now would be sheer folly. It will be interesting to see the report when it comes out in June, but I cannot now believe that there will be a referendum on the euro in this Parliament.
We are told that every Budget is for someone. It may be a Budget for pensioners, for the young or for the unemployed. However, once one has spent some time wading through the Red Book, it is genuinely difficult to see whom this Budget is for. It is certainly not for small businesses. Any small advantage gained through the changes to VAT regulations is greatly overshadowed by red tape and the national insurance rises. For bigger businesses, I seriously urge the Chancellor to tread very warily in his dealings with overseas companies and overseas domiciles. Of course, ensuring that everybody in this country is subject to the same taxation fits with his vision of social justice. However, consider the Baltic Exchange, which has made successful representations to the Chancellor and the Treasury over successive years. It is commonly understood that, were the Baltic Exchange and those families who operate their shipping fleets from this country to move, more than 5,000 jobs would be lost and a minimum of £125 million a year would be lost. I suspect that that figure is a great underestimation of the real figure. We should not forget that such people are highly mobile and can move their business anywhere in the world. The Chancellor's proposals may make a good soundbite but they are bad economics.
The reannouncement of baby bonds as child trust funds is another soundbite. I rather agree with the hon. Member for Morley and Rothwell (Mr. Challen) who
suggested that the idea has not necessarily been thought through. As the parent of a child born last August, I feel especially aggrieved that the scheme will be backdated only to last September.In the remaining time for my speech, I want to talk about the prevalent group in my constituency: pensioners. The Government's proposals to relieve pensioners of the need to contribute to the cost of their accommodation in hospital are another good soundbite but, in reality, the Government had already decided to extend the period covered by the rules from six to 13 weeks. In my constituency, we are examining ways to make more use of our community hospitals, to expand them to provide beds for patients who need long-term care. What will happen to those people if they remain in hospital for more than a year? Has the Economic Secretary discussed with health authorities and primary care trusts the financial implications of losing that money?
The winter fuel allowance has been increased by £100 to £300. That is extremely welcome but, as everyone is aware, a worryingly large amount of such allowances are unclaimed. That is why the Opposition tabled a reasoned amendment to the Government's pension credit proposals, to provide that the money should go into the higher basic state pension for older people. That must be the right thing to do.
What practical steps are the Government taking to ensure that, as we create an increasingly dependent society, pensioners will be able to receive their entitlements? The pension credit can be claimed by single people with an income of less than £139 a week and by couples whose total weekly income is less than £203. They could receive average increases of £7 for a single pensioner and £9 for couples. In reality, however, two thirds of pensioners will be means-tested by 2020, thus extending the dependency culture in one of the proudest groups in society. They do not want to be dependent on the Government but to have a basic state entitlement.
Those ring-fenced pension increases pale into insignificance when we consider the transfer to local authorities of bills that were previously picked up by the Government. I am of course referring to council tax. It is unfair of the Government to claim that some councils are using the Government's new grant support system as a smokescreen to increase radically the amount of council tax levied this year. That is certainly not the case in Devon.
I shall explain the reality of the Budget to a pensioner in Devon—one of my constituents who lives in Sidmouth, in a typical band G property. His council tax is £2,244 a year. His state pension is £322.64 a month. In 1997–98, when Labour had just come into power, council tax accounted for 38.7 per cent. of his state pension. Three years later, in 2000–01, council tax accounted for 47.9 per cent. of his state pension. In 2003–04, it will account for 57.9 per cent. of his state pension. In other words, in seven years, the state pension has risen by 24 per cent. while council tax has risen by 85 per cent. Many of my constituents simply cannot understand how that can be, and others simply cannot afford to pay—
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |