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Standing Committee H
Thursday 26 February 2004
(Afternoon)
[Mr. Roger Gale in the Chair]
Clause 23
Condition that may be required to be imposed by English funding bodies
Amendment proposed [24 February]: No. 82, in
clause 23, page 9, line 7, leave out paragraph (a).—[Mrs. Anne Campbell.]
2.30 pm
Question again proposed, That the amendment be made.
The Chairman: I remind the Committee that with this we are discussing the following amendments: No. 3, in
No. 144, in
No. 223, in
No. 239, in
clause 23, page 9, line 11, at end insert
'and that there is provision to students, as directed by the Secretary of State, of a bursary equivalent to at least 10 per cent. of the fee, or £300, whichever is the greater sum'.
No. 83, in
clause 23, page 9, line 13, leave out from 'period' to 'institution' in line 15.
No. 84, in
clause 23, page 9, line 26, leave out paragraph (a).
No. 85, in
clause 23, page 10, leave out lines 30 and 31.
No. 120, in
No. 110, in
No. 86, in
clause 24, page 10, line 44, leave out 'and the higher amount'.
No. 87, in
clause 24, page 10, line 48, leave out 'and the higher amount'.
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No. 88, in
clause 24, page 11, line 1, leave out 'either of those amounts' and insert 'that amount'.
No. 89, in
clause 26, page 11, line 26, leave out paragraph (a).
No. 225, in
No. 240, in
clause 26, page 11, line 30, at end insert
'and that there is provision to students, as directed by the Secretary of State, of a bursary equivalent to at least 10 per cent. of the fee, or £300, whichever is the greater sum'.
No. 252, in
No. 90, in
clause 26, page 11, line 32, leave out from 'period' to 'institution' in line 34.
No. 91, in
clause 26, page 12, leave out lines 33 and 34.
No. 121, in
No. 92, in
clause 31, page 14, line 5, leave out subsection (1).
No. 93, in
clause 31, page 14, line 10, leave out 'also'.
No. 94, in
clause 31, page 14, leave out lines 39 to 43.
No. 95, in
clause 35, page 16, line 4, leave out '(a) or'.
No. 96, in
clause 36, page 16, line 23, leave out '(a) or'.
I have been given notice of a desire for a Division on amendment No. 110. Traditionally, the Chair does not call grouped amendments, but I have agreed to call amendment No. 110 in addition to that moved by the hon. Member for Cambridge (Mrs. Campbell). If anybody wishes to press any others to a Division, they must give notice and only then will I exercise a judgment.
Mr. George Mudie (Leeds, East) (Lab): I was taken by surprise by the time extension this morning. I continue almost in the middle of my sentence making the point that clause 23 is an important part of the Bill. To my understanding it is the element that divided the House: about 49.5 per cent. of the House voted against and 50.5 per cent. voted for. However, that is not reflective of the numerical membership of the Committee. There is a danger that we may not get the Bill through.
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That close vote, triggered by the issue of variability, was supported by people such as my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge, who has highlighted great doubts about variability and involving the market in higher education. She is a nice, pleasant individual who is aware of the traditions of not killing a Bill on Second Reading. She, my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Plaskitt), I and others worked hard in negotiations to make the Bill more acceptable and were granted important concessions. We were prepared, because the negotiations continued until the last moment, to vote for the Bill on Second Reading on the understanding—I am a naive Scottish Yorkshireman so I am sure that this is accepted by the Committee—that there would be an open-minded discussion in Committee and that we would seek to mend fences.
I was making the point that putting me on the Committee was a disservice because more eloquent hon. Members with knowledge of education would have been able to speak to the Minister in greater detail and might have brought peace. I do not think that that is helpful—and it is no laughing matter. The futures of a lot of youngsters are at stake. If we are so tightly divided in the House that a Government with a majority of 161 can only win by five votes, there must be common sense that we do not want to return to Report or Third Reading unless we have moved closer together.
I support amendment No. 82 and wish to comment on amendment No. 3, because they both deal with important issues. I am glad that the break gave hon. Members some chance to forget the excellent contribution that was made before it—so that my contribution does not pale in comparison—but I cannot fault it in spirit, sympathy and objectives, even though it was made by a political opponent, the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Mr. Willis). I wish that I had made it. If I had made as good a contribution—and I am certainly not going to—and got such a reception, I would think that there was no hope for the Bill. If that contribution is ignored, sneered at and paid no attention to, we will clearly make no movement on variability. The decision has clearly been taken to introduce a market in education, and the traumatic time that Labour Members went through—I do not know about the Opposition—will be rerun. That is not something that I view with pleasure, in either an individual or, above all, a party sense.
I hope that the points of my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge will be responded to not just in words or argument, as the argument will then continue elsewhere. I point out that the majority was five. One Member did not vote because his wife was ill that day, so I would consider the majority to be four. A number of hon. Members voted for Second Reading on the basis that there would be further serious discussions.
Mr. Graham Allen (Nottingham, North) (Lab): I am sure that my hon. Friend is expounding his views, which I respect, on sound policy grounds. Does he
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concede that there may be a political party represented in the Committee that would vote with anyone who gave it the possibility of embarrassing the Government? Were there, for example, to be a difficulty about not including variability, would that political party have sided with those in my hon. Friend's position purely to embarrass—
The Chairman: Order. That fascinating speculation has nothing to do with the amendment.
Mr. Mudie: I think that it is a matter of record that both parties have been in the same Lobby this week. I seem to remember being in the same Lobby. I was not alone for a change. There were more than 71 of my colleagues with me. In fact, I looked around and saw a few familiar faces. There is no use in speculating as to why others were in the same Lobby.
The Chairman: Order. Not only is there no use in speculating; it is not in order.
Mr. Mudie: Your ruling is absolutely correct, Mr. Gale.
The hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough is far ahead of me analytically, and he found four objectives in the Bill. I could find only three—they relate to the funding gap, the introduction of a market and social inclusion—apart from the other padding that has been thrown in to make the Bill look half-decent in size, detain us for another week and keep my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington and myself out of jam money.
Many of my hon. Friends and I object to two of those objectives: the fee increase and the introduction of the market. The Government's real intention is the basis of the amendment. The Bill is genuinely about putting a market in the education system through variable fees. That is sad, because the other two objectives then become questionable, as they damage the third, which is social inclusion—
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Skills (Mr. Ivan Lewis): Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Mudie: I shall finish this point, then I shall give way; I should never find my place again if I gave way in the middle of a sentence. The Bill damages social inclusion, whatever the Government say—I accept their absolute sincerity—and will never, in my estimation, improve the chances of making university attractive to the poorest kids. If that is the Government's objective, all I can say is, they have a strange way of going about it. If—
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