Examination of Witnesses (Questions 72
- 79)
WEDNESDAY 23 FEBRUARY 2005
DR JOHN
HOOD AND
SIR ALAN
WILSON
Q72 Chairman: Welcome to our proceedings.
Sir Alan, I have to ask you a question which has nothing to do
with today's events but runs out of an inquiry that we have just
finished and delivered the seal only last week and that was the
UK e-university. We were informed by witnesses that you were a
non-executive director of that organisation. The one thing that
we were very concerned and disturbed about, and the analysis of
what we thought went wrong will come out next week, was the high
level of bonus that was paid quite towards the end of the life
of the UK e-university when the chair, chief executive and others
were paid very high rates of bonus, some of them 40% of their
salary, when they only had 900 students. It seems very disturbing
to us that we were told that this was private sector good practice,
the non-executive directors had recommended it. You were one of
the non-executive directors. Do you feel it was justifiable to
give them 40%? After all, the chief executive is on £180,000
a year and he got £40,000 when he only had 900 students.
Sir Alan Wilson: I am not sure
of the timing of that. I am not sure that I was a non-executive
director at the time.
Q73 Chairman: You were but you did
not attend the meeting, I understand. Were you consulted even
though you were not at the meeting?
Sir Alan Wilson: I certainly do
not recall being consulted.
Q74 Chairman: I thought it fair to
remind you of that.
Sir Alan Wilson: If I overlapped
into that period, I have no memory of being consulted on that
and I have no memory of those figures.
Q75 Chairman: You would not have
been too keen on paying the 40%, would you?
Sir Alan Wilson: I do not think
it is for me to comment at this distance in time.
Q76 Chairman: Dr Hood, you are a
refreshing presidency at Oxford, are you not? After 900 years
of having an internal candidate, you arrive largely experienced
in New Zealand. Are you a new broom? Are you going to revolutionise
the very traditional University of Oxford?
Dr Hood: I am new; I am not sure
about a broom. As you would well appreciate, universities are
collegial communities so to the extent that they change it is
not one person who creates change. It is the collegial community
that creates the change.
Q77 Chairman: Would you like to say
anything to the Committee before we get started or do you want
to go straight into questions?
Dr Hood: I would be pleased to
make a few comments about top-up fees, bursaries and access. Oxford
University was very supportive of the move to top-up fees because
it knows only too well the sort of funding difficulties research
intensive universities have, particularly research intensive universities
that are teaching at the undergraduate level in a very intensive
way, as Oxford is, so that the costs of doing so far and away
exceed the current revenue stream to fund that quality of teaching.
The university acknowledges very clearly that it has a major responsibility
to do everything in its power to encourage access for all those
who have the talent and the potential to succeed at Oxford. It
supports top-up fees also acknowledging the responsibility the
university has to do everything in its power to put in place the
bursary support and the other support mechanisms to ensure all
those who have the talent and the potential to succeed at Oxford
can do so without any concern about their background, their circumstance
or anything else. I would like that to create the Oxford context
for you. I am personally very committed to the whole access arena.
I recognise the many difficulties that exist in this country with
respect to its social history and the like. The university has
an extraordinary array of outreach and access programmes in existence.
We are currently working with the Sutton Trust in Cambridge in
order to assess and understand the effectiveness of each of those
programmes so that we can, over the course of time, better direct
our investment to those that have the highest leverage in terms
of raising aspiration levels and raising understanding of the
accessibility of Oxford as an institution and so forth. I guess
there will be three principles in conclusion that I would leave
you with in this respect. First, no talented young person who
has the capability and potential to succeed should be put off
the idea of applying to come to the University of Oxford. Second,
we will do everything we can to reach out and raise those aspiration
levels and create the pathways so that young people can understand
the university and understand how to come to it. Third, we will
always reserve the right to make the selections on the basis of
talent and merit.
Sir Alan Wilson: The scheme which
is now being implemented for 2006-07 was the result of much debate
on variable fees and student support with particular reference
to widening participation and bursaries, the kind of agenda you
have just been discussing in the previous session. The department
is confident that, working with the Funding Council, the Student
Loan Company, universities and colleges, the scheme will work.
If there are any unintended consequences, we would do our best
to look at them but we are confident that the scheme will work.
I believe we have a very strong, diverse higher education sector.
I would like to see all universities and colleges in that sector
and all kinds of students, properly supported.
Q78 Chairman: Dr Hood, in terms of
the analysis that came out of Cambridge University and the figures
published this week in terms of where the undergraduate students
come from, they showed a very powerful influence of students from
London and the south east. If you took London, the south east
and overseas students, something like 58% of the students are
going to Cambridge University. Is Oxford similar?
Dr Hood: I cannot cite the statistics
for you and I would be reluctant to say yes without seeing the
precise statistics for Oxford.
Q79 Chairman: If they were comparable,
do you think that should be addressed by Oxford and Cambridge
Universities? As a Yorkshire Member of Parliament, only 5% of
applications came from the Yorkshire and Humber region, which
is a very big, populous region and they comprise 6% of entrants.
Does that concern you?
Dr Hood: Our objective has to
be each year to find the 3,300, at the moment, most talented youngsters
from throughout this country to come to our university. If we
can succeed over a period of time—and we are possibly talking
generation here—in raising that awareness throughout this
country about the accessibility of this university and Cambridge,
one hopes that our procedures will be such that the best will
come and the geographic statistics will be what they will be.
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