Examination of Witnesses (Questions 480-499)
BRITISH COUNCIL
25 APRIL 2006
Q480 Mr Binley: I am delighted because
that establishes what I hoped we would establish, which is there
is opportunity. What I now want to talk about is how we exploit
that opportunity. It seems to me, having listened for only part
of the presentation we heard earlier, that there is an elitism
and an arrogance about further education in this country, which
seems to suggest that they are above and beyond competing and
that they are certainly above and beyond marketing. I, as a businessman
all my life, was horrified, quite frankly, by some of the answers
I heard in this respect. What can we do to kick academia up its
backside, quite frankly, get it off it, get it out there and get
it selling?
Ms Stephens: I am not sure I am
the person to ask. One of our major partnerships is with UK Higher
Education. I was not here for a lot of the previous session, but
I do have to say that I think it is a very diverse community and
I hope it is not all arrogance. When you look at the intervention
in China, which Nottingham has made, and so on, we can see lots
of examples where there is dynamism, there is innovation, there
are entrepreneurial approaches. I think that by and large we find
that the universities that come regularly through our education
fairs twice a year to India do so in a very good spirit of openness,
they are very keen to be culturally sensitive; they are ready
to take up opportunities and discussions, and I would not want
to characterise the whole sector in that way.
Mr Binley: Just most of them?
Q481 Mrs Curtis-Thomas: One of the
great things about going to Bangalore is that they have 150 engineering
students, which was marvellous for an engineer to find themselves
amongst so many people of similar minds. We were told that there
was more than enough engineering capacity both in the short term,
medium term and the long term to fill the acute shortages gaps
that we are going to experience in this country in the next 10
to 20 years—music to my ears. But at the same time we are
also told that the ICT sector was facing a shortage of suitable
recruits. So we have two situations, two statements there: overabundance
and undersupply. So which of those is true? Do you know?
Ms Stephens: I do not know. Is
it that they see some difference between the two categories? That
they do not see a link between the engineering group and the ICT
group? Is it that they are seeing a different skills base there
in some way?
Q482 Mrs Curtis-Thomas: I do not
know, that is why I am asking you the question.
Ms Stephens: Sorry. I am not sure
I do either.
Q483 Chairman: Can I ask you to give
an assessment, if you can, of what you think the quality of Indian
engineering graduates actually is? The figure is that there are
more engineering graduates every year, significantly more, leaving
Indian institutions and work, on the whole, in the call centre
sector in India. But if you press Indians they quite often say
that the quality at the lower end is actually not that high.
Ms Stephens: I would absolutely
agree with that. I think there is a huge variation in quality
in general, and I think in engineering in particular; actually
even more so in the whole MBA area where commerce graduates are
two a penny and really, I am afraid, not very bright and not very
good, in my experience, in most of the universities. I think when
you are coming to the top universities—and again obviously
the IITs—then certainly with the IITs you are talking about
world class, as we can see from the brain drain from India that
goes from those institutions.
Q484 Mr Clapham: Can I explore why
perhaps we are doing less well than we really ought to be? One
of the views that have been put forward is that it is because
British companies and institutions do not really obtain local
knowledge, that they believe that because customs and practices
are very similar to this country that they do not need to acquire
local knowledge. Is that your view with regard to the education
sector and, if it is, are you working to try and address that?
Ms Stephens: Yes. Is there a false
friend factor, I guess. I do not think there is any more. As I
said before, I think any complacency that we might have had was
thoroughly knocked out of us by the fact that everybody was turning
towards the USA at a certain point and we were losing ground.
We have managed to change that. There is a strong demand from
excellent sectors of higher education in India to have more contact
with the UK. So I believe that there is an issue of resource and
capacity and I believe that there is an issue of the UK in some
way marshalling it. It is probably what you are about really,
it is about having some sort of strategy to say, "We really
want to do this, and we really want to go there." I have
been working now for about 12 months, I suppose, on the setting
up of the UK Indian Education Research Initiative, from its very
beginning with cross-Whitehall meetings. I do not always find
cross-Whitehall meetings to be the most productive meetings that
I go to but I was really thrilled at the passion and the speed
with which this initiative came together because I think everybody
recognised that we had to do something because we were falling
behind. I think if Whitehall can do it I would imagine that industry
can do it and higher education can do it. I think we need to in
some way have a more coordinated and concerted approach to this
so that right across the spectrum: if you are talking about the
visa regulations, you are talking about the schools' work, you
are talking about the higher education, the work opportunities,
the R&D and all the rest of it, there is some sort of a linkage.
I think the Australians are better at that than we are, to be
honest.
Q485 Mr Clapham: Just developing
that question, do you feel that there is a need for a much more,
shall we say, coherent approach between the various agencies that
are working, yourself for example, Regional Development Agencies,
UKTI? Is there a way in which we could ensure that there is that
coherence and that we are pulling together rather than each particular
institution going its own way?
Ms Stephens: I completely agree
with that. I think that has been the strength of this initiative.
It has all those bodies you have just mentioned and more within
it and has worked out mechanisms for the parties to really come
together and make decisions quite quickly and quite flexibly,
while still remaining responsible for the resources they are putting
in. So they have a lot of ownership of where it goes. So I agree
actually, I think Lord Patten said that one initiative of £10
million is not really going to get us very far and I would agree
with that, but I think the way in which this has happened and
the fact that it demonstrates that you can have that coordination,
and over a fairly short timespan if there is the will and bit
of money to kick it off, why can it not happen on a large scale?
I believe it could.
Q486 Mr Clapham: I think you were
in when we were taking evidence about the actual setting up of
British university campuses in India and you heard the views that
were expressed. Would you agree with those: the view that if we
were to see university campuses in India we are likely to see
a fall in standards over a period. Is that your view?
Ms Stephens: I do not really feel
qualified to answer that. I do not know; I would not know how
to answer that. I was not quite sure I heard that actually, to
be honest. I think what I did hear was that there was a resource
crunch and in those circumstances you have to be pretty careful
about where you disperse your funding. I think actually it is
much more about whether there is a viable demand and a real wish
to do so, and then the mechanisms follow.
Mr Clapham: Finally, I hear what you
say but you said a little earlier that we are catching the Australians
up a little but yet the Australians and the Americans are given
to establishing university campuses, something that we are not
doing.
Q487 Chairman: Actually we did hear
from Lord Patten that the good American universities were not
doing that because of fear of risk of polluting the brand, but
the factual situation needs to be clarified.
Ms Stephens: I would just like
to say that we have done this in the UK, very successfully. We
were world leaders at establishing overseas campuses in Malaysia
and in China—we are doing it—because in that environment
it is the right thing to do, and I do have some sympathy with
us not doing it in India in the recent past because I do know
from having worked there up until 2000, which I know is a while
ago now, that the situation under the previous government, before
Congress came in, was that you could not even begin to think about
that, it was just impossible. I think we are perhaps being a bit
slow to understand that the situation has changed. I do not think
that India is articulating very clearly that it wants foreign
campuses; they are being very clear that they want some joint
ventures. Actually if you look at some of the things we are doing
in China they are in a sense that: they are joint ventures, they
are partnerships. Coming from the British Council I would, would
I not, but I do believe that partnership is the issue here: it
is the way forward rather than trying to set up wholly owned campuses.
Q488 Mr Binley: One of the reasons
given to us that we are not as attractive to Indian students as
we perhaps ought to be is the visa restriction question, which
constrains the ability, you will appreciate, of Indian students
to remain in this country. Can I ask you very quickly to tell
us what the current rules are for Indian students wishing to stay
to work once their studies are completed and what plans do you
think the government has to introduce a new visa initiative for
Indian students, such as the Fresh Talent Initiative in Scotland?
Finally, can you tell me whether you think changing whole aspects
of other work permit scenarios on to a wider basis would help
in this respect?
Ms Stephens: At the moment I think
the situation is that apart from Fresh Talent there are few other
schemes. There is the Science and Engineering Graduate Scheme,
that is a year allowed to certain maths, science, engineering
and technology graduate after they have finished to carry on working
in this country.
Q489 Chairman: That is an undergraduate
becoming a graduate, for a first degree?
Ms Stephens: Yes, I guess so.
Mrs Curtis-Thomas: For post-degree completion.
Q490 Chairman: On graduation.
Ms Stephens: Yes, you know more
about this than I do. Then there is obviously the Highly Skilled
Migrant Programme, which does give a further route to students
with exceptional ability or particular ability of the kind that
we need in this country. There is also something I believe called
the MBA Scheme—I do not know if you are familiar with that—it
is the graduates of 50 listed management schools. So there are
pockets, if you like, apart from the Fresh Talent Scheme, which
is more general. I know that the Fresh Talent Scheme has been
looked at very carefully as a model. My only knowledge of where
things are going is actually the Chancellor's statement in December
about all Masters Degree and PhD course students will be allowed
to stay on for a further 12 months after 1 May of this year. I
do not think that has actually come into effect yet and the starting
date of that seems unclear from what I have read. But that is
really the only other indication I have.
Q491 Mr Binley: Can I push this a
little because I think you are right? Do you think that we ought
to be talking about a more general view, of a more structured
work permit scenario, as a whole and, if we did that, would that
help this as opposed to specifically attend to the student problem?
Ms Stephens: I think the points
system does look as if it is going to do that as far as I can
understand it. It does seem much more structured and the whole
sponsorship notion would seem to provide that. That is my perception.
Q492 Chairman: I just want to push
this a little because, as I recall, your colleagues in Delhi,
when we were informally talking, attached great importance to
this issue and you seem not to be giving it so much importance
to your evidence now. You heard Dr Maini earlier saying that three
or four years were needed; in Scotland they are offering two;
the Prime Minister is offering one but that is a fraction of what
the HE Institutions think they need to be able to make it affordable
for Indians to be able to come to the UK.
Ms Stephens: I would take my colleagues'
view of this from an Indian perspective. I feel that there are
a lot of other initiatives we could make, as perhaps I said earlier,
in terms of preparing the groups of students that we most particularly
want to see in this country. I am slightly averse to feeling that
we need a very, very broad regime because, to be honest, there
are just so many potential students in a place like India who
we would not necessarily want to have come to the UK in enormous
numbers. If we see it simply as a fee paying money earner then
I suppose that is not the case, we would want anybody to come
who could come, but I think there is an issue here about the capacity
of our institutions and the areas in which we perhaps want to
strengthen our ties with India.
Q493 Chairman: Can I go back to my
first question because I asked you a question about numbers, which
you did not actually answer, and we are concerned as a Committee
that Australia is getting more Indian students than we are and
therefore building a strategic relationship with emerging elite
in India which will be one of the world's super powers in the
future. It is not about making money for HE Institutions, it is
about the future of the United Kingdom in terms with its relationship
with the country it ought to have a phenomenally close relationship
with. So I repeat the question about numbers. You have suggested
that there is a capacity in what we can absorb, which I entirely
accept. I think we are below that capacity at present, that is
my view. Where should we be aiming for?
Ms Stephens: I apologise for not
answering about the numbers earlier. I would like to make it quite
clear that actually we are not below Australia, we are above Australia
in the number of students coming to the UK.
Q494 Chairman: Not proportionately.
Ms Stephens: It depends whether
you are looking at the number of students who are applying to
come in a year or whether you are looking at the number in the
country, and the difference is that we have one-year Masters programmes
in this country and in Australia they tend to be longer, and even
our undergraduate programmes tend to be shorter and look like
they may be even shorter still. This is part of our competitive
advantage because obviously it is cheaper to come for a shorter
period, but what it means is if you look at any one period of
time there will be more students in Australia because you have,
in a sense, two intakes there at the same time. But if you look
at the number of visas that are being applied for we have more
visa applications from India for students than Australia. I can
give you precise numbers.
Q495 Chairman: The figures we have
for 2004-05: 17,000 for the UK, 20,000 Australia and 80,000 in
the USA. Therefore the 17,000 figure for the UK is actually better
than it looks.
Ms Stephens: That is right. Sorry,
I have it here now. The UK recruited 16,277 new students in 2005-06
in comparison to 80,653 for the US and 10,000 for Australia. The
difference is that students tend to follow two to four-year degrees
in the USA and Australia, whereas the majority of the UK-bound
students are on a one year's Masters course and so, as you have
just said, the actual number of students present at any one time
does not reflect, in a sense, the demand, the turnover. The percentage
of undergraduates in the UK batch is increasing, so that might
iron out some of this in the future: we will see more longer staying
students here.
Q496 Chairman: My view is that it
is the undergraduates you need as well as the postgraduates.
Ms Stephens: I agree.
Q497 Chairman: Because the strong
links that Britain enjoys with India are born, as Chris Patten
said, of the ancient background of the Indian elite at present
who have done the undergraduate courses at Oxford and Cambridge
or the London School of Economics, or wherever it was, and that
is numerically quite small at present.
Ms Stephens: We are trying very
hard to get that number up. We are focusing on it and one of our
strategies is to work with leading schools, as I think I said
earlier, because that is the feeder group that goes into the undergraduate
group that can afford to study overseas.
Q498 Chairman: That is precisely
the group that will have three years of fees, three years of living
expenses and therefore need to be able to work here afterwards
to repay the costs of their course.
Ms Stephens: Yes, I agree.
Q499 Chairman: You did not agree
earlier, you were saying it was not very important earlier.
Ms Stephens: I think what I was
trying to say earlier was at a more general level, looking into
the future. I was asked whether I was in favour of the very wide
work regime and I was taking that as something that was a general
question, and I would say that if you make it too wide you do
run the danger, possibly, as income levels grow, of finding that
you might not have quite the catchment that would most grow the
kinds of trade and industry links that perhaps we would want to
see. If you are talking about at the moment do I think we should
immediately be moving towards something like the Scottish Initiative,
absolutely; I would completely agree with my colleagues. That
would make a big difference.
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