Examination of Witness (Questions 140-159)
BILL RAMMELL
MP
31 JANUARY 2007
Q140 Chairman: Australia keeps being
mentioned. We learnt a lot in Australia. Can I just make the point
to you, Minister, that when all select committees now travel we
do pay into off-set to do something about our impact on global
warming and climate change.
Bill Rammell: I take that point,
Chairman. My Australian counterpart has actually gone out of her
way to discuss Bologna with me, which I think is an indication
that this process is being viewed seriously and on a much wider
basis.
Q141 Chairman: That is really worrying
in terms of mission creep, is it not?
Bill Rammell: It is better than
discussing cricket!
Q142 Fiona Mactaggart: You are saying
to us that the anxiety which has been expressed to us, by quite
a large number of people who have given evidence, that the European
Commission is using this as a bit of a Trojan Horse to see whether
it can extend its competence is well-founded and that you are
firmly pushing back. I am glad to hear you are firmly pushing
back, but is it going to work? There have been previous examples
of Britain firmly pushing back and the mission creep resulting.
The Commission is still doing this review of the European Credit
Transfer System. Is it any business of theirs?
Bill Rammell: We do not have another
credit translation device in existence. I think arguably, as part
of this process, we should develop one, but that is the only show
in town at the moment. It is used by our institutions and ones
elsewhere, and it is about getting it into the right shape. I
actually think that, in terms of all the debates we have about
the European Union, we have a much better track record of pushing
back and asserting our national priorities than any of the coverage
in our newspapers would suggest. I do think, for example, on the
ECTS we have had particular concerns that, although it is moving
towards a system that recognises learning outcomes rather than
time served, there is still too much of an emphasis on time served.
I think, in some areas, it attempts to be too prescriptive and
regulatory in specifying credit systems where this is not a top
down approach and an individual country or a university does not
have to have of itself, even though I think there are arguments
that it is desirable, a credit system, and there is a particular
problem as well. They have recently published a user's guide which
gave credit levels for different qualifications including master's,
and it made a statement within that document that the maximum
credit that you could get for a one-year masters programme was
75 credits. Once you translate our master's programme into the
ECTS framework you come up with 90. If you are only going to give
a maximum of 75, that could create the impression (which I think
would be wholly erroneous) that our master's qualifications are
of less value than those elsewhere within the European Union.
We have pushed back very strongly on that issue. We have recognition
and a commitment from the Commission that they are going to look
at this again. They are doing that in the early part of this year,
they are consulting with Member States, and we will push as strongly
as possible. If we take that particular example, when we bear
in mind we have 18,000 European Union students undertaking the
one-year masters programme within this country, 62,000 non EU
overseas students undertaking a one-year master's programme, students
internationally are voting with their feet in favour of our qualifications
and we should not be constrained or under-represented by a framework
which misrepresents the picture. So, on those issues we do push
back strongly, and I think we will achieve results.
Q143 Fiona Mactaggart: In many ways
rightly, you focus there on the content of what the Commission
are doing, but I am still quite interested in the fact that they
are doing it and the process. Do you think that in the meeting
in May there should be a key priority of the role of the European
Commission in keeping it separate from the Bologna Process? Do
you think that that meeting can do something to achieve that and,
if so, what?
Bill Rammell: It could. Because
this is a bottom up approach, everything is possible. However,
since the beginning of this process, if you go back to the Sorbonne
Declaration in 1998 and then the Bologna Declaration in 1999,
the Commission has played a role; it has not played a role in
the follow-up group from the conference, which is about monitoring
what is being done across the European Union to implement the
principles that we are aspiring to. There are other areas where
there are interconnections between what the European Union does
and what the broader Europe does. For example, in terms of professional
qualifications, there are currently 15 directives that govern
professional qualifications and the readability across the European
Union. I think it is important that there is an interplay and
relationship between that process and what happens within the
broader Bologna Process. So I think there is a legitimate role
for the European Commission, but it has to be constrained and
it has to be circumscribed, and that is what we do on an on-going
basis. If you actually went round the country and talked to our
universities and said: "Do you see evidence of the European
Commission doing things in relation to your courses that they
should not be doing?", I am not sure you would get a lot
of feedback saying, "Yes, that is the case."
Q144 Fiona Mactaggart: It takes a
bit of time to feel that kind of feedback. One of the reasons
I am pushing at this is because of the differences that I have
seen in the evidence which we have had from the universities themselves.
Of course, we talk about a bottom up process. In Britain we do
have a bottom up system, whereas in most other European countries
the sector is not as autonomous and as independent as here, the
person who is doing your job is actually the top and the bottom
in much of the rest of Europe; but Universities UK specifically
disagreed with you about the Bologna Process being fundamentally
about responding to the Lisbon Agenda, and I wondered what you
thought about that?
Bill Rammell: I am sorry, I did
read the evidence, but can you remind me of specifically what
they said?
Q145 Fiona Mactaggart: When they
were asked if they agreed with the DfES that the Bologna Process
is fundamentally about responding to the Lisbon Agenda on competitiveness
and making European education world-class, they said, "No".
Bill Rammell: This is where I
run the risk of contradicting something we may have sent you in
writing. I would not use the words that Bologna is fundamentally
about implementing and achieving the Lisbon goals. I think it
is an important contribution, but I think this is much more important
and much wider than just the European Union. I think there is
a process of globalisation that is taking place within the world
of higher education that mirrors that which is happening elsewhere
in our society. Increasingly there are links with countries right
the way across the world at a higher education level, whether
it is Africa, whether it is Russia, whether it is India, whether
it is China. I think that can be a positive process, and I think
that by embracing the Bologna Framework we can place ourselves
in the strongest position to be able to do that. In the bargain,
I think this can make a contribution towards achieving the Lisbon
goals, but I would not use the words that this is fundamentally,
or by implication exclusively, achieving the Lisbon goals.
Q146 Fiona Mactaggart: What do you
think it fundamentally is about?
Bill Rammell: I think it is about
enabling a greater mobility of students and academics across that
wider European area, and it is about facilitating interaction
and movement between global higher education institutions. There
is a debate to be had about whether this would ultimately end
up as a global system. I think that is pushing it too far at this
stage. If you asked me really to project in the longer term forward,
at some stage I think you will have a global system of comparability
and compatibility across the world, but it is important that you
do not run before you can walk and we actually get this right,
and that is wider than just Europe. I made the point earlier,
we are talking about, after this conference, 46 countries compared
to 27 in the European Union.
Q147 Fiona Mactaggart: You have done
the opposite of what you did at the beginning. At the beginning
you were looking at the content of what this was trying to be
about and you have moved into the process. If you are talking
about what it is fundamentally about, and you have described the
process, what is the aim of that process? What would be better
as a result of that process?
Bill Rammell: What will be better
is that you will enable students and academics to interact and
travel to other institutions. In the process, I have a very strong
view that British students (and let us look at it from the British
perspective, because that is what we are responsible for) who
spend some time studying abroad develop skills and competences
in terms of self-reliance, language skills, appreciation of other
cultures that are very beneficial in the increasingly globalised
jobs market. I think it will enable a mobility of labour to take
place that has an economic benefit and, crucially, it will ensure
that we maintain a very competitive position, which is what we
have at the moment, in terms of attracting overseas students.
We have fought very strongly, particularly through the Prime Minister's
Initiative, to get to a situation where we are second only as
a destination for overseas students to the United States. It is
getting much more competitive out there. The Australians, the
Canadians, the New Zealanders are, rightly, promoting their systems
of education; we have got English language delivery elsewhere
in the European Union; we need to ensure we have a global system
that enables us effectively to compete.
Q148 Chairman: I am getting more
and more worried. There is all this talk about globalisation.
One thing about UK higher education is that we are a totally different
edition; we are unique. Not only unique, certainly in terms of
the rest of Europe, we have institutions that are proud of their
independence. There really are some very independent strands.
We have a system of incomes, which many of us celebrate, that
the more independent an income a university can have away from
the Department the better, and that is from someone who has supported
variable fees. The tradition of independence is very important,
and it is totally different to so many other countries in the
mainland part of Europe. Long-term that is worrying, is it not?
The long-term shift may gradually give you more power over universities.
That is horrific, is it not? I do not mean you personally, I mean
the Government. We do not want to be a centralist government.
Governments interfere too much in universities as it is. We do
not want to get like rest of the world, do we?
Bill Rammell: No, we do not, and
although in my more frustrated moments sometimes you look at systems
elsewhere and you think, "Would that be attractive?",
actually much more on balance, no, it would not be. I think our
system has got real merits and advantages, and I think if you
look at the evidence rather than the speculation around this process,
actually the broader Europe has been moving towards our system
of higher education.
Q149 Chairman: At the same time,
Minister, you are describing this as long-term. The unintended
consequences of political and social action are sometimes the
ones that really count long-term. What you do not even predict,
or we do not predict now, might actually be the result. I think,
in a sense, some of the stuff that is coming out in the evidence
is an arrogance that, "They are all going to be like us."
Some of us fear, from the evidence that we have taken, that there
will be a kind of slow movement to be more like them.
Bill Rammell: The process of globalisation,
not only in higher education, is a reality, it is happening. My
view is that it is a bit like trying to push water back up hill.
You have got to embrace it; you have got to try and influence
it to the benefit of the people that you represent.
Q150 Chairman: But there is no sign
of European universities becoming more like our universities in
their independence. When you go to these meetings it is all governments
talking to us. We are the unusual ones because you go along with
Universities UK?
Bill Rammell: Two things. Firstly,
as I go round the European Union discussing this with my counterparts
(and I do not want to over-state it), there is a degree of strong
support for our model, even if it is said behind closed doors
sometimes. Sometimes it is said overtly, sometimes it is said
behind closed doors. Secondly, look at the evidence of what is
happening. This is a process where the Bologna Declaration explicitly
makes clear that this has to respect university autonomy; that
it has to be bottom up. If you look at the Bologna Framework,
it is based explicitly on learning outcomes, not on time served.
There are a number of different ways. If you look at the three-cycle
situation, whether that is national arrogance or not, and I am
not instinctively nationally arrogant, if you look objectively
at the way we manage our affairs within our universities, the
Bologna Framework, in terms of the principles it has established,
is moving towards our situation rather than the historic European
situation.
Chairman: We are going to move on and
look at the purpose and broader impact of Bologna. It sounds like
we have been talking about that all the time. Gordon is going
to lead us.
Q151 Mr Marsden: Minister, in the
written memorandum your Department gave us you said, "Bologna
is not intended to lead to standardisation or greater uniformity
of HE provision across Europe. It is more a framework designed
to ensure highest levels of quality, consistency and coherence."
So why do you think Lord May, who after all is a very significant
figure in the higher education community (scientific adviser to
previous governments, et cetera) said it would be not easy to
achieve that level of consistency and coherence without it leading
to standardisation or greater uniformity?
Bill Rammell: I have got the highest
regard for Lord May's academic credentials, but I think I am right
in saying, from reading his evidence, he queried at the beginning
why you had invited him.
Q152 Mr Marsden: I think that was
academic modesty.
Bill Rammell: Okay. When you are
reading it off the page it sometimes comes across differently.
I think, again, you have to look at the evidence of what has actually
taken place under this process. Let us look at what has actually
changed as a result of Bologna? (1) More than half of countries
have developed quality assurance structures and put them in place,
something that we believe very strongly in this country. I do
not think that is a process of standardisation. (2) The two-cycle
degree system. 55% had the system in place on a wide scale, 21%
in a more limit capacity. Again, I do not think that is standardisation;
it is simply putting your system of higher education into an internationally
recognisable format which, by the way, happens to mirror the practice
that we have always had here. The great majority have ratified
the Lisbon mutual recognition convention which is manifestly in
the interests of every institution, and it is about recognition,
it is not about standardisation. The Diploma Supplement is simply
a descriptor of your qualification; it is not saying that the
Diploma Supplement has to specify what is within that qualification.
If you look at the tangible changes that have taken place, they
are about comparability and compatibility, they are not about
standardisation. Whilst we constantly have to monitor this process,
in all the discussions I have, particularly with UUK, we do believe
that we are making progress and ensuring that we get the benefits
out of this.
Q153 Mr Marsden: So you think we
in Britain, your Department, Universities UK and other players,
are doing enough to stop this framework becoming a straightjacket?
Bill Rammell: I think we are,
but we constantly need to monitor that process. My experience,
having been in this job for almost two years—I was at the
last conference in Bergen and, having sat through a few European
Councils, it was probably more challenging and frustrating than
a European Council when you are dealing with that number of countries.
Nevertheless, because we keep at this, because we watch the detail,
I do not believe it is becoming a straightjacket.
Q154 Mr Marsden: Without being complacent,
we have given ourselves a few pats on the back there as a country.
Let us take ourselves out of that position and perhaps look at
it from the point of view of other people who may be turning up
in May in London and let us ask ourselves about what we do about
credit transfer. Here we are talking about the importance of ECTS.
What do we do about credit transfer? We have just had the Burgess
Report, which has obviously made a number of recommendations towards
progressing towards it, but it did not even look at compatibility
with the ECTS. How are you going to convince your fellow education
ministers in May that we should be taken as an authority in this
area when we have not even engaged with ECTS?
Bill Rammell: In a sense, we cannot
have this both ways. The critique comes from one point of view
that this cannot be about standardisation and then, in the next
breath, hold on a minute, you are not actually moving to standardisation.
If you look at what the declaration actually says, and I think
this was first featured in the Berlin Declaration and then was
reinforced in Bergen, it expresses a desirability to move towards
a system of credit transfer, it does not stipulate it, and probably
it does not stipulate it because it cannot and it should not stipulate
it because that is a matter for national discussion. However,
if you asked me: "Do we want in this country to move towards
a better system of credit accumulation and transfer?", my
answer to that is, "Yes", and I welcome the progress.
It might be described as faltering progress, but I think it is
a movement in the right direction that the Burgess Group has undertaken.
For the first time in many, many years we now have a timetable
and a framework of how we can get to a system of credit transfer.
Chairman: You are not answering the question.
You are not answering the Burgess point.
Q155 Mr Marsden: I accept all of
that and, for what it is worth and for the record, I share your
enthusiasm for that development of the UK system, but the point
I am making is a negotiating point. Should not the Burgess Report
have given you a little bit more ammunition to go to the conference
in May by at least examining whether ECTS is feasible, working
or what our contribution to it should be? Otherwise, someone once
talked about socialism in one country, we are talking about credit
accumulation in one country, are we not?
Bill Rammell: Forgive me, I was
not deliberately trying to avoid the question. This has been a
difficult process for higher education institutions in this country.
I think some progress has been made, but I think there is an argument
that, as this develops, there does need to be a link into a wider
European credit transfer system, and I would hope that that is
picked up and addressed by the Burgess Process.
Q156 Mr Marsden: So accepting that
you are not a Stalinist education minister and would not wish
to be so, what oomph can you give between now and May and subsequent
to May to universities in this country to say: "How do we
improve our own act? How do we improve our own credit accumulation?",
so that when we go to the rest of Europe and the rest of the world
and say, "Our way of doing this is slightly better than the
ECTS", we have got a little bit of beef to back it up with?
Bill Rammell: I am reminded that
the Burgess Report does specifically say that the credit system
should be compatible with the ECTS, and I think that is welcome.
I think it is both important to reinforce that but also, at the
same time, I set out some of the limitations that I think surround
the current ECTS at the moment, and it is a bit chicken and egg.
Yes, we need to ensure that the system we develop in this country
is compatible with the ECTS, but we need changes in the ECTS as
well.
Q157 Mr Marsden: I appreciate that
and I hope you will make that point, not least to the Burgess
Group, next time you see them. Can I ask you about what you said
earlier about globalisation and mobility? I agree with you in
terms of that overall agenda, but the fact of the matter is that
in terms of UK students there has been a very significant decline
in the number studying in Europe. Are we doing enough to look
at whether the present initiatives to get UK students overseas
(Erasmus and Socrates) are actually working. When we had people
here from the universities before, they admitted, I think, that
there had not been a comprehensive assessment as to how successful
Erasmus and Socrates had been in achieving the sorts of aims you
have described.
Bill Rammell: Two things. Before
I come on to actually say I agree with you, there is a real concern
about the downturn in numbers of British students participating
in Erasmus. Firstly, there has been research on the benefits of
Erasmus. 90% of the participants, and this is across the European
Union, actually rate the experience as very high or of high quality.
Q158 Mr Marsden: That is across Europe,
not in the UK?
Bill Rammell: Yes, but it covers
students within the UK as well. There is also evidence of getting
you into a job quicker. There is more recent Australian research
underlining the benefits of international student mobility. However,
I do think we have an issue in the UK. I have been conducting
a series of meetings with Vice Chancellors and I am shortly going
to be publishing some proposals about how we try to do more to
incentivise British students travelling overseas, both within
Erasmus and more broadly. Partly it is about language competence,
partly it is about demonstrating that the experience that you
get whilst you are abroad is a quality one, and I think, if we
are honest, that is not always the case, partly it is about recognition
within your home institution, that it actually contributes towards
the qualification you have got, and partly it is about mobility
of student financial support. Those are all areas that I am looking
at.
Q159 Mr Marsden: That is well put.
Can I ask one final supplementary on that. Again, accepting that
you do not want to be top down, is it enough simply to rely on
the current system of bilateral agreements between universities
and is not the danger, as we move more into the Bologna agenda,
that universities in this country find themselves in perhaps an
unequal situation because they are effectively, in some cases,
negotiating with national governments and that produces all sorts
of discrepancies? It is not necessarily like with like.
Bill Rammell: That is an argument.
For example, where we get particular problems, and let us talk
about the Greek experience as an example where there is some resistance
towards the recognition of our higher education qualifications,
we do not have institutions going in on their own to bat with
the Greek authorities, we are there with them. I have met my Greek
counterpart, Alan Johnson has discussed it with his counterpart,
the embassies are involved, we do push very strongly, but I do
not think that is an argument for saying we can take over the
process.
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