Official Report 256KB pdf
Student Fees (Specification) (Scotland) Order 2006 (draft)
Welcome to the seventh meeting in 2006 of the Enterprise and Culture Committee. I have received no apologies. I remind everybody to switch off their mobiles.
Please do.
It should be compulsory.
Absolutely. I will explain the background to the Student Fees (Specification) (Scotland) Order 2006. Last year, we passed the Further and Higher Education (Scotland) Act 2005, which included provision for the introduction of fees, particularly for medical students. We gave an undertaking, to which the Executive agreed, that any statutory instrument made under that act would be introduced under the affirmative procedure to provide the opportunity for anyone to come to the committee and give evidence.
I thank the committee very much for inviting us here today. It is important that we have this opportunity to put our views across so that you can make recommendations to the minister.
Will you tell us for the record what the current fees are?
The information is somewhere in our submission. That should have been a nice easy question to start with.
The current fee level is around £1,200. Fees were introduced at a rate of £1,000, but the level has increased a bit with inflation over the past four years.
And for medical students?
The fees are the same for medical students—all tuition fees are currently the same.
Okay. I just wanted to get that on the record, to ensure that anyone who reads the Official Report of our meetings—I am sure that many do—can see what the increase will be.
Not at the moment. I will let James Alexander lead for the most part.
I seek information on the discussions about the proposals. Many members are aware that the NUS and individual students associations have raised issues and concerns about the matter—the Edinburgh University Students Association has been in touch with me. What representations have you made directly to the Executive and what response have you had?
We made a formal written submission to the consultation on the proposals—it is written into the Further and Higher Education (Scotland) Act 2005 that we must be consulted. We have also had contact with ministers, including the Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning, on the issue.
We meet the minister every six months. During the passage of the Further and Higher Education (Scotland) Bill, on the two occasions that we met the minister and his predecessor, we raised the issue formally. We have also raised it informally at every opportunity that we have had.
I welcome the evidence that you have submitted, as I lobbied for the NUS to be a statutory consultee on the issue. Although I do not agree with the evidence, it is helpful for the committee. I have three questions. First, you argue that, after the changes, students from England will find it more expensive to study in Scotland than to stay in England. However, if they went straight into second year, as I did at the University of Aberdeen, I presume that that difference would not be maintained.
I understand that point and I will come to it, but I want to explain to the other committee members why we consider that the proposals will make it more expensive for students to study in Scotland than to stay in England. Table A in our submission compares the loans that students will require if they study in England with the loans that will be needed if they study in Scotland under the proposed £1,700 fee structure. For a four-year degree in Scotland, the loan for the fees added to the loan for four years of student support at the maximum rate of £3,190 will give a total of £19,560. That is the debt that students from England will get into if they study in Scotland under the proposed system. If they stay in the rest of the UK at a university that charges the maximum possible under the top-up fee system, that loan added to the loan for three years of student support will give a total of £18,570.
Thank you very much, James. I have always said that that is true.
The vast majority of students cannot go directly into second year and will find that it costs more to come to Scotland than to stay in England. Therefore, the main reason that the Executive gives to justify the proposed increase in fees does not hold. The fee level is set too high for students who come from England to do a four-year degree.
My contention remains, but I want to move on. Your submission also makes the point that there has not been a big increase in the number of applications from students from England to study medicine. However, if I recall correctly, last year, there was a big increase. My argument is that we cannot plan ahead on the basis of this year's figures. Indeed, surely the measure needs to be pre-emptive to do what it is designed to do, which is to ensure that the cross-border flow is not excessive.
I do not agree. This year there was a drop in the number of applications—
I acknowledged that.
At the same time that there was a drop of 6.5 per cent in the number of applications that were made by people in England to study medicine in Scotland, there was an increase of 12 per cent in the number of applications from Scots to stay in Scotland to study medicine. The previous year's increase, to which Richard Baker referred, was an increase of 5.5 per cent. That means that over the past two years, there has been a 1 per cent drop in the number of people who have come from England to study medicine in Scotland.
I certainly think that we must continue to gather evidence, but I do not believe that the statistics prove that the opposite of the Executive's contention is true.
As I said in my answer to the previous question, there is no statistical evidence to show that the introduction of top-up fees in England has caused a problem with cross-border flows. The best way to guarantee that as many students from Scotland as possible go to Scottish universities is to enhance and promote the widening access programme that the Executive has pushed over the past few years. However, medicine is the subject on which the record on widening access is worst. Only 10 per cent of the students who study medicine in Scotland come from working-class backgrounds. The tragedy is that while the Executive considers a non-existent problem with cross-borders flows, the task of widening access and getting more Scottish students from working-class backgrounds into medicine seems to be getting left to one side.
My fear is that if we did not make the proposed changes, less than 10 per cent of medical students would come from working-class backgrounds.
I am not sure that I should intrude on what it is clear is a family dispute among members of the NUS. I should declare an interest because my entry in the register of members' interests refers to the fact that I am an external member of the board of management of Dundee University Students Association.
Absolutely. One of our key arguments is that there is no evidence to suggest that students are coming up to Scotland in large numbers. You are right to say that the table indicates the exact opposite. That has been a key part of our discussions with ministers. However, it appears from the order that we are discussing today that they have not taken the points that we made on board. Had they done so, we would have hoped for at least a deferment of the fee proposals until statistics had been gathered. Our ideal position is that there should be no fee.
The Executive has not disputed the figures. Have you received a response from it indicating why, notwithstanding the figures, it is determined to press ahead with the increase in fees for medical students?
The minister's position is that one year does not make a trend. Everyone in the room is likely to agree. However, our position is that, even if the figure for the previous year is included, there has been a drop of 1 per cent overall. That shows the beginnings of a trend. I am not a qualified statistician, so I do not know how far back or forward we need to go in order to have a trend. We have a difference of opinion with the minister on that issue.
That is helpful.
It is fair to say that we seek to recognise trends. We would be inclined to have a full and frank debate once statistics are available and trends can be identified, which is currently not the case.
So the answer is yes.
Yes.
In your response to Richard Baker's question, you talked about the widening access initiative and seemed to suggest that nothing was happening, especially in medicine. Is that a fair representation of the situation as you understand it?
We did not say that nothing is happening. However, the figures for students who are currently in medical education indicate that only 10 per cent are from working-class backgrounds.
Is it fair to say that the pilot scheme to increase access to medicine for students from poorer backgrounds that is running in parts of Glasgow may in a couple of years' time result in more folk from such backgrounds entering medical education? Is it too early to say whether there is a trend?
I am glad that you have raised the issue. The Calman report, which appeared recently, examined many issues surrounding medical education in Scotland. The report contained many recommendations, many of which were recently implemented by the Minister for Health and Community Care. Among them was a recommendation that relates to widening access and ensuring that more students from working-class backgrounds in Scotland are able to enter medical education.
Do you agree that it is equally valid to say that, as well as implementing the widening access initiatives, the Executive should put in place steps now to protect to an extent places in medical schools in Scotland for students from Scotland?
I do not agree. As I have said several times, there is no evidence that those places need to be protected or that there is a huge mass of students coming to Scotland. We are investigating a long-term problem. We need to consider statistics over a long period and wait a couple of years to see the results of the initiatives.
When you looked at the relative numbers of students in Scotland going into second year, did you take account of the number of students who come under the two plus two arrangement, whereby after completing two years at a further education college they can start in second year—or even a later year—at university?
NUS Scotland campaigned for that system prior to the work of the Dearing and Garrick committees in 1996 to 1997. We have considered the issue in the round, but we have always argued for greater articulation schemes. I am not convinced that the figures to which you refer would add up in terms of protecting places.
I mentioned them in the context of the value of the final amount of loan repayment, which you set out in table A in your submission.
Will you expand on that a bit, please?
I recall that when we asked the Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning—in either the Subordinate Legislation Committee or this committee—why ministers were taking this step, he said that it was an improvement on previous practice, whereby there was no consultation with Parliament when fees increased; they were just increased.
You are talking about the powers under previous acts. As I understand it, ministers had the powers to set fees under the Further and Higher Education (Scotland) Act 1992. Our position is that we are against fees, as we say later in the submission, so we sometimes have the luxury of ignoring more practical, pragmatic facts.
We are going to discuss the Bankruptcy and Diligence etc (Scotland) Bill later and we have just published the report on our business growth inquiry. Are you concerned that the imposition of the fees will act as a disincentive for students to take university courses? I do not suppose that you can comment on this, but I am particularly concerned that the fees will act as a disincentive for students to enter further education.
The strongest argument against tuition fees—and certainly against variable fees—is that they act as a strong disincentive. Research commissioned by the Executive in phase 3 of its higher education review showed that the most debt-averse students are those from the poorest backgrounds. We are trying to get as many students from those backgrounds into education as possible, but lumbering them with tens of thousands of pounds of debt is certainly not the correct way to do it. They will be put off courses that are more expensive and which will lumber them with even more debt and might take a cheaper course. We will end up with a scenario where prospective students cannot do the course of their dreams because they are scared of getting into debt, so they settle for not going into higher education at all or for taking a cheaper course.
I gather that the Cubie report set the threshold income level for the repayment of loans at £25,000. I assume that you believe that that is the way forward. I am concerned at the level of debt that students are having to take on. One way round the issue would be for the threshold to be raised. That might ease the situation.
We regard £25,000 as the income level at which students can be said to have benefited financially from their university course. An additional part of our campaigning work is to campaign for the threshold to be raised. However, raising the threshold is not enough. Even with a higher threshold, students—certainly those from the poorest backgrounds—will continue to feel that the mountain of debt that they will get into is a disincentive to going to university.
I have a question for the NUS witnesses on the process and timescales.
I believe so.
The committee has to address three questions in this regard: first, whether variable fee increases should be implemented; secondly, if they are to go ahead, whether a decision to implement them immediately is premature; and, thirdly, whether implementation should differentiate between medical and ordinary fees. Do you agree with the statement that a university principal made recently on the subject of preventing fee refugees from coming to Scotland? That principal said that if acceptances to universities are in line with the applications for entry that have been made so far, the number of fee refugees from England will not be enough to fill a bus.
The applications data for this year show that the number of English students who have chosen to apply to come to Scotland, so to speak, is not different from the number that we saw last year. The trend for the past five or six years is for figures to stay much the same. Top-up fees will begin for the first time this year, of course.
In our questioning of the minister, we will address the fact that, at the time that it did its original consultation, the Executive did not have available to it the most recent figures. It talks of the need for a disincentive to stop the cross-border flood of English students into Scotland. However, last year's acceptance and this year's application figures make it clear that the position is stable. Does that mean that there is no need for the Executive to rush into implementing this measure?
Yes. We are concerned that the Executive will implement it as a knee-jerk reaction to something that it only perceives to be a problem. As the member says, the applications data do not indicate that there is a problem.
Even if we agreed with the Executive—I do not—that it should introduce this measure, we need only look at applications that have been made to the medical schools to see that applications are down by 6 per cent even without the disincentive having been put in place. Is that what the UCAS figures show?
That is what they show.
Finally, the former Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning told us that one of the reasons why the Executive wanted to increase fees was to make funding available to support Scottish students who want to study in England. Obviously, those students are subject to the top-up fees. However, this year, the number of Scottish students applying to English colleges has gone down by 3.5 per cent, which will mean less of a cost to the Executive. If that remains one of the reasons why the Executive feels that it must increase fees now instead of waiting to find out what the trends are, where should that funding come from?
Certainly not from English students who come to study in Scotland. They should not be made to subsidise Scottish students going the other way.
As there are no other questions, I thank the witnesses for their evidence.
I might be in a minority of one on this, but I will make my case anyway. I have to say that I was not particularly convinced by the National Union of Students Scotland's evidence on the general fee level, because I feel that some issues have still not been properly addressed.
I certainly support the suggestion that the increase should be delayed for a year. It seems grossly unfair to introduce such a measure so quickly, because it will negatively impact on students who might not have been aware of the increase when they applied for their courses. At the very least, implementation should be delayed for a year.
Do you mean for medical students or for all students?
I mean for all students: after all, the order will affect other students.
When the minister at the time, Jim Wallace, first made the proposal to increase medical student fees and we asked him about it, he gave us his reasons for introducing such a measure. As Murdo Fraser has suggested, we could, in our letter, ask the minister the following: to reflect on the evidence that was given then; to consider whether there has been any change in the national circumstances or in the relationship between Scotland and England; and, if so, to give us his views on what those changes mean.
So, basically, we should concentrate on the evidence.
Yes.
My points will chime with Christine May's comments. We should seek from the minister information on and assurances about the evidence base and we should highlight specific points and statistical information that have emerged this afternoon.
The committee was influential in arguing that action on the differential funding of universities was needed because of the introduction of top-up fees down south. That helped to produce a favourable allocation of funds to the university sector as a whole. The question is whether there is evidence of cross-border flows. When the Executive consulted, current figures were not available. This is not an issue that I raised with the students, but the move to increase general fees—not just medical fees—from £1,200 to £1,700 changes the fundamental allocation of funds to the university sector from a grant base to one that is based on a per capita percentage increase. The committee may want to ask the minister about the rationale for that change.
Putting to one side the substantive matter that is before us, I want specifically to address the issue of timescales. Fiona Hyslop used the word "rush". Members of the committee will know that we have been debating these matters in considerable detail for a number of years. It is important to note that. The Executive, too, has conducted a range of consultations and discussions on the issues. I am not prejudging people's views on the substantive issue, but words such as "rush" and "knee-jerk" being used about an issue that many of us have been debating, thinking about and discussing for several years does not chime with my experience.
I will try to get consensus on the points that we want to include in a letter to Nicol Stephen. Members are asking the minister for evidence. Murdo Fraser was seeking evidence specifically on medical courses, but other members want evidence on the whole issue.
I am particularly interested in the evidence on medical courses, but it would be sensible for us to get evidence on the whole lot.
We need evidence if we are to make a judgment. That is a fair request that applies across the board, rather than just to medical students. Such a request would cover the points that Murdo Fraser and Christine May made, and Susan Deacon's first point. Susan Deacon made a number of fair points about monitoring and evaluation—I cannot remember the other points that she made, but they were very good.
I made a point about on-going liaison with the United Kingdom Government.
We will raise both Susan Deacon's points in our letter. The timing issue is related to the point about evidence. Why are the increases being introduced now, and why are fees being raised by the amounts that have been suggested?
The changes also reflect the move to per capita funding. More money is being given to universities through student fees, rather than in grant. There is not meant to be an increase or a decrease.
Are members happy for the clerks to draft a letter and for me and Christine May as deputy convener to agree that letter? I am being advised that we should try to get a reply to our points before the Executive lays the order.
Will the committee have an opportunity to look again at the matter before the order is laid? According to my notes, it is to be laid on 21 March.
That is a week today. The answer is that we will not have another opportunity. When we were notified that the order was to be laid on 21 March, the clerks began a discussion with the Executive to try to make sure that we had time to put the matter on our agenda before the order was laid.
If we are writing to ask for evidence, we will not have a chance to consider our response to that evidence in advance of the order's being laid.
That is precisely the point. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do about that. It is one of the procedural problems with Scottish statutory instruments.
I remember debating amendments; any SSIs were meant to follow the super-affirmative procedure. Therefore, we have to either make our changes now or forever hold our peace. If we cannot get the evidence back in time, as Murdo Fraser rightly said, it means that this super-affirmative instrument will be subject to pretty much the normal statutory instrument procedure.
We could ask the Executive not to lay the instrument on 21 March to give us the chance to study the evidence in its reply. The minister is not due to come before the committee until 18 April, anyway.
He will have laid the order by then.
Yes he will, but I do not imagine that it will be a problem to have it delayed by a week. I ask members to leave the matter with us to negotiate with the minister. There were negotiations to ensure that we had time for today's evidence session.
It might be that the situation that we are discussing is an annual process. Perhaps we should flag up now that we want more notice of the equivalent SSIs in the future. I would like to have had the chance to take oral evidence on the draft order from the minister before it is laid. I agree that satisfactory procedure has not been followed.
Shall we make that point in the letter?
I ask for clarification. The convener touched on this matter at the beginning of the meeting, so I apologise if I blinked and missed it. You mentioned that the NUS was the only organisation to say that it wished to give oral evidence to us, but I think that I am right in saying that we contacted a number of groups and organisations. Has anyone else expressed any views to us in writing?
We contacted a number of organisations to ask them whether they would like to provide written or oral evidence, including the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council, Universities Scotland and a number of others, but they did not want to provide anything at this stage. I can get the full list to members if they so wish. The only organisation that expressed an interest in coming before the committee or in providing written evidence was NUS Scotland.
I apologise for being late today. Do we have an inkling as to why the organisations decided not to respond? It would be interesting to know.
It is difficult for me to put words into organisations' mouths. A number of organisations had already responded to the Executive's consultation and had nothing further to add to that. Perhaps we can take it from that that they had no difficulties, but you would have to study their submissions to the Executive's consultation to find that out.
Okay. Does everyone agree that we will write to the minister and make those various points?
I thank members for that and I thank NUS Scotland for its evidence today.