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Item 2 is consideration of a negative statutory instrument, the Designation of UHI Millennium Institute (Scotland) Order 2001 (SSI 2001/39). Copies of the instrument have been circulated to members.
If the committee would find it helpful, I would be happy to do so.
If you would like to make some brief remarks about the instrument, that would be welcome.
Thank you for the opportunity to tell the committee about the purpose of the statutory instrument.
One or two members are having difficulty hearing you. Could you lean more towards the microphone or bend it towards you?
The order will give the Highlands and Islands a local, publicly funded higher education institution, which will be able, in time, to accede to university status. It will fulfil ministers' aims of widening access and giving new, enhanced opportunities for higher education across a large area of Scotland in which opportunities have been limited. Ministers expect that the institution will also underpin the local economy by opening up the range of training and education opportunities available locally to improve the skills base.
I will ask a general background question for the benefit of the committee. If the instrument were not passed, would funding stop, or would there still be a vehicle for funding?
I am sorry—I did not quite catch that.
If the instrument were not passed, would there still be a vehicle for funding?
There would be no means of funding the UHI millennium institute. The academic partners that receive their funding through the Scottish Further Education Funding Council would continue to do so, but there would be no mechanism for giving public sector funding to the institute.
When the committee met UHI in Inverness in October 1999, there was discussion about how it was progressing to attain university status. Can you give the committee any further information on that progress?
Not really, except to say that under the Further and Higher Education (Scotland) Act 1992, only institutions designated as eligible for funding by the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council can apply to have degree-awarding powers and, ultimately, a university title. The instrument is a big step forward, in that it puts the UHI millennium institute in a position where it can begin to develop the academic expertise and maturity and the critical mass that it will need to attain university status.
Will you explain further how that progress towards university status will take place? You have talked about funding being made available and about taking on students, and you have said that when UHI reaches the stage at which there is critical mass it will be in a position to apply for university status. What are the numbers involved and what time scale can we expect for that to come about?
I cannot give an indication of the time scale because the development of academic maturity is largely a matter for the UHI millennium institute. However, once it enters the higher education sector, it will be part of the quality assurance regime and it will have access to all the advice, expertise and assistance that the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education can give it.
How can the institute enrol students on degree courses if it does not have the power to award degrees? Which comes first? I am not clear how the process works.
That is not really a problem. A number of institutions that do not have powers to award their own degrees run degree programmes that are validated by a university. The institution gradually builds up academic maturity—it builds up a track record of maintaining the standards of its awards, and quality assurance and enhancement. That is what the Privy Council examines when considering applications for powers to award degrees.
Are we talking months or years before the power to award degrees is given to UHI?
Again, I cannot offer a view as to how long it might be before the UHI millennium institute feels ready to make an application. I do not think that it would be months.
So it would be years then?
I could not put a figure on how long it might take.
I have one last point on funding. The financial memorandum to the order says that funds amounting to £6 million will be transferred from the Scottish Further Education Funding Council to the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council. Is that extra money, over and above SFEFC's normal allocation, or is it being taken from the college funding pot and transferred across?
The amount of money that will be transferred from SFEFC to SHEFC is nearer £5.5 million, and was calculated by SFEFC as the cost of funding higher education provision within the academic partner colleges that are members of UHI. It is the slice of funding that goes at the moment to the eight colleges that are funded by SFEFC to cover the higher education activity in those colleges. If the order comes into force, from 1 April, that activity will become the responsibility of the UHI millennium institute and be funded via SHEFC.
I do not think that you answered the question. I asked whether the £5.5 million that is being transferred to the higher education sector is being taken from the further education sector, or whether it is extra resources over and above—
No, it is not extra resources. It is money that is allocated through SFEFC at the moment in respect of the proportion of activity that is higher education activity.
So the transfer is a recycling of funds.
It is a straight transfer of the money that currently funds higher education activity in the eight publicly funded further education colleges.
So they will continue to get the funds, but via a different route.
Absolutely.
Does that mean that the number of students on the further education side at the colleges will go down?
No. The balance of FE students in the FE colleges remains absolutely the same. They are funded by the FE funding council. The transfer is only in relation to the chunk of money that covers HE activity in the colleges. That funding simply moves across, because the funding responsibility transfers from one funding council to the other.
George Lyon has pursued most of my points. Creating a new university from scratch does not happen often. Is it the case that it is not until UHI becomes a degree-awarding body in its own right that it gets approval from the Privy Council and becomes a full university? Is that comparable to the situation with the University of Stirling? How many years was it before that institution became a full university and gained approval from the Privy Council?
No, the situation is not at all comparable. Stirling University was established in the 1960s following the Robbins report, and was Scotland's only greenfield university at the time. The UHI millennium institute is in a different ball-game altogether. Things have moved on considerably in the 30-plus years since that time.
At present, the institute is therefore at the stage prior to becoming even a university college.
That is correct.
Notwithstanding my personal interest, which I expressed earlier, I welcome today's move. The development is welcome for various reasons, some of which have been outlined. For too long, there has been a brain drain—people leaving to go to university and never returning—from the Highlands. Furthermore, many people have stayed in the Highlands and have sacrificed their ambitions to go to university because of the lack of a facility.
The funding methodologies of the two funding councils are not identical. Kenneth Macintosh has, rightly, identified potential implications for the funding of individual places or of colleges as a whole. Instead of getting their funding via a single route, colleges will receive their funding via two routes. One of the things that we have asked both the funding councils to do is to work closely together to ensure that the transition is smooth. By working closely with SHEFC, SFEFC—which still has overall responsibility for the statutory duty to secure further education across Scotland—can help to ensure the overall financial viability of individual institutions.
One concern might be the fact that a collection of separate colleges and distance learning—the importance of which has been empahasised—can be an expensive form of education to fund. I imagine that the college's concern would be that if the cost per student were compared with that in an urban university, the comparison would not be fair. We may address that point later in this morning's discussion.
The Executive's responsibility for the viability of institutions will continue for as long as the institutions continue. The First Minister has the statutory duty, under section 1 of the Further and Higher Education (Scotland) Act 1992, to secure adequate and efficient further education throughout Scotland. That duty is exercised on his behalf by SFEFC, to the extent that it can exercise that responsibility within the mechanisms—principally the funding mechanisms—at its disposal. The Executive will continue to take an interest—and not a tapering interest at that—in the financial health and viability of all the institutions.
Thank you.
I detect, from the view that is being expressed by the committee, that there is no fundamental objection to the passing of the instrument. I believe that our formal duty is to recommend that we make no recommendation, which is a rather quaint way of describing the procedure. However, we could accompany a recommendation that we will not obstruct the passage of the instrument with one or two passing thoughts of our own. I sense, from some of the questioning, that there is slight concern about the conferral of designation. As it seems that that is the necessary precursor for any organisation to become a university, a somewhat indeterminate period now lies ahead for the institute before any formal university status is attained. Do any members wish to comment on that aspect?
We should welcome this move, as it is one of the most positive steps that we have seen towards the designation of the University of the Highlands and Islands as a university. It is a positive development and should not be seen in any way as something to be concerned about; rather, it should be applauded.
My point was not that that was an issue of concern. I detected from members' questioning that there was genuine uncertainty about when this now designated institution would attain formal university status. Do members want to comment on that area?
The committee should state that it wants that process to happen as quickly as possible. We welcome the steps that have been taken and the statutory instrument is critical to moving the project forward. However, there is a great desire in the Highlands and Islands to see the institution achieve full status, so that it can award degrees. That has to be reflected in what we say to the Executive.
Is it acceptable to members that we make no recommendation to obstruct the passing of the instrument, but that we express the hope that formal university status is being actively pursued?
I thank Mrs Scott, Mr Logie and Mr Reeves for their contributions this morning.