Enterprise and Culture Committee, 28 Oct 2003

Meeting date: Tuesday, October 28, 2003

Official Report 264KB pdf

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Scottish Solutions Inquiry

Item 3 is back to the Scottish solutions inquiry. We have before us representatives of the Association of Scottish Colleges, who listened intently during the previous evidence session. We have Professor Thomas Wilson, the principal of Glasgow College of Building and Printing, Janet Lowe, the principal of Lauder College, and Tom Kelly, the chief executive of the Association of Scottish Colleges. Tom, do you wish to say a few words before we go to questions?

Yes. Our view is that Scotland should not be thrown off course by the new plans for England, important and far reaching though they are. Scotland already has a distinctive system of higher education. We are ahead of England in terms of participation—not just by young people, but by older students too. Our higher education system is broader and more accessible than that in England. Since devolution, we have had major improvements in student finance, particularly for full-time students, and we have opened up access to many more people from deprived areas and disadvantaged backgrounds. We also have a better range and catalogue of higher education qualifications than England has now, or plans in its proposals for reform.

We do not see that the plans for England require sudden changes here, but we must continue to strengthen our system of higher education so that Scotland can be smart, successful and socially inclusive. For the colleges, the most important and distinctively Scottish measures we would like to see, apart from extra funding—which I will briefly say something on—are easing the cap on full-time places; improving funding support for part-time study, in particular for the low-paid who are in work and those who have family commitments; implementing fully our Scottish credit and qualifications framework, which is essential to ensure opportunity for all; and modernising the catalogue of higher national courses and awards.

Of course—members would expect me to say this—with more resources, colleges can do even more and better things for students and their employers. We welcome the increase in resources that is promised for the period from 2004 to 2006, but we would like further increases in order to improve choice, quality and support for students, to reward staff fairly and to meet the changing requirements of employers and local communities. We intend to pursue that in next year's review of the spending plans for 2005 onwards.

I am delighted to see the representatives of the colleges here. During our inquiry, I have asked a number of questions on the further education sector. The HE sector has expressed significant fears about the potential impact on individual staff members and whole departments if top-up fees are introduced. If those fears are realised, will there be a knock-on effect on you? What solutions can you suggest?

The most adverse affect that we do not want to see would be Scotland's departing from its broad-based approach to lifelong learning. We are much more nordic than we are ivy league in our approach to higher education. That is right for Scotland; and we might go further and say that it is right in principle. Our system enables people, wherever they start from, to aspire to access degrees—but by different routes. We do not invest our all only in the fast stream or only in full-time students and we would not like that to be lost.

On loss of staff, some of what is being discussed in England could lead to a much more mobile work force in higher education generally. The long-term effects of that could be serious for our sector, as for others. However, those effects are difficult to predict. As is the case in relation to students, because we are at an early stage and cannot yet see the detail of the English arrangements clearly, it is difficult for us to assess any possible increase in cross-border flow—especially for college courses that already have a high and international reputation.

We can but speculate on the cross-border flows of staff and students. If there were to be cross-border flows of staff, that could create pressure on us because people might move out of our sector. Should that happen, one of the best ways to guard against it will be to ensure that our staff continue to be well rewarded and well motivated. As members know well, we have a very effective work force in the FE sector—our staff are motivated to do the job that they do for our students and we wish to continue to support them in that job. Any support that Parliament could give us to enable us to reward and motivate our staff would be one of the best forms of defence against any potential impact—given that we cannot, at this stage, predict whether there will be one.

I agree with the point that was made about students. There may be cross-border flows of students, although we cannot yet make predictions. Our best response will be to continue to support and develop the positive system that we have, which will allow us to maintain opportunities for Scotland and Scottish residents.

In his introduction, Tom Kelly spoke about funding of part-time study. Will you expand on how important that is, where the money might come from for it and what impact it will have on employers?

That is a serious issue and one that was highlighted in Glasgow when we were involved in a citizens jury exercise. Among the people interviewed were folk who worked in fairly humble jobs in supermarkets and who had aspirations to move into education and to use some of the time when they were not at work to improve their lot and engage in self-development. However, the hurdles were real. They had the time but were humbly paid and did not have the money to pay the fees that the system required of them. We have to face up to that serious issue.

In Glasgow, 27 per cent of the work force have absolutely no qualifications. That is worse than the national average of 19 per cent. There is a big job to be done with people on low incomes, many of whom are in employment. We have to find ways to cut the Gordian knot and ensure that those people have the opportunities that we would want them to have.

For the benefit of the committee, will you tell us what financial support is available for people in employment to attend a course of study at college?

Support would be means tested. The fact that people are in employment would rule out the vast majority of them from any benefit whatever. They would be responsible for their fees, travel and all other costs.

Christine May asked where the money would come from. Our approach is to say that of course we would like to see expanded funding for the sector and for the students whom we seek to serve, but we see that as a decade's work. That has been the consistent approach that we have adopted. We would like there to be a much better balance of entitlement between those who are best and most successful immediately on leaving school and those who want to get into lifelong learning but have the opportunity to do so only later. We do not expect the resources that that will require to come in full in a short spurt, but we would like to see efforts to improve the situation gradually step by step.

Traditionally, we classify students as being full time or part time. Perhaps we make the mistaken assumption that the full-time students are not working and the part-time students are working. The majority of students in colleges, whether full time or part time, who are following higher education programmes at higher national certificate or diploma level are working. The ones who are officially part-time are at a serious disadvantage in that there is no support for their fees. Many people in Scotland are prepared to work their way through higher education by studying part time, but there is a disincentive for them to do so because of the fees. The question about where the money will come from is relevant and the committee might wish to consider it.

I want you to clarify one of the points that you made in your submission. In paragraph 9 you talk about some features of the plans for England that could cause difficulties for Scotland. You talk about the introduction of foundation degrees and the effect on higher national diplomas and higher national certificates. It is not clear to me how the introduction of foundation degrees in England would impact on Scotland. In spite of my having the good and worthwhile Langside College in my constituency, I am far from being an expert, so it would be helpful to get an explanation.

The key is employer recognition. Many of the employers who recognise higher nationals in Scotland also operate in other parts of the United Kingdom. Were foundation degrees to be established as the standard two-year full-time education qualification, increasing numbers of employers who operate in Scotland and elsewhere would ask what is the calibration between the foundation degree and the HNs. They would ask whether the HND was worth the same as the foundation degree, whether it covered the same things and whether they could regard an employee with an HND in Scotland as the equivalent of an employee in England with a foundation degree.

At the moment, England has its own HN system; it is just not used very much. England did not develop higher nationals as we did over the past decade and that is a big weakness. Having said that, the strength in our system, which England's plans do not address, is that it is designed not just around two-year qualifications, but around one-year full-time qualifications and the gamut of part-time qualifications right down to evening classes. People can do HNs by evening class throughout Scotland if that is what is best for them. We have strengths in our system, but we do not want to lose employer recognition.

I can see that. Your answer is complemented by the fact that in the brief that accompanied your evidence you said—this came as a surprise to me—that over 60 per cent of Scots entering higher education courses for the first time in Scotland do so in an FE college. I had not appreciated that—I do not know whether other committee members had. It certainly underlines the importance of your sector.

I move on to another point that you mentioned. In paragraph 15 of your evidence you talk about specific courses and you say:

"It is possible, therefore, that more students from England will seek places on such courses in Scotland if there are top-up fees in England but not in Scotland."

I wonder what that is based on. To what extent do you fear—I do not want to phrase this too strongly—or are you concerned about, an increase in applications from English students to Scottish FE colleges?

I notice another interesting statistic in paragraph 51 of your briefing paper, which addresses cross-border flows. The table shows the number of students from outwith Scotland on higher education courses in Scotland's FE colleges. Using the most recent figures, which are from 2001-02, the figure is only 2.9 per cent of higher education enrolments in FE colleges. Given that that figure is a 50 per cent increase on the figure from two years previously, there seems to be an upward trend in such admissions, especially given that overall numbers have increased by about 9 per cent in the same period. What would be the effect of an increase in English students coming to Scotland? It seems that there is already a trend in that.

The figure is small scale in our sector. We are quite clear that Scotland's further education colleges exist overwhelmingly to serve the needs of those who live and study in Scotland and who expect to work in Scotland. We expect that to continue to be the case.

We have flagship courses, which tend to be either specialised courses or in particular fields for which there is high demand. Like everyone else in the sector, we have to play to EU rules. If the situation arose in which more highly qualified candidates from England applied for those courses and did so primarily for financial reasons, problems could arise in ensuring that that course provision was used for Scotland in the way that it is today.

That is not to say that we want to bring down the shutters. We are raising a marker. We are saying that if there is to be some sort of adjustment to the cross-border trade—if I can put it that way—that is a factor for us as well as for the universities.

At least in my college, there is no difference in the increase in the number of students from England who come to the college than is the case for students from elsewhere in the EU. If fees go up south of the border, that might lead to an increased flow into Scotland from other EU countries, as well as from England.

As an aside, what support do English students get if they want to come to a further education college in Scotland? Do they get local authority support?

They are eligible for local authority support, but the English system does not give quite the same guarantee as applies in Scotland. One example is that full student support, which is the student awards loan, grant and other aspects of student finance, is made available for one-year higher national certificate students. Such support is not generally available in England for such courses.

I have one last question, convener. I am going to try it out although it is not absolutely central to the inquiry. The question has its roots in paragraph 22 of your submission, in which you set out the obstacles to continued progress in Scotland, one of which is

"The unsustainably low unit of resource available to support HE courses in FE colleges."

As most of your funding comes from the Scottish Further Education Funding Council, to what extent is the fact that that funding comes from the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council a factor in that statement? Look ahead, what is the association's view of the merger of the two funding councils? Is it likely to benefit your sector?

In the background briefing, we explained the differences in the unit of funding. We wanted to draw attention to the fact that, at the same level of provision in terms of the Scottish credit and qualifications framework, the funding that we get, which is from SFEFC, is much lower than the funding that institutions that are funded by SHEFC get.

That situation has been highlighted by the transfer of funding for Bell College and the UHI Millennium Institute. They now get SHEFC units of resource for the same things for which everyone else in Scotland gets SFEFC units of resource. The discrepancy is too wide to be used in the long term.

We have been promised that the issue of comparability will be looked at once the councils have merged. However, that will be a long slow process. It is difficult for colleges to sustain high-quality and high-cost higher education courses when they get much less funding.

The situation is even starker if one looks at sub-degree provision. An FE course that is roughly equivalent to an HNC would be funded in a university at the HE level—the SHEFC level—and not at the lower level. Although the course is exactly the same, there is wide disparity in the level of support.

I would like to make two comments about the potential merger. We view positively the possibility that the merger could bring about more cross-sector flows of students and the more effective implementation of the Scottish credit and qualifications framework, in which our sector is the heart and core. If the merger accelerates the framework's implementation, that can only be a positive step. We hope that it will happen.

That said, we are concerned about whether a single body would have the expertise and ability to understand and support the full range of learning from the foundation learning that we offer in our colleges to research and postgraduate degrees. The whole spectrum of lifelong learning should continue to be reflected and have equal focus in the membership of the council and the make-up of the executive. Although that is feasible, great attention would have to be paid to the matter.

We will no doubt hear more about those concerns when we discuss any future bill on the matter.

In paragraph 15 of your submission, you say:

"It is not impossible that Colleges of Further Education in England will introduce top-up fees for high demand, specialised courses".

Most of the debate has centred on the potential for universities to take such an approach. Have you had any discussions with your counterparts in the Association of Colleges about the likelihood of that happening? What are the prospects that such fees will be introduced?

The current difficulty is that, with the foundation degree concept, an award is offered by a degree-awarding university while the partner colleges provide the teaching. As a result, there will very often be what might be called a bilateral deal between the partners. We have focused on the fact that some areas of higher education provision in colleges—such as music production and television production—are in very high demand. Moreover, in Scotland, there is high demand for some land-based courses and courses such as golf management. In England, colleges that want to develop facilities and continue to improve the quality of those courses would be able to take in more money through top-up fees. The philosophy in Scotland is quite different in that respect. I think that many English colleges would rather not introduce top-up fees, but would prefer to retain standard tuition fees for every student at the same level of course.

So you are saying that there is such demand for some courses that top-up fees could be introduced for them.

Yes, that could happen.

I have a couple of quick questions about the unit-of-resource issues that Mike Watson raised. I might have missed this piece of information, but has any comparison been made between the unit of resource in English and Scottish further education?

I am afraid that things are counted differently in England.

Fair enough.

It is the usual problem. However, I should point out that there is a significant difference in the organisation of funding. In England, the Higher Education Funding Council funds higher education wherever it takes place, which means that it funds such provision in colleges according to its units of funding. In Scotland, the dividing line is drawn elsewhere.

Will the merger mean that the same conditions might exist in Scotland in the future? Presumably you feel that that should happen in the Scottish context.

It will bring the issue to the fore. I do not think that anyone assumes that colleges will ever be funded to the same level as universities. There are wider functions to take into consideration and we do not want in any way to diminish the argument that Scotland needs elite research or research of a very high standing. We do not dispute the fact that differences exist. However, we want to be clear that there is a fair funding basis for learning at the same level.

I also want to ask about the unit of resource. After all, every time that I visit a further education college, people raise the point that you provide degree-level courses at a much lower cost base—at least if we consider the cash that you receive to provide them.

When we have taken evidence from people from the university sector in this inquiry, they have argued that the introduction of top-up fees in England will mean that English universities will be better resourced. As a result, they claim that additional funding must be found—usually from the public purse—to fund Scottish universities. Surely that would exacerbate the situation in which you find yourselves. I presume that, if universities receive a funding injection, you will want the FE sector to receive a similar injection to ensure at least that the differential does not get any wider than it already is.

We certainly do not want a wider differential; I am perfectly clear about that. If there is additional investment available, we believe that it needs to be directed to the needs of students and to the sorts of things that employers require. We are not looking to get money just so that colleges have a bigger share of the cake; we are asking what benefits are being sought, and we think that there are important benefits.

Futureskills Scotland has said that demand in the labour market will be much greater in intermediate levels—Scotland already has a relatively well-qualified work force at the higher levels—so we are looking to make increases there. We would not resist the suggestion that, if there is more investment to be made, it should be made to get extra volume and opportunities. We believe that the priority for that extra volume and those opportunities should be in the areas that colleges offer.

I would like to make two points about the additional funding in England. First, there are offsets to the additional income. Universities and colleges would be expected to do more for top-up fees in relation to support and endowment funding of student support. In Scotland, at the moment, we have national support schemes, so there is a difference in that respect. Secondly, much of the additional funding in England will be going on the increased places for foundation degrees, because 50,000 extra places for foundation degrees do not come cheap. That accounts for a substantial part of the extra funding that England is putting in. However, if England achieves that target—supposing that Scotland's population makes up roughly a tenth of the total UK population—it would only bring England closer to what Scotland has at the moment, but it would not bring it level with us in terms of non-degree provision of higher education.

My point is about the differentiation between funding for research and funding for learning and teaching. We understand that much of the case for additional investment in the universities is made on support for research. Although we do not question the importance of investing in research, which is not an area that is of interest to us, we suggest that the two arguments should perhaps be considered separately. If there is further investment through top-up fees in higher education in England and a corresponding investment in Scotland, there should be clarity about whether that investment is for research or for improving opportunities for lifelong learning for the Scottish population. If it is for the latter, we would expect that our sector could be considered equally when the allocation of that resource is made. For many lifelong learners, more investment in research would not add value to what is available to them, whereas investment in lifelong learning would. We therefore ask you to consider the issues of learning and research separately if and when more resource becomes available.

My point is along the same lines and illustrates the need that exists at the intermediate level, to which Tom Kelly drew our attention. I mentioned that, in Glasgow, 27 per cent of the work force had absolutely no qualifications, but the work force in Glasgow has the highest level of graduate employment—26 per cent of all employees in Glasgow hold a university degree. As I trust you can see, the gap lies below degree level, and we need to find ways of addressing that deficit. We need to raise the level of qualification of the whole work force. That would not in any way diminish the strong case that the universities are progressing, but we must draw attention to the fact that we have major deficits elsewhere that we should also be addressing.

In paragraph 5 of your submission, you say:

"There are important issues, however, as to whether the Scottish spending plans for these and later years may be inappropriately skewed by reaction to developments in England."

What exactly did you have in mind when you wrote that?

We had a standstill for two years on the understanding that extra funding would come online from 2004. We see the plans for those years as part of a package that includes more than the situation that has developed until now. We think that there needs to be a measured response to what is happening in England. We must recognise that what will happen in England, even if it is approved by the Westminster Parliament, will not kick in until autumn 2005. We want to see what is developing, and we should not start making anticipatory changes that the events in England may not eventually require anyway.

The impression that I got from reading your evidence—perhaps I paraphrase it unfairly—is that you are saying that the HE sector is crying wolf a bit too soon. Would that be fair?

I would not put it as strongly as that. One must remember that FE stands in a different position in relation to England. We believe that we are ahead of England and we will stay ahead of England, frankly. We have a better system and we expect it to remain so. We do not compete in the same pool. We made that point about the low percentage of our students who currently come from outwith Scotland. That is why FE will not be caught out in that way. Although quite a number of our principals have come from across the border and some of ours have gone the other way, we do not have a high level of cross-border flow in staff either. That is quite a different situation from the one facing the universities.

If your question is whether we believe that the case for shifting funds away from us has not yet been made, the answer is certainly yes.

I reiterate the point that I made earlier. If there is a case for investment in research in England, there is not necessarily an equal and comparable case for immediate investment in research in Scotland. Investment in higher education in Scotland should be considered with reference to the needs of Scotland, its economy and its people rather than simply paralleling what happens in England.

Forgive me for perhaps being slow, but I picked up something that Janet Lowe said a moment ago about the need for learning and research to be considered separately. She also said something on that just now. What has been said is enormously informative and helpful for our deliberations, but the general thrust has been that we ought to look much more at education, or certainly further and higher education, in the round.

To put it simply, or simplistically—it has been a long meeting—at one level the most simple, but at another level the most powerful, point that was made is that we need to think of lifelong learning in the broadest sense. Whether or not more resources are made available in Scotland, we perhaps need to be mindful of the fact that our starting base is different. The relative participation rates are different. Indeed, the skills needs are different as well. That is another thing that I would like people to comment on a wee bit more.

How could Scotland make available additional investment and resources for further or higher education in the context of top-up fees taking effect south of the border? Such a scenario would mean that there would be no Barnett consequentials coming into the Scottish block, so there could be quite a high opportunity cost in terms of the additional public funds that could be made available for that purpose. That would mean that there would be an even greater need for us to see the bang for that buck, if you like.

Will you say more about where best the FE sector could contribute to that? That issue has been touched on, but I want to hear a bit more about, for example, how we might address the skills gap and how we might contribute to the much wider imperatives for economic growth.

One simple example is the care sector. At the moment, demand for early-years and child-care courses in colleges is extremely strong. We cannot meet all the existing demand for places. At the same time, there is a professional move towards greater licence-to-practice requirements even at relatively junior levels of operation in the sector. How will we provide for that extra requirement? That will involve both education and training, as some people will need education before they are ready for the training. If we are to have better work forces in not just the business sector but across the public services, we need to plan and think in ways that we have not done in the past.

I invite the committee to think that investment in additional places in the universities is perhaps more likely to result in more places for full-time higher education degree courses for 18-year-olds coming out of school. That is what the universities are good at; that is what they were traditionally set up for. It is likely that that is how the universities would allocate the places unless they were directed otherwise.

Arguably, that is not what Scotland needs at the moment if it is investing more resources. It is arguably much more important to invest in the existing work force that has missed out on higher education in earlier stages of life. As we said, such people are prepared to study part-time for higher national certificate and diploma qualifications and for professional awards. All of those are available cost-effectively in colleges; they also result in an upskilling of the work force in areas where that is needed.

The Parliament has increased investment in modern apprenticeships, which colleges have participated heavily in developing. We are working with our local enterprise companies to deliver modern apprenticeships with employers. Increasingly, there are possibilities for progression routes into part-time degrees and some examples of that are being developed.

All those routes are more flexible and cost-effective. They contribute to the skills of the work force as well as create lifelong learning opportunities for individuals. They are valid alternatives to full-time higher education immediately post school and they are what we are good at. We are flexible. We are good at supporting part-time learners. We put the support in and have contact with the employers. That is why we argue that investment in further education would give bang for the buck and would repay the investment in a variety of ways. It would be cost-effective. Such investment should at least be considered vis-à-vis other proposals that the committee may receive from the university sector.

We are in no doubt that the FE sector is well placed to respond quickly to the emerging needs of the economy. For example, we welcome the fact that the Scottish Parliament has freed a great deal of money for public investment in building stock, but that is creating grave shortages of labour. Professor McGregor of the University of Glasgow has estimated that, currently, at the beginning of a 10-year upward path of investment in the public sector—at the beginning of the growth curve—we are already 6,700 tradespersons short in the construction industry. Clearly, we need to be able to respond quickly to meet such needs. The FE sector is well placed to be able to respond to such needs as they emerge and it can do so efficiently, effectively and at moderate cost.

Thank you. I think that there are no further questions, so I thank Mr Kelly and his colleagues for what has been another informative session.

Meeting closed at 16:31.