Higher Education Bill

Public Bill Committee, 4 March 2004.

Standing Committee H

Higher Education Bill

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

On a point of order, Mr. Gale. I want to rectify an error that I inadvertently made when we debated amendments Nos. 260 and 182 on part-time students last week. I said that the Open university had 28,000 students, but that is the number of part-time students who get fee remission across the sector. The actual number of students at the university is an incredible 200,000. I thought it best to make that clear so that staff there did not wake up thinking that they had lost about 180,000 students.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Happily, that is not a point of order for me, but it is now a matter of record.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

On a point of order, Mr. Gale. The Minister kindly agreed to supply all members of the Committee, through your good self, with a list of the universities offering bursaries that will come on top of the £3,000 grant in the Bill. I very much appreciate the fact that he has responded quickly but, in his desire to do so, he may inadvertently not have given us the complete picture. I know from my researchers that, as well as the four universities mentioned in his letter, another five—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. Nice try, but that is obviously not a point of order for the Chair. The hon. Gentleman is seeking to make it a matter of record. Of course, it would be perfectly reasonable for him to ask the Minister to update or amend his letter.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

In light of your guidance, Mr. Gale, I wonder whether the Minister could update his letter, given that even I have been able to obtain that information through my sources. Could the Department write to individual universities to ask what the current position is?

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

That is not a point of order for me either, but the Minister will have heard the hon. Gentleman's comments.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

Further to that point of order, Mr. Gale. When the Minister writes to us, could he also update us on the thresholds below which such bursaries will be available? Even at Cambridge—the most generous case that the Government have put before us—help will be available only below a very low threshold of about £15,000.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Once again, that is not a point of order for me, but the Minister will have heard the hon. Gentleman's comments.Clause 30 General duties of relevant authority

Clause 30 - General duties of relevant authority

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I beg to move amendment No. 24, in

clause 30, page 13, line 39, leave out from 'to' to 'and' in line 40 and insert

'ensure full access to higher education based upon academic ability and potential.'.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 268, in

clause 30, page 13, line 41, leave out paragraph (b).

No. 193, in

clause 30, page 13, line 41, after 'functions', insert

'have regard to any legislation for the time being in force which is intended to prohibit discrimination or promote equality and'.

No. 194, in

clause 30, page 13, line 41, after 'functions', insert

'have regard to the need to eliminate covert forms of discrimination and denial of opportunity'.

No. 221, in

clause 30, page 13, line 42, at end insert—

'(1A) Without prejudice to the performance of his duties under this section, the Director may take any further action which he considers likely to promote fairer access to higher education.'.

No. 235, in

clause 31, page 14, line 16, at end insert—

'(2A) A plan under this section relating to any institution may not include any provisions relating to admissions to that institution.'.

No. 195, in

clause 38, page 17, line 12, at end insert—

' ''fair access to higher education'' means the principle that no person shall be precluded or deterred from pursuing any qualifying course for any reason other than academic ability, and in particular that no person shall be so precluded or deterred by reason of his income,'.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

We now reach the second crucial element of the Bill. Having spent last week debating the fundamental issue of top-up fees, we come now to a subject that is perhaps less welcome to universities—the access regulator.

Let me start by saying how surprised Opposition Members were when the Government imposed a guillotine after clause 29—the first of this group of clauses, which relates to the establishment of the access regulator. It would have been more understandable had they imposed one before clause 29, and it is altogether regrettable that we have been forced to start debating the issue at clause 30 instead. For no obvious reason, the Committee has been deprived of the opportunity to debate certain issues relating to the establishment of the access regulator.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

Would the hon. Gentleman not concede that time-wasting by Conservative Members in our first four sittings and, indeed, on Thursday—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. I am going to curtail this discussion right now. We are discussing the amendments, not the allocation of time.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Absolutely, Mr. Gale. It is important, however, that we give proper and full consideration to the establishment of the access

regulator, and it is regrettable that we are being forced to start with amendment No. 24, which relates to issues beyond the principle of establishing the regulator. However, we must move on and discuss the details of the regulator's remit rather than whether the regulator should exist in the first place.

The principle behind amendment No. 24 is a fundamental one that Conservative Members feel passionate about. We do not want the access regulator at all. We believe that the provision is a mistaken attempt by the Government to interfere in the independence of universities. With the amendment, we are trying to redress the balance, and to do so in a way that, as I will come to shortly, has many supporters, not least among those in senior positions on the Government benches.

The access regulator is being established by the Government to give them the power—for the first time—to wield a direct influence over how universities select their students. The Minister and the Secretary of State have been at pains to say that it is not about the application process, but purely about the admissions strategies of universities. The two are umbilically linked. The concept of a strategy to secure applicants cannot be separated from how those applicants are admitted. They are, inevitably, two sides of the same coin. The Government's approach is designed to give the Secretary of State, the Minister and the Government the ability to tell universities what they must do when admitting students.

Conservative Members have profound misgivings about the measure, as do many vice-chancellors. I think that if it were brought forward in isolation and if it were purely a social engineering measure and not attached to a carrot—if it were just a stick—there would be a widespread rebellion by vice-chancellors. Many vice-chancellors already do excellent work in trying to encourage applications from non-traditional backgrounds. Good work takes place in the higher education sector, trying to create opportunities for people who would not traditionally have gone to university or would have found it difficult, in the past, to achieve the level of success in their school environment that would have given them the opportunity to be credible applicants for university. That work is already happening. The Government are seeking to interfere and dictate where, in our view, they should not be doing so.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

I am listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman. My understanding is that the access regulator would not be concerned with admissions, as I would like it to be, but with access plans and ways of attracting non-traditional students into universities. Those students are under-represented at the moment and I have not heard anything about the Conservative's plans for attracting them to universities. Perhaps he could clarify them.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I am afraid that the hon. Lady is getting caught up in semantics. The reality is that one cannot create a system in which universities are fined £500,000 if they do not have a proper strategy to admit

non-traditional students and do not provide financial support for them. If that is not interference in the application process, I do not know what is.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

Would the hon. Gentleman accept that, as the draft guidance to the director of fair access makes clear, the capacity to fine an institution is not related to its failure to admit a particular type of student?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

No, but the ultimate sanction that the access regulator has is to deprive an institution of the power to levy fees.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

Of course, the ultimate sanction is to deprive an institution of the power to levy fees, but the Government have made it clear that they do not expect that sanction to be used because they expect institutions to conform to the requirements of the access regulator. That sanction does not relate to admissions, but to the Government's plan for widening access and increasing the breadth of applications.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Let us take a look at what the letter says about the powers and content of the access agreement, and the areas in which the access regulator has the power to get stroppy with universities. It mentions:

''Institutions' plans for bursaries and other financial support for students''.

The Government set minimum limits for that. It also mentions:

''Any outreach work that institutions plan to encourage more potential students to consider higher education . . . The provision of financial information to prospective students on available funding . . . Institutions' own objectives . . . set by themselves, by which they will monitor whether their efforts to safeguard and improve access are succeeding.''

The access regulator clearly has the power to decide whether or not those objectives are acceptable. If the access regulator is not satisfied with the objectives to improve access, he will not approve a plan.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

With respect, the draft letter does not say that. It makes it absolutely clear that the milestones are to be set by the individual university, not by the access regulator.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I have quoted directly from the draft letter.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

I am sorry, but the hon. Gentleman has not.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Unless I am mistaken, the document that I am holding, which was kindly circulated, is a draft letter of statutory guidance from the Secretary of State to the head of the office for fair access. I could read it out, but the hon. Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) would undoubtedly accuse me of filibustering. I just read to the hon. Member for Bury, North (Mr. Chaytor) the section of the letter that specifically sets out the details of what the Government expect to be contained in plans.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

The section of the letter reads as follows:

''Institutions' own objectives (milestones), set by themselves''.

Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that the letter says that, and not ''set by the director of fair access''?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I totally accept that. However, the director of fair access has the right to reject the plan as not appropriate. The institutions have the right to set their objectives, of course, but the director of fair access does not have to accept them. If the director is not satisfied that the plan goes far enough, he has the power to say to the institution, ''Sorry, you may not levy fees.'' The hon. Gentleman is clearly deluding himself. The access regulator has the power to dictate to an institution the degree to which it acts to widen its nets.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

Is not the logic of the point made by the hon. Member for Bury, North that if the institution continues untrammelled in its ability to set its own objectives, the whole function of the director of access is utterly irrelevant?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Absolutely. The hon. Member for Bury, North is a distinguished Member of the House in the field of education. He has wide experience of his subject. I am sure that he, like my hon. Friends and I, spends time in universities talking to the people who run them about the range of activities that they carry out. I am sure that he has experienced at first hand programmes that are designed to widen participation. He must have seen that there is good best practice out there. Universities try to encourage people who might not traditionally have applied to those universities to go there.

The hon. Gentleman is now arguing not only that that work is not adequate, but that it should be dictated and its parameters should be established by an access regulator. The access regulator has the power to say, ''You will produce a plan for me with these four headings.'' If he is not satisfied with the plan, he does not have to accept it and if he does not accept it, the institution cannot levy fees. That is the bottom line. That is a pretty powerful sanction. Other institutions that tow the line would gain millions of pounds a year extra through the levying of fees, while an institution that could not reach an agreement with the access regulator would not be able to do so.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

I am grateful that the hon. Gentleman has given way because this is an important point. The question that he has to address is whether he would be satisfied if a particular university, or a particular set of universities, continued to pay no attention or minimal attention to the question of widening access to their courses. That is the issue that is at the heart of the amendment.

The key point that I want to correct is the hon. Gentleman's earlier assertion that the director of fair access will determine the milestones. It is clearly set down in the draft guidance—it may not be the ultimate guidance but, as it stands, it is clear—that the milestones are to be established by the university. It is important that there is an element of self-regulation and that the universities take responsibility for themselves. However, it is equally important for universities, as in any broadly self-regulatory scheme, where people do not take that responsibility—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. The hon. Gentleman is not making an intervention; he is making a speech.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I am listening to the hon. Gentleman, and all that I would say to him in return is that if he believes that institutions are wilfully declining to widen participation, perhaps he would care to name them for the information of the Committee. My experience is that there is a lot of committed work taking place in the higher education sector to widen participation.

I visited a university college last week and talked about precisely that issue with the vice-chancellor. He said that the college ran a programme of outreach in conjunction with a number of other institutions, through which it genuinely sought to widen participation. I believed him, because the nature of the college was such that it had a clear strategic reason for wanting to broaden participation in its courses. However, he said that although the college had been doing its best, it had had difficulties finding students. Universities face real obstacles and cannot simply be told, ''You will go out and find non-traditional students.'' The task is not necessarily easy.

I profoundly disagree with the hon. Member for Nottingham, North on a number of issues, but I strongly agree with him on one thing. In many parts of the country, there is a culture that militates against going to sixth-form college and doing A-levels, let alone applying to university. That is a real challenge for us. That culture is not new in this country. One of my closest university friends came from what by any measure was an exceptionally deprived neighbourhood. I went to Cambridge. I came from a middle-class background and arrived there as, perhaps, a traditional applicant. My friend most definitely did not, but he probably achieved more than anyone whom I have ever come across in education to get into Cambridge. His was a startling achievement, helped by a university tutor who interviewed him and spotted his potential. He did not jump the hurdle at A-levels, even though he achieved pretty good A-levels for his background, but none the less he got to university.

I fundamentally agree with the hon. Member for Nottingham, North that there should not be parts of this country in which there is a culture against going to university. That is a shame on us all. We should encourage young people to see their aspirations beyond the age of 16. The hon. Gentleman made a compelling case on where the real problem lies, in that it is seen as naff to stay on beyond the age of 16. We are some distance from addressing that issue and there will be a feed-through period even when we start to do so. Until we address the problem, however, we shall not even begin to pull such people into university.

Last week's debate was relevant, because access to higher education for people who have missed out could, and probably should, come through the part-time rather than the full-time route. Otherwise, we would probably be pulling people out of employment in their early and mid-20s. Instead, we should open up opportunities to them through part-time courses. I agree with the hon. Member for Nottingham, North about the need to do something about the problem, but I do not believe that gerrymandering the university admissions system is the way to solve it.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point and makes it sincerely. We are quite close on the matter, so I will not make the partisan point that his party voted against both Sure Start and educational maintenance allowances, which might have assisted. However, I would like him to address the fact that it is not enough for universities to be involved with the strata in our secondary schools that may go to university. If the problems that he rightly highlights are to be tackled, universities must be part of the wider educational family and involve themselves much lower down the pecking order, as it were. That way, more youngsters can rise to the level at which all the access stuff, on which I commend the universities, will seriously come into play. Universities must get involved a lot earlier. If they do not do so voluntarily, however, they must be encouraged to do so through effective regulation, which is what the Bill is trying to do.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I agree with the hon. Gentleman's aspirations, but I disagree totally with his way of achieving them. Such developments are already taking place. The idea that the university sector sits in an ivory tower and pays no attention to society at large is not correct. All round the country, there are partnerships between universities and local further education colleges, for example, to create bridges between those who have gone into further rather than higher education and to help them make the jump into higher education. Universities run programmes all over the country to open their doors to people whose potential they recognise and who often perform well at university.

My point is simply that passing laws is not the solution to the problem. If the Government do not like something in our society, their natural instinct is to pass a law. The problem should be handled voluntarily through the university sector, encouraged by politicians and through information about the nature of the challenge. I passionately believe that passing a law—we shall discuss the consequences of that in a moment—is the wrong thing to do.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

I essentially want to make the same point as my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that in many universities—Cambridge is one—there are insufficient young people from lower income backgrounds? They do not attend those universities for a variety of reasons. Promoting an access programme whereby universities raise aspirations at a much earlier age—12, 13 or 14—so that children have an incentive to do well at school and obtain the qualifications that can get them into universities such as Cambridge is an essential part of the Government's strategy. Does he believe that that could be achieved without the access regulator?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Let me make two points. First, there needs to be some sort of threshold of achievement for getting into university. Surely we should tackle the problem of under-achieving young people in sink schools in inner- city areas who do not secure the necessary exam grades to go to university. Creating a university admissions system under which

the benchmark examination passes apply only to some people, based on social class, and not to others, is a difficult road because admission to higher education would be based not on achievement but on subjectivity. That is a huge mistake.

My second point, which tends to be missed, is that universities are great changers of social standing. I return to the example of my university friend. He is now a successful business man who lives in the countryside, having benefited from his university career. His children, under the Government's categorisation, are from a traditional background. We tend to forget that if the first person in a family to go to university is a target for social attention, the second generation immediately becomes part of the middle-class rich against whom we should discriminate. There is a danger that universities will be forced constantly to pull up from the bottom, but they are not social engineers; they are engines of achievement for the nation and it worries me profoundly when Labour Members see universities as vehicles to right wrongs lower down the education system.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

Everyone on the Committee will accept the hon. Gentleman's point about the need to make rapid improvement far earlier in our education system—in primary and secondary schools. His confusion between admissions and applications and his concern about admissions policy is a valid subject for debate, but not at this point in the Bill.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. If the hon. Gentleman is suggesting that the debate has been out of order, he is incorrect.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

I apologise for any implication to that effect, Mr. Gale.

If the hon. Gentleman believes that everything in the university sector is acceptable—I am attracted by his endearing faith in the status quo—why are university rates of success in attracting students from different social backgrounds so hugely variable?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Because the education system in schools is failing to provide the opportunity for many young people to get the exam grades they need to get to university.

James Purnell (Labour, Stalybridge and Hyde)

The hon. Gentleman used the phrase ''social engineering'' and one of his hon. Friends used it in an earlier debate. Setting aside whether three As from Eton are worth the same as, or are as difficult to get as, three As from an inner-city comprehensive, the data show that people from a non-traditional background with a particular set of A-levels are less likely to go to university than people from a traditional background with those same A-levels. Surely it is not social engineering to correct that.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

The hon. Gentleman is correct, but the practical reality is that 90 per cent. of young people in this country who achieve two A-levels go to university. As a nation, under Governments of both persuasions—much of what has been done has been achieved under a Government of our persuasion—we have done a huge amount to widen participation. Are

we going to end up with an application process for universities that discriminates against people on the basis of social class?

Let me pray in aid somebody to whom some, but not all, Labour Members look up to and hold in estimation: the Prime Minister. Twelve months ago, during Prime Minister's questions, I asked the following question:

''There are increasing reports of pupils of high ability and achievement being turned down by universities because of their social background. How would the Prime Minister justify that to the people who are losing out?''

The response was:

''The simple point is that I would not. If universities are doing that, they are wrong. What is more, people should go to university based on their merit, whatever their class or background. That is what should happen . . . Well, the hon. Gentleman asked me a question and I have given him an answer.''—[Official Report, 26 February 2003; Vol. 400, c. 256-7.]

I completely agree with him.

I simply do not accept the point that the hon. Member for Bury, North makes about the difference between admissions and applications. If all the access regulator is about is saying to universities, ''Look, we want you to go out and make contact with lots of people, and talk to them about university,'' why did the Minister say what he did in the debate that took place about six weeks ago in Westminster Hall? It was a 30-minute debate and I came in to listen at the back. He said that the access regulator would have ''teeth''. It is clear that if the university sector does not deliver and manage to widen participation, the Government expect the regulator to step in and do something about it.

Tim Collins (Conservative, Westmorland and Lonsdale)

I have been following my hon. Friend's argument closely. Will he spend a moment addressing the importance of getting from the Minister a clear answer about whether he agrees with the majority of Labour Members who have spoken so far, who indicated that they believe that the problem stems at least in part from inadequate behaviour by universities and that universities need to be compelled to alter their behaviour? That is what we have heard from many Labour Members. It is not what Ministers have been saying up until now. If the Minister does agree with those Members, does my hon. Friend agree that he should name the universities that he thinks should be compelled to behave differently?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

The Government do not need to introduce laws if they think that everything is right. So the clear implication is that Labour Members, the Minister and his boss, the Secretary of State, believe that universities are failing to admit students from poor social backgrounds and that that needs to change.

It has been interesting watching the Government in the various discussions about the access regulator. I hope that the Minister can clarify some points. All the discussions so far have been about the establishment of the plan, what is expected to be in the plan and the powers to levy a penalty if the plan is not implemented. What happens if that does not work? Let us suppose that it is four or five years down the

track. The university has got a plan, it has spent a bit of money, and it has given some bursaries to students. One of the interesting things about the comments that hon. Members have made about universities that are offering bursaries above the basic level to their undergraduates—an admirable initiative and I applaud universities for doing that—is that the students they are giving the bursaries to are probably already there, because every university has got a proportion of students from non-traditional backgrounds. I am not at all persuaded that the introduction of all those bursaries will suddenly lead to a wave of people from the estate mentioned by the hon. Member for Nottingham, North going to university. To some extent, I wish that it would, but I do not think that it will.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

I have a great deal of sympathy with what the hon. Gentleman says because Cambridge university has long been generous in providing bursaries to students from low-income backgrounds. The trouble was that until recently it had not told anyone about them so people would apply to Cambridge university, get there and then find that they had a bursary. That did nothing to attract low-income students to Cambridge university in the first place. It was only if they happened to get there that they were lucky enough to find that they had a generous bursary. However, that is changing, partly because of the Government's statements on the introduction of the access regulator. Surely, the hon. Gentleman can see that there has already been some benefit.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

The hon. Lady describes a situation in which a university is already doing the right thing, but doing a lousy job of communicating it. There is good practice in the universities sector. She makes a perfectly fair point, but we do not need to pass a law to rectify the problem. That is where the difference lies between Government and Opposition Members. My colleagues and I do not disagree, nor do I suppose for a moment that the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) does, with the desire to ensure that we do not waste talent in our society.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point, but my hon. Friend intervened because he mentioned a specific problem—that bursaries do not attract students and probably go only to students who would have been at the university anyway—and then said that a law was not necessary to resolve it. Clause 31(4)(c) states that the regulator will

''require the governing body to make available to students and prospective students information about financial assistance available''.

It offers a specific resolution to the very real problem that the hon. Gentleman described, which has not been resolved through any other means. Surely that is a step forward.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I am afraid that I do not accept that. Let me give the Minister a practical example of what he could have done. I promise that I shall not digress far, Mr. Gale.

We debated financing and top-up fees. The Government will spend more on the new student

support systems than will be raised from fees. If they had taken a small amount of the extra money that will be used to subsidise the student loan system to enable students to pay their fees, set up 20,000 or 30,000 bursaries at £3,000 or £4,000 a year for people from non-traditional backgrounds, and left everything else as it was, they would have had a much greater impact on participation than they will through anything that is in the Bill.

The Government believe that such problems are resolved by passing laws. My argument is straightforward: they are not. There is also a risk of creating injustices. One point on which I agree entirely with the Prime Minister is that there are losers as well as winners if covert or overt pressure is placed on universities to change the way in which they admit students.

The amendment is specifically designed to address the issue of academic ability defining people who go to university and to ensure that we do not create entry points for social reasons alone. We would insert the words

''ensure full access to higher education based upon academic ability and potential''.

We included the word ''potential'' as many universities look beyond immediate exam results for potential in the student.

We do not want a situation in which the regulator, in effect, imposes a plan by saying to a university, ''Produce a plan. Show me your targets.'' We do not know what would happen four, five or seven later if the university's proportion of students from non-traditional backgrounds had not changed a jot. What would happen to the university if plans were drawn up for an outreach programme but nothing much changed? The Minister said that the access regulator will have teeth. Would it be encouraged by the Government to step in again and ask for a tougher plan and more funds to be set aside for bursaries? It is not clear what would happen, which is a worry for Opposition Members and, I have no doubt, for universities because if the regulator truly will have teeth, the powers that are implicit in what the Government ask it to do must go beyond the formulation of an initial plan.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

Once again, the hon. Gentleman confuses admissions and applications. He really must confront this point: does he not accept that there is a fundamental difference between an agency—be it the director of fair access or whoever—that requires universities to increase the pool of candidates that apply, and an agency that intervenes directly in the process of selecting candidates from that wider pool?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I understand that the hon. Gentleman thinks that there is a difference between the two, but I do not agree. At the moment, 90 per cent. of young people who get two A-levels go to university. I asked the Minister in a written question what happened to the other 10 per cent. and he said that many of them went into the job market by choice, and some went off and did other things. In an

interesting and enlightening comment, he also said that some were put off by the cost of going to university. How top-up fees will affect that proportion I have no idea—well, I do have some idea.

The reality is that, to all intents and purposes, virtually all people who get two A-levels already go to university. So if the net is going to widen, inevitably, what the Government are asking the universities to do, through the regulator, is to start taking people who do not have A-level passes—there is no one else to take. To my mind, I am afraid, that is saying to universities, ''You have to change the criteria for admission to your universities.'' That is inescapable.

Tim Collins (Conservative, Westmorland and Lonsdale)

Does my hon. Friend agree that, under clause 32(5), Ministers can instruct the director, by regulation, on whether to approve any university's plan? We know for a fact that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is interested—some might say that he is obsessed—with not just access, but individual admissions. They are something of direct concern to the most powerful domestic Minister in this Government.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

My hon. Friend's point speaks for itself. The Government have a track record of interference. The hon. Member for Bury, North, spends time with head teachers, college principals and vice-chancellors. He will know—unless they are telling him a very different story to the one that they are telling me—that across the education sector and particularly in higher education there is a real feeling of frustration about the dead hand of Government: the bureaucracy and the interference in their affairs. Why would we believe that a Government who have a lifestyle of interference would have a light touch, when the Secretary of State will have powers of interference through the access regulator into what universities do? That is incredible and unbelievable, and I do not believe that there is a single vice-chancellor who thinks that that is the case.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Just in case the hon. Gentleman runs away with the idea that there is not a single vice-chancellor who feels that way, I refer him to what Nottingham university, which is part of the Russell group, said:

''The University of Nottingham welcomes the light touch approach proposed by the access regulator''.

There is one.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

It has been quite interesting to have conversations with vice-chancellors during the past two or three months. Their perspective on the access regulator has changed by the week. About three months ago, they were saying that the change was not particularly dramatic. During the past couple of weeks, they have been getting quite worried about it, as the comments that Ministers have been making about the access regulator's powers and aspirations have become more and more tough.

The Minister has said that the regulator will have teeth. I do not believe that one can have a light touch and teeth in the same regulatory body. In reality, it will be a vehicle to compel universities to change the mix of

students that they admit in the future. I accept the points that the hon. Member for Bury, North made about admissions and applications, but I do not accept that they are separable concepts. The two are integrally linked—the consequences of one are integrated with the other.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

If the hon. Gentleman is arguing that admissions and applications are inextricably linked and that the director of fair access will therefore intervene in the selection process, he cannot simultaneously raise the question of what will happen in five years' time when a university's social mix has changed. Presumably, things will have changed as a result of the intervention by the director of fair access.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

That is a perfectly fair point. We have two scenarios. If what I say is right and the body is, as the Minister says, one with teeth that will indirectly compel universities to change the application processes for students, the social mix will change. I accept that. At the same time, universities will admit people on subjective rather than objective grounds. There will be those who pass exams who do not get places, and those who do not pass exams who do get places. If I am right, that will happen, so the hon. Member for Bury, North is absolutely right: five years down the track that will not be an issue because the interference is happening now.

I have a question for the Minister. Let us assume that the hon. Member for Bury, North is right and the body is a light-touch regulator. The Government are clearly determined to ensure that there is change in universities. So what happens in five years if things have not worked? The regulator clearly has powers to put pressure on universities at the very least. What are the Government planning to do in those circumstances? It is hard to believe that this is all simply about having a plan, and that all that matters is that every university has a strategy and does not have to deliver anything. The access regulator becomes a much less problematic creature if that is all that we are talking about, but I do not believe that we are. Nothing in the Government's record convinces me that they simply intend that the plans will sit on the shelf.

Tim Collins (Conservative, Westmorland and Lonsdale)

It is, of course, the Conservatives' hope and expectation that we will be in government in five years. The Labour party must recognise that if, by some ill fortune, it were still in office then, it is quite possible that the Chancellor will be Prime Minister, and he would undoubtedly use his powers to interfere with admission.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

My hon. Friend is looking five years into the future.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. The hon. Gentleman is also testing the boundaries.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

In that case, I will let my hon. Friend's comments speak for themselves.

Amendment No. 24 would provide a clear counter-balance. We did not have the opportunity to set out our principal objection to the establishment of the access regulator during the debate on clause 28. In this

debate, however, we can suggest that, if the Government use the majority that they established for themselves in the Committee and insist on pushing through their proposal for an access regulator, the regulator's powers and remit must be tempered at the very least by the simple provision that he is constantly mindful of his objectives and the work that he does in the higher education sector. He must have a duty to ensure that full access to higher education is based on academic ability and potential, and that we do not start to admit people purely because of their social background. To do so would do those people no favours.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

I am becoming more and more angry, the longer that the hon. Gentleman speaks. He would delete fair access from the Bill on the premise that we seek to interfere with the admissions policy for the purpose of social engineering. I wish it were so, but where is that in the Bill?

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I do not want to repeat all my comments, but was the hon. Gentleman not listening when I said that almost all young people who obtain two A-levels go to university? By definition, if we are going to widen the net, the Government and the access regulator must be talking about admitting to universities young people who do not pass their A-levels.

Patrick Hall (Labour, Bedford)

The hon. Gentleman misunderstands the fundamental nature of outreach work in the field that we are discussing. It is not about leaping people over the need to pass the examinations and achieve the grades or to have the ability, but about trying to reach out to people and to generate the aspiration at a young enough age, backed by their parents and schools, to pass the examinations and achieve the grades at school. That is what outreach work is about, and he should support it.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

The Conservatives understand that perfectly well. I do not doubt for a moment the sincerity of the hon. Member for Nottingham, North when he talks about his constituency and his constituents. Our point is that the university admissions process will not solve the problem. Of course, people's aspirations should be addressed. The difference between us is that the Conservatives believe that the Government are seeking to gerrymander the university admissions process by pressing the universities to sort out a problem that should be solved elsewhere. The problem lies in the absence not only of choice in inner-city schools, but of Government determination to stamp out failure in many parts of our education system. The Government tolerate the fact that many school-leavers are unable to read or write, and they tolerate the culture that the hon. Member for Nottingham, North talked about.

Those problems cannot be dealt with by the higher education admissions system. That is where we differ: we believe that this measure is the wrong solution to the problem and an unwarranted interference with the university admissions process. It fails totally to reflect the good work that has been done already in many universities, and it is an inappropriate gerrymandering exercise that interferes with universities' independence

in a way in which politicians have never done in the past. We passionately believe that this measure should not be in the Bill.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

It may be appropriate for me to make a few observations at this point. First, I trust that hon. Members understand the ground rules by now. I have deliberately allowed a fairly wide-ranging debate on these amendments because it is abundantly plain that others flow from them, so it is appropriate to clarify the position from the beginning. However, it is highly unlikely that I shall permit a clause stand-part debate.

I look studiously at the Wall as I make my second point, so as not to appear to point a finger in any direction—if I may mix metaphors. Hon. Members on both sides of the Committee have been criticised for making lengthy speeches. The House has a proper tradition of intervention, which stimulates the flow of debate and is part of our democracy. If hon. Members are generous in allowing interventions, it is axiomatic that speeches will be longer. Therefore, it would help the proceedings if interventions were interventions, rather than speeches. If time permits, I trust that this Chairman, at least, will call all those Members who stand or seek to catch my eye.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

I congratulate the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) on his speech, which was long, but he took lots of interventions. He outlined the Conservative party's philosophy very eloquently, although, obviously, I wish to pick up on several issues. The speech was not of the sort that we have heard on other days, which have cost us at least 10 debates. It was a thoughtful speech.

Given your strictures, Mr. Gale, that we may go a little further than the scope of the amendments, I should like briefly to refer to the debates that we had under—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. The hon. Gentleman is an old friend, and he knows me well enough not to push his luck. The debate must relate to the clause in hand, not to previous clauses.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

Thank you for that guidance, Mr. Gale. I was starting to stray—even in my second sentence.

We are considering how the market works. I will not revisit our earlier debates. We accept that there is a market, but how perfect is it and how can we make it work? I think that it is deeply imperfect. Opposition Members sometimes use the term ''social engineering'' as a pejorative expression, as though, if there is any intervention or regulation, some social engineering is going on. An imperfect market, by definition, socially engineers a different outcome to that of a perfect market. For example, when kids of five or six are given IQ tests, regardless of background, some of them will be shown to have a high IQ, and others achieve will lower scores. When those youngsters are tracked, those of high IQ from working-class backgrounds cross over with those of lower IQ from middle-class backgrounds because, as they go through school and receive good parenting, their environment changes and they are tested, challenged and supported, as perhaps

other working class kids are not. That crossover has been demonstrated, and I hope that that is generally accepted in the Committee.

That is social engineering; the social circumstances of those children are such that even bright working-class kids are starting to be denied the chances that perhaps a perfect market—whether in parenting or schooling—might create for them. The first point that I want to make in reply to the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell is that social engineering starts at an early age. Attempting, rather feebly, some regulation at a later point might well be insufficient. It certainly does not deal with the root of the question. The hon. Gentleman and I may agree on that.

Social engineering takes place at all points. What we are trying consciously to do is bring in regulation through OFFA to bring about a little rebalancing, not by denying anyone the right to go to university—I have to be a little sharp with the hon. Gentleman, whose party's policies would reduce the number of youngsters going to university—but by making sure that those who are able can get to university. That is important.

Of course there are vice-chancellors—even my good friend Sir Colin Campbell of Nottingham university—who would like light-touch regulation. Many of us would like spending on health, education and policing without taxation. What a wonderful world that would be. However, that is to close our eyes to reality. Light-touch regulation will not enable us to make progress.

I draw succour from the hon. Gentleman's opening remarks: he wondered about the consequences if what is proposed does not work, and where we will be in 10 years. My reply is that we are now 40 years on from the first statistic that demonstrated that about 20 per cent. of working class kids go to university. As I mentioned in my first contribution in Committee, that figure has stayed static for those 40 years. There has been little progress on that percentage.

A light touch has been tried. Four decades of effort has been expended on that approach. Any Government—of whatever political party—who find that statistic unsatisfactory must deal with the question.

Jonathan R Shaw (Labour, Chatham and Aylesford)

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. However, in talking about the percentage of working-class kids going to university, is not it important to remember that in the 1970s 90 per cent. of the population was defined as coming from those groups? That figure has now declined to 40 per cent. As a consequence the problem is smaller than it was. One needs to recognise the changes in society and the fact that university has allowed social mobility.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

That is why we want university to be open to all those who are able and capable and who get the right qualifications. The raw numbers nevertheless fit into the percentages that I have explained. With the polytechnics becoming universities all of a sudden, there are more people going to university. We need to bear in mind the vast

expansion in universities, but I ask my hon. Friend to look, as I know he will, beyond the simple statistics and attend to the underlying problem.

Mark Francois (Conservative, Rayleigh)

I grew up in an area in many ways similar to large parts of the constituency that the hon. Gentleman eloquently described in previous sittings of the Committee. At 16, at the school that I went to, a great deal of raw talent that could have remained, and might well have benefited from a university education, walked out of the gate. However, the fundamental problem was in the school. The school did not do enough to encourage those people and build their aspirations. It is arguable that universities might have been able to do more in interacting with the school, but in my experience the fundamental problem was at the schools rather than the universities, and that is where the burden should lie.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

I am happily surprised by the hon. Gentleman's intervention, which is pertinent to the debate. No one should run away with the idea that OFFA will become a body that revolutionises education for most people in this country, but it can contribute even in its current weak form. It could make an even better contribution to help those youngsters to whom the hon. Gentleman referred.

In addition, the role of the Committee is to improve legislation. Whether we win or lose Divisions, by our very debates I hope that we will influence the minds of not only the Minister and his officials, but the vice-chancellors who read our debates. I have not yet heard anyone in Committee say that they are totally satisfied with the way universities bridge into the community.

The hon. Gentleman makes a very important distinction between—to use a footballing analogy—the scouting of talent, which universities are doing in their different ways quite well, and the building of a football academy for six to 11-year-olds for training and skills a little earlier on. Perhaps we need to look to vice-chancellors to become far more a part of the education family, rather than just scouting for and picking out the youngsters who have got through an unnecessarily testing educational experience to make it to the top.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

The hon. Gentleman is making a most interesting and broadly sensitive speech. Would he not accept that, paradoxically, one danger of going down the regulatory route is that if minimum requirements for access plans are specified, certain institutions may be tempted to do simply that and not develop their own approach beyond the minimum requirements of the access regulator's remit?

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

The hon. Gentleman makes a very sound point. There is always a problem, but I rest that part of my case on the failure to get stuck into the appalling statistic that eight out of 10 working class kids cannot enter university because they have a congenital learning problem. That is not the case, and at this point in our history, after 40 years of that relatively static statistic, we must take responsibility for it and help universities and vice-chancellors to progress.

We can help in Committee. The idea started as the brainchild of someone in No. 10 Downing street,

perhaps assisted by Nick Barr—whose friend, my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Mudie), reads his works at great length—and Mr. Iain Crawford, who was of a more practical mind and attempted to link fees with political reality. I understand that Mr. Crawford is not enjoying the best of health at the moment and I wish him well in his recovery.

When No.10 seized upon the idea, as happens when policy-making, the concepts of a £3,000 grant and proper regulation were not floated. Imperfect as the consultation may have been, and I do not cast aspersions on my right hon. Friends the Minister of State and the Secretary of State, who have done an incredible job subsequently to get the show back on the road, Parliament, through the Opposition and Government parties, has helped to improve the Bill.

We ended up with a £1,000 grant at the beginning of last autumn; we now have a £2,700 grant plus a £300 bursary, perhaps overlain—when my right hon. Friend writes to the Committee once his officials have done their research properly—by dozens and dozens of universities helping to push the grant even higher.

In addition, OFFA has appeared through the White Paper, and we can improve that concept too. What started as an idea about how we could raise one thirteenth of the money that universities need by allowing graduates to repay when they are able to pay can become something far wider. It has, by dint of the effort of Members in this House, been made into something that could be extremely valuable for the people we represent.

We need to integrate our universities into our education system. It is a stereotype to talk about ivory towers and academics, and about people being distant from reality. Nevertheless, the reality is that universities are somewhat distant from the rest of our education system. On a later amendment I will talk about how the smallest nursery in someone's constituency is inspected by Ofsted. The most capable and able further education college is inspected by Ofsted. Every primary and secondary school is inspected by Ofsted, even to the extent of driving certain heads in the past—we have changed it a little now—to the verge of nervous breakdown and beyond. Can we get our most senior uncle in the education system, the universities, into that family and give them the joys of being inspected by Ofsted, so that they are making the contribution that we expect of everybody else, even of people dealing with under-fives? I will float that in a later group of amendments.

So as to have a rigorous process of inspection, so that we obtain proper effect and value for money from universities, what did we have in the White Paper? On the consultative paper on widening participation, it was suggested that OFFA would not have any inspection capability, but would merely enter into access agreements with any institution that wished to charge more than the standard fee for any course. That has become the way we do that. OFFA was intended to be a reactive body. The universities themselves would devise their own access agreements, according to what they deemed

''necessary to achieve their widening participation ambitions,''

and to choose the milestones and indicators that would be used to monitor their progress. It would be OFFA that would then decide whether the institution was making a genuine effort to apply those.

This is a curious role and almost unique in regulatory history in this country. Most regulators operate from a statutory framework of rules and ensure that those affected comply with them. OFFA, it seems, will let the institutions write their own rules and then decide whether they are acceptable. That will draw some cynical chortles from school heads and further education principals who have recently had the Ofsted experience. Some, indeed, presented me with this badge, which says, ''I've been well and truly Ofsteded.'' I certainly would not suggest that this process should go up from the universities to the ministerial team or Back-Bench MPs or the Select Committee on Education and Skills. Who knows where full inspection could stop if we are determined to extract every possible assistance from those who service our education system?

It was initially proposed that the Education Secretary should write to the head of OFFA with intermittent revisions, setting out OFFA's statutory duties and how they were to be met. This presupposed a statute giving OFFA a clear set of principles to which to work. Unfortunately, this Bill does not do that. It is not clear from the Bill what that set of principles is. The Bill merely gives OFFA the duty

''to promote and safeguard fair access to higher education,''

which, sadly, the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell would seek to remove from the Bill. That would not help us get the sort of education system we are all after. However, the Bill does not contain any definition of the highly debatable term ''fair access'' and leaves OFFA's criteria either to future regulations, which Parliament may not be able to amend, or to future guidance, which Parliament may not even see in advance. I raise that in a later amendment, so I will not continue down that path.

I believe that OFFA's mission is so important that it should be defined on the face of the Bill, debated fully by Parliament, and revisited annually by Parliament, through the Select Committee on Education and Skills. That is why I have tabled my amendments. They define the key concept of fair access, they ensure that OFFA is guided by equality legislation and tackles overt and covert barriers to access, and they give Parliament, the universities and the public the chance to discuss how OFFA should work.

I would also like to see OFFA given the power and money to act on its own initiative, rather than simply react to what the universities set before it. OFFA could do a great deal to make young people think about further and higher education and could address the complex factors that keep them from pursuing it. More than that, universities should be part of the local education system, helping to raise standards in their own area.

I hope that the Government will take my concerns seriously. In doing so they would remove uncertainty, and ensure that OFFA helps to achieve the higher education levels for those who can aspire in our system.

Amendment No. 193 seeks to prohibit discrimination of any prescription, and says that the director of fair access

''should have regard to any legislation for the time being in force which is intended to prohibit discrimination or promote equality''.

Amendment. No. 194 requests that OFFA has regard to the need to eliminate covert forms of discrimination and the denial of opportunity. That is very pertinent to the points made by the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell. We need our regulator not merely to be a referee once the game has taken place, we need it to dig back into those very causes outlined by the hon. Gentleman and by his colleague on the Front-Bench, the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Collins). We need OFFA to examine why this underachievement takes place, and why we waste those people of talent from a working-class background. If the regulator is to do anything, it must be encouraged and allowed to get on with that particular job.

Tim Collins (Conservative, Westmorland and Lonsdale)

The hon. Gentleman is now turning to the text of the amendments that he has tabled. Could I tease out from him a point of clarification? Although he has tabled amendment No. 193, surely the regulator would be governed, as is everyone else in our society, by whatever legislation relating to discrimination is put on the statute book by Parliament. I do not see how amendment No. 193 alters the legal position.

With regard to amendment No. 194, to the extent that there is a distinction between covert discrimination, referred to in this amendment, and the other forms of discrimination—which would, in any case, be covered by existing or perhaps future legislation—would he explain what he means, and whether he thinks he is broadening sensibly the range of interpretations of discrimination that have already been legislated upon at some length by Parliament?

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

The hon. Gentleman is right to pick me up on my drafting. As he will know, when one is attempting to secure a debate in Committee, getting the amendment in is probably more important than getting the wording absolutely right. Even the Clerks cannot make a silk purse out of my sow's ear on OFFA.

Nevertheless, raising the issue of the broader discrimination that does take place, we are obviously now signatories to the European convention on human rights, and all the other things that flow from that. The aim is to draw in that wider sense of equity that we would all like to see in our society.

Amendment No. 221 states:

''Without prejudice to the performance of his duties under this section, the Director may take any action which he considers likely to promote fairer access to higher education.''

In a way, that gives the ability of initiation—by appointing someone, hopefully of extremely high calibre, who can address the problems, and not merely say ''if ever I get an access agreement I will

make a few points.'' We need someone of great ability, who can address the questions that the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell put on our agenda earlier.

There is a problem with the numbers available. If we pass the Bill, it will make virtually no short-term difference to my constituents' prospects. There may be a number who have been put off by not having a grant, and I hope that their teachers will encourage them to go to university rather than go to work. But I do not anticipate that that will make a massive difference in the short term.

I have not always agreed with the directors of Ofsted. However, if we employ people of that calibre—who are capable of getting their teeth into those issues and coming up with answers and proposals in order to push Governments of any complexion—in the long term, we will have done a great service to those people who wish to go to university, but often feel that it is not for them.

Amendment No. 221 is the most important of those amendments. For the first time, it imposes a duty on the institution that would allow it to see where the problems are and tackle them.

As I said in my intervention on the hon. Gentleman, we should look not merely for ways into sixth forms and 14 to 16-year-old education, but further back down the food chain and make serious proposals about how that would work. We should make serious plans and proposals for outreach, using best practice. Committee members have been inundated with good practice from universities. We need that pull together to ensure that people use those best practices at the earliest opportunity.

We also need to look at specific disadvantaged groups. I am not referring solely to their socio-economic class. Sometimes their racial or gender specification are important. In my constituency, it is my experience that ethnic minorities and asylum seekers often act as role models for established non-traditional and traditional groups. Universities need to become partners with the local education authorities and become intimately involved with them, rather than viewing them as bodies that merely come in, look at the best talent and help those people get to university.

The Minister knows that the universities of Nottingham and Trent—both of which are close to my constituency—have attempted to build on six school sites that have to kick children out on to the streets at 16, and help them provide vocational training for 14 to 16-year-olds. I referred to those sites earlier. The provision needs to be extended to 14 to 18 or 19-year-olds, in order to keep those kids on site at 16. Those young people could then continue to study information technology, health and beauty, service industry skills, catering, motor engineering and so on. There should be a small offering on each of those constituencies.

To their credit, FE colleges in Nottinghamshire have agreed to brand a 14 to 18 centre on those school sites. The universities have also seen the problem that lies within 1 mile of the ivy-covered walls of Nottingham university's nice campus and Trent university's dynamic city centre campus. Many

Committee members have visited the former site. The universities have agreed to brand a centre on those school sites, even though it may appear to be of no relevance to them. That is not a talent-driven initiative, but is intended to help the community build vocational training that may not immediately appear to be of benefit to the universities.

Mark Francois (Conservative, Rayleigh)

The hon. Gentleman has put away the partisan knockabout this morning and, if I may say so, is making a thoughtful speech. Is the thrust of his argument, which I have been following closely, that the bulk of the responsibility for changing the existing culture will lie with schools even though universities have a role to play? Does he agree with that?

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

No, I do not. We are all in this together—it is a classic case of joined-up thinking. We must get universities working with secondary schools, and primary schools working with the under-fives. Sure Start needs to work through. There has to be a continuum, so that people who do not go to university can continue lifelong learning in some other way.

Universities sometimes see themselves as slightly apart from the rest of the educational system, but I am talking not only about education. I am offering my right hon. Friend the Minister the chance to draw the universities in so that they are willing to play a serious part in overcoming some of the deep problems encountered by my constituents and those of many of my colleagues. To take the argument slightly wider, we must link the issue with the way in which secondary schools deal with their local police, antisocial behaviour orders and discipline. We should not force schools to include people who will lower standards for those who are desperately trying to claw their way up the attainment ladder. So, the issue is far broader and involves health, policing and many other things.

To return to the Bill, however, OFFA gives us the chance, if we are prepared to take it, of drawing universities into the educational family. They would not merely be talent scouts but could bring their tremendous expertise to bear on deeper problems. Solving those problems will require us to tackle attainment at secondary, primary and pre-school level.

Let me give one final example. I have done a lot of work on social behaviour as opposed to antisocial behaviour. As soon as I discussed my proposals with Sir Colin Campbell and Neil Gorman—the two vice-chancellors of Nottingham's universities—they put the resources of their relevant departments at my disposal. That is a tiny example, but people working in child psychiatry or researching sexual health issues will now be at my disposal and at that of secondary schools in my constituency. That is one benefit of universities reuniting with the populations that they are meant to serve.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

I am about to wind up, but I shall give the hon. Gentleman the benefit of my inspiration.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

The hon. Gentleman is making an eloquent speech. Is he not describing the powerful contributions that the university sector has made to

help address problems about which he as a constituency MP is rightly concerned? Given that excellent practice, why is it necessary to pass a law?

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

It is not necessary to pass a law, to use the hon. Gentleman's phrase. However, it is necessary to strip away the universities' need to be defensive about their role in our broader educational system. They are part of the family, and we should welcome them as such. We should challenge and make demands on them. We should ensure that they can make a contribution. I have given a couple of examples of what they might do from my experience, and I am sure that all hon. Members could bring similar anecdotes to bear.

I know how deeply the Minister cares—not least because of his constituency experience—about ensuring that every youngster who can do so takes up the chance to go to university. At the moment, however, OFFA is a reactive body that is unable to inspect—I shall come to that on later amendments—and which in many ways is a pussy cat. What we need is a tiger to ensure that universities play their full part in education. If the Minister cannot accept the amendment as its stands, I hope very much that he will at least take away the thoughts that we have put on record. We should make OFFA an institution of which all parties can proud and which will survive not only this Government, but which an incoming Conservative Government will welcome in 30 year's time as well.

Several hon. Members rose—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. Before I call the next Member, I should explain the Chairman's general approach to the calling of speakers in these debates. Traditionally, the Chairman will call the mover of the lead amendment, then those who wish to speak to amendments standing in their names, then other Front-Bench spokesmen and then Back-Bench Members; hence, Mr. Clappison.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

I shall speak to amendment No. 235, which stands in my name and deals with the important matter of admissions. I also speak in support of the excellent amendment No. 24. In addition, although it may come as a surprise, I listened carefully to the thoughtful speech of the hon. Member for Nottingham, North and I have a certain sympathy for his amendments Nos. 193 and 194. However, I shall need to hear more about them during the debate, and I shall be extremely interested to hear what the Minister says.

We are considering one of the parts of the Bill that worry me the most. As the Committee will have gathered, the other effect that worries me the most is that on families with lower and middle incomes—a vast range of families. My concern is that there will be a disincentive for young people from such families to apply to universities, because they will face an additional burden of debt that is far worse than the debt that they face now. However, if I go much further down that road, you will call me to order, Mr. Gale, and rightly so.

I feel strongly about this matter, which is why I am anxious to go into the facts and figures with some particularity to compare the situation for students now—in pounds, shillings and pence—with the future situation, which in my view will be much worse under the Bill. My feelings are so strong because my assessment is that people's opportunities will be reduced.

The measure could reduce opportunities in another important way. We established earlier that higher education institutions face serious consequences if they fail to comply with the requirements of the director of fair access. Although I made the argument in earlier debates, it is relevant to remind ourselves that the issue concerns not only the director's will, but that of the Government, given the relationship between the Secretary of State and the director that the legislation creates and the detailed statutory guidance to the director that the Government have issued. As my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale rightly said in an intervention, the Bill means that behind the director will stand the Secretary of State.

I have also argued, equally relevantly, that higher education institutions will inevitably direct their minds to complying with the requirements being set for them, given the serious financial consequences if they fail to do so. Higher education institutions will be exercised by exactly how to jump through the hoops being set before them. We have already heard that, in essence, the issue is about encouraging applications and not interfering directly with admissions, and we shall no doubt hear that said again. The Minister used that form of words, and I think he is giving his assent to that. I completely accept his good faith on that point.

It seems, however, already to be in the interests of institutions to seek talented youngsters from as wide a range of sources as possible. I am mindful of the great deal of evidence that institutions are doing just that, including, and perhaps especially, the most prestigious Russell group universities. In the light of that, I pose this question: is there is any evidence or suggestion from the Government that those institutions, including the prestigious ones, are failing in that regard or not doing as much as they could? I want to hear from the Minister specifically on that.

It seems to me that those institutions would not be serving their own interest through any such failure or complacency, given the competitive nature and much greater extent of today's university sector. Universities face severe competition. They are under a lot of scrutiny—I take the point made by the hon. Member for Nottingham, North—and it is in their interest to keep their standards as high as they can manage.

The key question for universities is how they are going to be judged. How can they show that they are complying with the requirements of the director of fair access and the Government? Accepting for the sake of argument that there is a distinction between applications and admissions—to put it another way, there is a difference between activity in promoting applications and outcomes in terms of admissions—I draw the attention of Government Members to the fact that, although universities can encourage

applications and do a lot to do just that, they cannot control them. In particular, although they might encourage applications from one source, they cannot discourage applications from another.

We have spent a lot of time discussing Cambridge, which the hon. Member for Cambridge (Mrs. Campbell), as its representative, has rightly drawn to our attention. However, I shall have a lot to say about other universities that we might have overlooked but which, like Oxford and Cambridge, are very important. It is a fact that certain universities—obviously including Oxford and Cambridge, but a number of others as well—attract a disproportionately high number of applications from certain types of school. Let us be frank about that and put our cards on the table. They receive a higher number of applications from independent schools, selective grammar schools and a certain number of high-performing state schools, some of which are in my constituency. A large number of parents in my constituency send children to such schools and a number of them go on to prestigious institutions.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if a university is to keep up its high standards, it is essential for it to attract the best applicants? Does he also agree that when only 9 per cent. of the applicants come from the lower social classes, it is obvious that that university is not attracting all the best applicants? Some applicants from the lower income groups are not applying to that university but should be, if it is to achieve the highest standards.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

There are a number of assumptions in what the hon. Lady says. Although universities can encourage applications, they cannot control them or determine that applications should come from a certain source. There is another important assumption that I think she has accepted, given her earlier intervention: if the universities control admissions, she assumes that that will somehow have an effect on applications from particular schools. She can correct me if I am wrong, but I think she is on record as saying that although OFFA will be concerned with applications, in her view it should also be concerned with admissions. I shall give way if she wants to correct that or enlarge on it.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

I am grateful for the opportunity to clarify my intention in this area. It is important that OFFA should encourage applications from students with non-traditional backgrounds. My concern is that, having got those students to apply, the universities may exclude some of those students if they continue to use the admissions procedures that they use at the moment. At a later stage, I am prepared to make a short speech—it would not be appropriate to do so during an intervention—to amplify what I want to say.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

On the point of admissions, the hon. Lady and I may not be as far apart as she might think. I would be prepared to leave admissions to individual universities, strictly subject to the principle of merit. She and I might be close, perhaps on how merit is interpreted, but if merit is to be overridden by other factors, that might be a different matter. I fear that the Bill will do far more of what she hopes it will do than she apparently believes at the moment. I fear that it

will meet what I take to be the objectives of some Labour Members. If she will listen, I shall explain how that will come about.

When there is a high number of applications from certain types of school and those applications are judged on merit, it is likely that the student body of the institution will contain many more students from such schools than will that of other institutions. This may provide the hon. Lady with some comfort, but in those circumstances I would support a realistic approach to merit in appropriate cases, subject to the individual judgment of academics.

I commend to the Committee an excellent editorial on the subject in the Evening Standard last week. Among other matters, to which I shall refer later, it mentioned the subject of merit:

''Admission tutors already recognise that decent grades from a sink school, alongside other evidence of talent, may represent a greater achievement than better scores from a good school.''

I would certainly accept that in appropriate cases, but it would have to be subject to the judgment of individual academics, free from any outside pressure and strictly based on a realistic assessment and interpretation of merit. That is how the principle of merit should be interpreted, but that, I fear, is not what the provision is about. It is about something completely different from and antagonistic, if not antithetical, to the principle of merit, which will certainly override it.

My next point will certainly give comfort to Labour Members. The Secretary of State gave us some clues as to what this is really all about in his statement of 8 January when he referred to the focus of OFFA's work. He spelt that out clearly in the draft statutory guidance that was given to OFFA and which contains the answer to the key question of how universities are to be judged by OFFA. In fact, this is spelled out clearly twice in the document, in which he says:

''I would expect that OFFA would expect the most, in terms of outreach and financial support, from institutions whose records suggest that they have furthest to go in securing a broadly-based intake''.

That is in paragraph 2, and the same is said of the access agreement under paragraph 6—''Approving an access agreement''—which clearly spells it out for the institutions, in a similar form of words, that the most is to be expected

''from institutions whose records suggest they have furthest to go in securing a broadly-based intake of students.''

This is the key point—[Interruption.] Perhaps the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Kali Mountford) will contain herself for a moment. The key point is that what is expected of universities is to be determined by the intake. If the intake is not broadly based, they will be put in the dock, hauled up for judgment before OFFA and told to do more. They know what lies in store if they fail—a substantial penalty.

I have a question for Labour Members, including the Minister: given that that is what universities are being told is expected of them, how can it do other than put huge financial pressures on them over admissions? They will be judged on outcomes in terms of admissions, not on activity in terms of

applications. There is no provision on how many applications they must encourage; they will be judged purely on outcomes in terms of admissions.

I am not the only one to have noted that. It has been widely noted, and I quote again from what I regard as the fair-minded article in the Evening Standard:

''Mr. Clark may insist that Offa will have no power over individual admissions. But if he creates a procedure which penalises universities for the overall outcome of their decisions in individual cases, he is manifestly interfering in admissions.''

The Bill and the statutory guidance do precisely that.

Mark Francois (Conservative, Rayleigh)

I want to reiterate a point that my hon. Friend has touched on. Whatever universities do, they can choose to admit only from the pool of people who apply to them; they cannot compel people to apply. It is not fair that they should be punished if people from certain socio-economic groups do not apply to them in the first place.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

On what should be done to encourage people from individual schools to apply later on, one of my contentions is that interfering in admissions, and putting financial pressure on universities, will not help or encourage the people that the hon. Member for Nottingham, North mentioned.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

The hon. Gentleman made a lengthy speech, so I will give way to him later, perhaps when he has heard the full extent of my remarks. I know his thinking on the issue and I agree with much of what he says.

The guidance refers to ''a broadly based intake''. That is the bottom line for the Government as far as the universities and the director of fair access—the whole caboodle—are concerned. The Government owe it to the Committee and the universities to tell us precisely what that phrase means. What are the size and nature of the hoops that universities will be required to jump through? I think that it will create distortions and possible unfairness in the system. There will certainly be a widespread perception of unfairness.

Sir Howard Newby, who, as the chief executive of HEFCE, should know what he is talking about, predicted today that there will be a large influx of students from EU accession countries. That is his prediction, not mine. He thinks that the 5,000 undergraduates from those countries could rise to at least 20,000. Will they come under the remit of the director of fair access? Will they be regarded as part of a broadly based intake or will they be exempt from the attentions of—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Worcester (Mr. Foster) disagrees, but I am only quoting the words of the Government and Sir Howard Newby.

Several hon. Members rose—

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

I will take an intervention from the hon. Member for Bury, North and then the hon.

Member for Nottingham, North, if he feels that he cannot constrain himself any longer. To be fair, I will then let my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Mr. Boswell) intervene.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

Accepting the ingenuity of the hon. Member for Hertsmere, which I think worthy of the front page of the Daily Mail, in linking the accession countries and the office for fair access, does he not think that his honest and welcome remark earlier about his support for a realistic approach to merit implies that there will be a move to a broader-based intake? Is that not the consequence of what he argues?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

No. The hon. Gentleman has a lot of experience in the sector, but I think that universities largely take merit into account. It is in their interest that they do so because they want to reach the highest possible standards. They will do that by admitting people on merit, as far as they possibly can, which means admitting the best possible students. If a student from a difficult background, who has perhaps not had the same educational advantages as others, has merit, they will adjust things accordingly.

The question is how to interpret the principle of merit. The financial pressure that the measure creates wholly overrides the principle of merit and is all about a broadly based intake. The hon. Gentleman has made a number of interventions, and my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry has been patient. I will return to the hon. Gentleman as I have a question that I want to ask him later on, to which the Committee needs to know the answer.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

Going back to the specific point that my hon. Friend rightly raised relating to the extension of the European Union, is it not the case that all 10 of the new entrant countries have national income levels that are less than 75 per cent. of the Community average? If it is a matter of taking an interest in access for the most disadvantaged students, a priori, one would expect that the universities would be under an obligation to admit more from such groups, bearing in mind that the basis of European legislation is that there should be no distinction between citizens of this country and applicants from other member states. In other words, if we are in the business of expanding access, does OFFA have to take an interest in European Union students and secure their best interests?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

My hon. Friend makes an important point. He mentioned European legislation, as did the hon. Member for Nottingham, North. I would be very interested in eminent legal opinion—I have not received any such advice—as to whether the Government are breaching the European convention on human rights with the discrimination that they are introducing.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

The hon. Gentleman obviously has to make his points about the straw man—that OFFA will try to impose unqualified or less suitably qualified people on universities. I accept that that argument is an aspect of the party political battle, but no one has said anything to sustain it.

I want to ask the hon. Gentleman a personal question. Imagine a young person, not from a

privileged background, who had fought very hard and worked his way through difficult educational circumstances to get a couple of A-levels. He applies to a university and is given preference over people who are better qualified. Can the hon. Gentleman put himself in the position of that young person and imagine how he would feel? He would not want to be in that situation and would rather go to a university that is appropriate for his level of qualification. He would not want to be a fish out of water or seen as in some way inferior to his peers. Were this straw man actual policy—it is not—it would not benefit even the individuals to whom the hon. Gentleman refers, but would make them feel worse and would lessen their educational attainment.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point, but he has not grasped the fact that I am talking about merit. I am asking what it is. I have not employed the argument that is sometimes used by people to attack what the Government are doing because it is not necessary to do so. The problem is that they are not taking merit into account at all. They are overriding it by requiring universities to have a broadly based intake. If he searches through the statutory guidance and the Bill, he will find no mention of admissions on merit.

The hon. Gentleman makes a convincing case, to which I hope the Minister will listen, for accepting amendment No. 24, which seeks to

''ensure full access to higher education based upon academic ability and potential''.

The Minister would also address the problem that the hon. Gentleman raises were he to accept amendment No. 235, which states:

''A plan under this section relating to any institution may not include any provisions relating to admissions to that institution.''

Admissions should not be affected. If the Minister is prepared to be as good as his word, he will accept that amendment.

Does the hon. Member for Bury, North agree with the interpretation of the hon. Member for Cambridge, that the measure applies to admissions as well as applications? I give way to him. [Interruption.] I must have reached a lacuna in the Committee's proceedings.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. First, the hon. Member for Bury, North was not seeking to intervene. Secondly, with great respect, the hon. Member for Hertsmere cannot invite another hon. Member to make a speech.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

We reached a rare moment in our proceedings when the hon. Member for Bury, North did not wish to intervene. If I have managed to silence him, I have achieved something.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

Does it occur to my hon. Friend that the non-speech of the hon. Member for Bury, North may be analogous to the non-application from the disadvantaged student who ought to go on to higher education but has neither sought nor been offered a place?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

I seem to have brought forth another one.

Kali Mountford (Labour, Colne Valley)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for calling me ''another one'', and for giving way.

The hon. Gentleman needs to pay greater attention to one part of his argument and perhaps give a definition to the Committee. Given that, depending on one's point of view, there are different ways of using the words ''merit'' and ''potential'', which have a range of definitions, can he define what he means by the terms and explain how the amendment helps the Committee?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

I apologise if there was any ungraciousness on my part. I was referring to the intervention, not to the hon. Lady.

I am happy with the wording of amendment No. 24, which I commend to the hon. Lady. I think that it is widely understood. I would leave the assessment of merit and academic ability in the hands of institutions and academics, free from pressure.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

Free from pressure, but surely not free from examination. The hon. Gentleman will accept that a great deal of public money goes into those institutions, and the spending of public money should be transparent. That raises the matter of admissions.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

I accept that universities have to be transparent when making it clear that they are assessing people strictly on merit and that applications are all determined on merit. However, I fear that that is not what widening participation is about. There is a different agenda altogether, which is reflected in the statutory guidance, in some of the funding mechanisms that the Government have put in place, and, in particular, in policies relating to education. I am happy to go into those, but I think that I would be trespassing on your patience, Mr. Gale. You have already been extremely patient. I will try to make some progress, but I can give Labour Members chapter and verse of where academic merit has been overridden in the name of—I hesitate to use the phrase ''social engineering'', so I will use the Government's own choice of words—''a broadly based intake''.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I should like a little more clarity from the hon. Gentleman. As I understand it, amendment No. 24 will ensure that the clause reads: the director must perform his functions to

''ensure full access . . . based upon academic ability and potential.''

How could anybody ensure full access based on those criteria unless he knew what was meant by academic ability and potential? If that is left up to the universities, I do not understand how the director can fulfil that function.

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

I said that I support the amendment moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell, who can say more about it. I am supporting his attempts to make the best of a bad job. I do not want a director or an office for fair access. Instead, I want matters to be left in the hands of individual institutions and a more realistic approach to be taken towards creating opportunities for young people.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

I will make a little progress, if I may, because I think that I might get into trouble for taking up too much of the Committee's time. I know that other Members are waiting to speak. Perhaps I will give the hon. Gentleman one more try later. [Interruption.] Well, go on then. I am being tempted.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

I accept that it would have been entirely out of order for me to have responded to the hon. Gentleman's question earlier, but if he cares to repeat it the next time I intervene, I will happily reply to it. My current point is that if he is so satisfied that existing arrangements work well, can he answer the question that the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell could not? That question is: why does the record of individual universities vary so greatly?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

Dare I say it, but perhaps the hon. Gentleman has not been paying attention to what I have been saying because I covered that point earlier. When I gave way to him before it was because he had indicated earlier that he wanted to intervene. I was just being patient and trying to get around to him after I had taken interventions from other hon. Members. Perhaps in the fullness of time we will hear whether he wants the director of fair access to deal with admissions rather than applications.

The hon. Gentleman raises the question of cause and effect, which my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell dealt with quite properly in his opening remarks. If we want children from the backgrounds to which the hon. Member for Nottingham, North referred to go to university, which is a laudable intention, we must examine standards and aspirations in schools and how they can be raised to encourage children to apply to universities.

We have spent a lot of time discussing Oxford and Cambridge—understandably, as the hon. Member for Cambridge is keen to discuss Cambridge—and other illustrious universities, such as Nottingham, which is near the top of the prestigious list of Russell group universities. Those universities have a relatively small student intake compared with the whole university population, and they are elite institutions that demand very high standards.

If such high numbers of students from the constituency of the hon. Member for Nottingham, North or anywhere else are to go to university, we must talk more about other universities, some of which have not received a look-in at all—certainly the new universities. It was very good of the hon. Lady to mention Anglia polytechnic university, but we have not heard any mention of other former polytechnics or the huge number of places on offer at excellent universities, such as Leeds, Manchester, and Hull, which is represented by the Minister. I am sure that he knows Hull university well.

I am not sure whether Hull university is a member of the Russell group, but the standard of teaching and quality of university life there is second to none. To add a word of praise, I know that it does a tremendous amount of work helping local people get into education. I am told that the cost of living is very

cheap as well, but the right hon. Gentleman can probably tell us more about that. We must talk about those universities as well as the elite institutions.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the spread of universities. If we agree with Labour Members that talent is being wasted and that there are people who would excel at university if they had the opportunity to go, does he accept that the results at universities that voluntarily widen participation will improve and that they will set a precedent that others will want to follow, given the need for all universities to demonstrate that they are delivering academically?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

My hon. Friend makes an important point. What does the Minister think the effect of all that financial pressure will be on universities? I look forward to hearing his answer. I suggest to him and other Labour Members that the Government are overriding the merit principle of admissions and, importantly, the independent academic judgment on admissions that should be part of academic freedom. The Government may say that they are not interfering with that freedom, but the only freedom that academics will be left with is to choose how to do what the director of fair access and the Government tell them to do.

The proposal will put academics and university departments in an invidious position. They might find themselves saying, ''On strict merit, X is the best candidate, but if we admit him we may be penalised for taking too many students from his type of school.'' The pressure to override merit will probably be greatest in elite universities and in over-subscribed subjects such as law, English and psychology. That will be unfair on academics, whose judgment will be overridden; they are being asked to do the Government's and OFFA's dirty work. It will also be deeply unfair on applicants, who will suffer because of factors in their background that are unrelated to academic merit.

I shall quote once again—I can do no better than to do so—from the fair-minded article in the Evening Standard. [Laughter.] Labour Members may like some parts of the article, but they should read all of it. Perhaps the Minister can answer the question that it poses:

''What does Mr. Clarke propose to say to the 18-year-olds turned down despite meeting the necessary standards? They chose the wrong parents? Or the wrong postcode'',

or whatever would be wrong under the definition of a broadly based intake that the Minister is to supply later?

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

No, the Committee will have to accept that I have been generous in giving way. I put it to Labour Members that the proposal is unfair on universities and applicants and will cause a deep sense of resentment of the type that the hon. Member for Nottingham, North described. It will be unfair on the wider public, too, because it will inevitably result in a dilution of standards in our universities. They will not be allowed—particularly the most prestigious institutions—to select and admit students purely on

merit, but will have to apply other criteria as well. Standards will suffer and the country will suffer from that. Our universities will be less competitive than those of other countries that admit strictly on merit.

What will happen to the individuals who have been turned down because of something that is wrong about the type of school that they have attended, or in their background? They will be left with a long and lingering sense of resentment. They will certainly, in many cases, feel that they have not attended the university of their choice. It will be interesting to see whether many choose to go to universities in other countries where such discrimination is not practised. Labour Members should not be under any illusion. Some may welcome the measure, but it will put huge financial pressure on universities and put people at risk of discrimination.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

The amendment refers to access ''based on academic ability'', and I accept that the hon. Gentleman is sincerely pushing that, but how can a university offer places to people before the A-level results on that basis? It must choose people to offer places. The hon. Gentleman will understand the response of the student who applies for a place at Leeds and is told not that he has a place if he gets two As, but that a place is not on offer. How can choices be based on academic ability when offers go out before the results are known?

James Clappison (Conservative, Hertsmere)

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. I am no expert, but I think that he will find that universities look carefully at the grades that children accomplish at GCSE and at their school reports. They then set a certain level for the students to attain at A-level—an A and two Bs, or two As and a B, or for Oxbridge, probably three As—depending on the level of demand for the university in question. It is guided by academic ability. The hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to practice; at the moment, many of the popular, over-subscribed and most prestigious universities make higher offers to children from some types of school than they do to children from other types of school. That is what I believe has happened.

Increasingly, children from certain types of school will not receive an offer at all, no matter how well they have achieved in their GCSEs or how many As or A*s they get, because they will run up against the problem that the Government are creating for universities. The university will be afraid that it will not have the broadly based intake referred to in the statutory guidance, on which a judgment will be made as to whether it will get its hands on the variable fee that the Government will allow it to charge.

Universities are under huge financial pressure and that is how I fear—with good reason, I believe—that the provisions will work. There may be Labour Members who would like to see it work in that way; they might find that it is even better than they think it is already. I find myself hard put to say which aspect of the Bill is more obnoxious—the huge amount of debt with which students are being saddled, or the discrimination that is being introduced. If Labour Members will answer my question about whether the measure should deal with applications or acceptances,

I will in the fullness of time be able to tell them what I think about that. However, at present, I consider both elements are discriminatory and against the interests of individual students and the universities.

Jonathan R Shaw (Labour, Chatham and Aylesford)

Amendment No. 268, which I tabled, concerns the extent of the Secretary of State's leverage or power in respect of OFFA. I want to make some comments on what else has been said. There will be no convincing Conservative Members that OFFA is anything other than a sinister form of manipulation. They are portraying the proposal as one for a Minister for admissions. We are not going to have that; that is the difference between Labour and Conservative Members.

The OFFA proposal presents a clear ideological difference. I understand why Conservative Members do not support it; it is a level of intervention that they think unnecessary. That is an entirely reasonable standpoint. However, we on the Labour Benches s believe that, as we are putting additional public money into our higher education institutions, it is reasonable for us to have a light-touch expectation that they will do their level best to widen participation—for all the reasons that we have agreed. Working-class kids from poor backgrounds should have the opportunity to go to university.

One can argue that the issue is attainment and about getting those two A-levels, but it is how you get the attainment—not you, Mr. Gale, I am sure that you have lots of attainment. How the young person arrives at that attainment relates not just to the school but to the wider community. As my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North said so eloquently, this is about universities being part of that wider family and spreading their influence. That will have an impact on schools, which will have an impact on individuals.

We have heard about lots of cases of best practice. The hon. Member for Hertsmere (Mr. Clappison) said that perhaps we had heard too much about the elite universities and not enough about the former polytechnics. I referred to Greenwich university, which has a joint campus with Kent in the Medway towns in my constituency. Some excellent work has been done there: summer schools and a children's university, which has been inspiring. The vice-chancellor has taken part in graduation ceremonies for youngsters leaving the children's university, and all the parents have come to see that wonderful occasion.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I join the hon. Gentleman in applauding the work of the two universities that have come together in his constituency. Does he not recognise that he and his colleagues are making the case for those of us on the Conservative Benches? Each time that a Labour Member stands up, they applaud the work of their local university. What more evidence does the Committee need that the work is being done and that we do not need to pass new laws and set up new bureaucracies to deliver the goals that the hon. Gentleman is talking about?

Jonathan R Shaw (Labour, Chatham and Aylesford)

The hon. Gentleman makes an entirely reasonable point. He describes an ideological difference between us: laissez-faire; it is working; do not intervene. As I was about to say, my hon. Friend

the Member for Nottingham, North and others have referred to examples of good practice. We want that to be widespread. If we are making additional investment, it is reasonable to want assurances and a light-touch plan for that. Some hon. Members say that the provision is not necessary and that the universities will widen participation anyway, but we are not satisfied with the level of participation at the moment. We are not convinced that we should leave the job to universities or the market, or that we should take a laissez-faire attitude.

There were the same ideological differences about the minimum wage. Conservatives argued that the issue should be left to employers and employees, who will ensure that they get a good rate for their work. That did not happen; people were exploited—not by all employers; the majority are fine. It follows that some universities will make every effort to push the boundaries of intervention in their communities but that others will not be so proactive. We have heard that figures for the participation of people from different social groups vary considerably among similar universities. Yes, we can point to examples, but perhaps they are of some universities not doing as well as others. Therefore, we say that if we are increasing investment, we should have a light-touch OFFA—an organisation that will ensure that best practice is spread.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

The hon. Gentleman is making a characteristically modest speech. Does he agree, however, that the provisions do not differentiate between levels of performance, and will not solve the problem of differential performance? As long as the institution complied with the requirements of the director of fair access, there would be no need for its performance to approximate that of its neighbour or counterpart.

Jonathan R Shaw (Labour, Chatham and Aylesford)

I believe that the proposals in the draft guidance have helped universities to understand what they can expect from OFFA and what it will expect them to do to widen participation. I do not think that they have much to fear. However, I am concerned that we are giving assurances that OFFA will have a light touch and that it will not be draconian, but subsection (1)(b) gives it carte blanche. It says:

''The Director must . . . in the performance of those functions, have regard to any guidance given to him by the Secretary of State.''

Conservative Members may agree with me. I have no intention of pressing the matter to a Division, but will the Minister say why he believes it necessary to have such a potentially draconian piece of legislation that will give the director of fair access carte blanche? To set up OFFA and to issue guidance is one thing, but to say ''any guidance'' is causing universities concern. As someone said to me, it is like having a dog but wanting to bark oneself. Will the Minister say why such a provision is so necessary? Setting up OFFA is the right way forward, but it needs to have a light touch, and the legislation should reflect that. I am slightly concerned that the provision goes too far.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I am delighted to have the chance to participate briefly in the debate. I shall not speak for long, partly because of the many erudite and well argued speeches made by Members on both sides of the Committee on a matter that I am delighted has been raised as a result of Conservative amendment No. 24. However, I am not sure that either side has got it right. I say that with some trepidation, as I risk creating a great many enemies in Committee.

I am entirely in favour of promoting fair access, but I fear that the Government's original wording says nothing about widening participation, which is a very important part of what we all seek to achieve. I believe that everyone accepts that it is necessary not only to make access fair, but to try to widen participation among groups of people who may not have fully participated in higher education until now. Simply to make access fair does not tackle the problem properly.

On the other hand, the Conservatives want to ensure full access, and their amendment tries to define how that access should be achieved. It does not, however, say anything about how access should be made entirely fair. I have considerable concerns about the definition of access based on academic ability and potential. The hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell quite rightly defined that as more than A-levels. I have been delighted to hear that the Conservative spokesmen are unanimous in their approval of the idea that A-levels are not enough. I am totally in favour of the suggestion that we need more than A-levels to promote access to universities and to decide fairly on access. I have been making that argument over the past year.

Although independent schools still appear to be determined to suggest to universities that access should be decided purely on the strength of A-levels—presumably because they believe that their students can get better A-level results than those in the state sector—I am delighted that, despite that, the Conservative party now appears to reject the move.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is familiar with some of the academic research that has been carried out into the relationship between A-level grades and final degree classification. There was a considerable amount of work done in the 1970s. One publication was called Degrees of Excellence—I am sorry, but I do not have the names of the academic authors who produced it. Their conclusion was that the only strong correlation between A-level grades and degree classification was in physical sciences and in maths. In every other subject, A-level grades were irrelevant. I do not know whether that adds to the hon. Gentleman's argument.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for producing that evidence. I have seen research in all directions on the issue; it is not a subject on which the research is entirely clear. However, it is clear—the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell gave an example from one of his friends—that in instances A-levels are not the best indicator of grades at university.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Is the hon. Gentleman as delighted as we are that the apparent Letwinisation of the Conservative party has led to hon. Members saying

that it should be down to the institution to decide whether A-levels are sufficient? Does he remember the criticism that came from the Conservative Front-Bench team when the university of Bristol decided to do just that?

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I do. However, I was in the process of making enough enemies without directly attacking the Conservative party in quite that way. I accept the Minister's comments.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

At one point, the hon. Gentleman tossed out a remark about the attitude of independent schools to the maintenance of A-levels. Could he give the Committee some evidence of that? He should bear in mind that, as I recall, the master of Marlborough college, Mr. Edward Gould, was a member of the Tomlinson committee that recently reported and advocated a severe shake-up in the system.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

The hon. Gentleman may have slightly misunderstood what I was saying. I was not saying that all independent schools support the idea that A-levels should be maintained, but that as I understand it they all support the idea that A-levels should be the criterion on which access to universities is decided. That is a slightly different point.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

I am a little puzzled by the hon. Gentleman's comments. I said clearly that I thought

that it was important to leave universities to decide what happens to the admissions process and that it is not for politicians to interfere with that. Politicians may voice their views, but they certainly should not interfere. However, I do not recall suggesting that A-levels should not be part of the process. Does the hon. Gentleman not agree that the worst possible development would be the regulation of universities so that students who did not have A-levels and had not made the grade were admitted?

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I shall say two things about that. First, I apologise if the hon. Gentleman thought that I was accusing him of saying that A-levels had no part to play. I was not; I said that he had talked about a friend of his who in spite of getting comparatively bad A-levels—grades that might normally not have resulted in a place at Cambridge—nevertheless showed potential and was able to go with those lower grades. I accept entirely that university success, qualifications and proof that one has reached a certain standard can play a part in university applications and in being granted a university place.

It being twenty-five minutes past Eleven o'clock, The Chairman adjourned the Committee without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned till this day at half-past Two o'clock.

Standing Committee H

Clause 30 - General duties of relevant authority

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

I remind the Committee that with this we are discussing the following amendments: No. 268, in

clause 30, page 13, line 41, leave out paragraph (b).

No. 193, in

clause 30, page 13, line 41, after 'functions', insert

'have regard to any legislation for the time being in force which is intended to prohibit discrimination or promote equality and'.

No. 194, in

clause 30, page 13, line 41, after 'functions', insert

'have regard to the need to eliminate covert forms of discrimination and denial of opportunity'.

No. 221, in

clause 30, page 13, line 42, at end insert—

'(1A) Without prejudice to the performance of his duties under this section, the Director may take any further action which he considers likely to promote fairer access to higher education.'.

No. 235, in

clause 31, page 14, line 16, at end insert—

'(2A) A plan under this section relating to any institution may not include any provisions relating to admissions to that institution.'.

No. 195, in

clause 38, page 17, line 12, at end insert—

' ''fair access to higher education'' means the principle that no person shall be precluded or deterred from pursuing any qualifying course for any reason other than academic ability, and in particular that no person shall be so precluded or deterred by reason of his income,'.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I have just met a group of young students from my constituency and was able to tell them that I was in the middle of probably my longest speech in the House of Commons. I spoke for around an hour in our sitting this morning and it is now more than three hours since I started my speech. I shall not take too much more time.

I was responding to an intervention from the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), who said that A-levels, if not the sole criterion for university entrance, should play a part. I was agreeing and did not want him to think that I thought that A-levels had no part to play in the choice of students who are offered places at university. I was about to say that some people had gone to

university without having any A-levels, perhaps as mature students. A-levels are a useful, but not necessarily essential, part of the criteria to be used in choosing who goes to university.

In terms of the Conservative amendment, it is hard to measure how difficult it is to decide how to choose people on the basis of their academic ability and potential. Examinations are only part of the process. Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that if A-levels are not the only way of judging the ability and potential of applicants, all applicants will have to be interviewed? I have some sympathy with the use of interviews as another way of sorting out those who have the greatest ability and those who have a lesser ability, but they also pose problems.

The first is the problem of cost and timing if we continue with the present system. Many of us—the Minister indicated earlier that he might agree with this—think that it would be better to change the system so that applications are made only after A-level results are known at the end of a fifth term of an applicant's final year. That might help, but there would be a problem in interviewing everyone who applied to university because of the cost and the time involved in that process.

Another problem that has become apparent is the quality of interviewers. Most interviewers are lecturers at the universities concerned and not all of them have been well trained in interviewing techniques. Some may not be good interviewers, so the whole business may become a lottery. I have always told my family and other youngsters who apply to Oxford and Cambridge that entrance to those universities is a matter of luck. Many students could make good use of an Oxford or Cambridge course and have the necessary academic ability, but it so often seems to be a matter of luck as to who interviews them. Some people have an interviewer with whom they click and who immediately takes to them as a person and sees their abilities. Others have an interviewer who may be shy or does not know much about interviewing techniques and may make the wrong choice. I have always tried to persuade those who go for an interview at Oxford or Cambridge that it is a matter of luck as to whether they are accepted and that there are many good universities elsewhere if they do not get into those two.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it should not be a matter of luck and that selection interviewing, if done properly, can be a good way of discriminating between good and mediocre students, not that Cambridge ever gets mediocre students? Does that not point to the need for much better training for interviewers rather than leaving the process to luck?

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

The hon. Lady makes an extremely good point, with which I entirely agree. Techniques can be taught. There is no question that the quality of interviews can be improved. Obviously, that can be done in some cases. The difficulty is that a scheme under which everyone is interviewed requires a large number of interviewers. Although training can be given, there will always be some people who are better at an activity and more able to learn the techniques than others. There will be a problem if we say that everyone must be interviewed.

Kali Mountford (Labour, Colne Valley)

I am following closely the hon. Gentleman's points about selection by either A-level results or interview alone. Has he considered those universities that take students from so-called non-traditional backgrounds without any A-levels? They check the student's potential, academic achievement or merit by setting a standard test—for example, an essay or a piece of work that is applicable to the degree course for which the student is applying.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

The hon. Lady also makes a good point. I did not intend to imply that the process should consist of any one of A-levels, interviews or some test. All those methods should be considered, and sometimes several may have to be used to make a fair choice.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

The hon. Gentleman makes some perfectly fair points. Does he agree that use of the interviewing technique leaves room for difference of opinion? For example, the interview may be culturally loaded in favour of the confident student and away from someone with a background that is less socially developed, or, conversely, as I suspect happens more often than not, it may tend to favour the person with the kind of ability to which the interviewing technique is sensitive.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

The hon. Gentleman makes good points in both directions. That is why I was emphasising that none of the techniques is perfect on its own. We must consider the possibility that universities will use a variety of techniques, depending on the individual candidate or circumstances.

There are also problems with the Government's wording. First, there is great difficulty in defining exactly what ''fair access'' means. The Government have not done that. It is clear that the techniques that are used to decide who goes to university result in many people from less-advantaged backgrounds not going. That is not necessarily a failing of the process itself. I shall explain in a moment the other reasons for under-representation of some groups, which clearly is happening.

The question is whether the access arrangements are causing the problem. For example, would the Government consider that access arrangements were fair if students did not necessarily need any particular qualifications? It is dangerous to say that someone is fully and sufficiently prepared for a university course just because they have the ability to do it. Certain levels of knowledge and understanding of a particular subject may be necessary before one starts a university course. If they went on ability alone, they might struggle when they got there and be put off from finishing the course. There is a question as to whether we need to set at least some qualification standards.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

The hon. Gentleman's last point is enormously important. I am sure he would accept that that consideration becomes

doubly important given the overall context of the debate. Not only are we asking a young person to enter an environment for which they may not be best prepared, we are also asking them, as a result of the Bill's provisions, to make a much larger financial contribution than they would have previously. Therefore, it is doubly important that a university course is right for them.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I would not demur at all on that point.

Making access fair does not necessarily guarantee wider participation. That consideration is missing from the way in which the office for fair access is being set up. If anything, I would like OFFA to try to ensure wider participation, but all that we have been given is an assurance that it will ensure that the access arrangements are fair. However, fair access arrangements do not necessarily lead to better and fairer participation.

In particular, we have the difficulty that participation in universities depends on a number of people other than those in the university. The first group of people it depends on are the potential students. They have to decide that they want to apply to go to university, let alone whether they want to go if they are offered a place. As a number of hon. Members said, unless we encourage potential students to get to the stage at which they apply to and accept places at universities, we are going to be in trouble.

I say in passing that one of the saddest things about the Laura Spence case was the way in which—perhaps without meaning to—the Chancellor undoubtedly gave the impression that he felt that Oxford and Cambridge were snobbish universities and not the sort of places that were likely to accept students from poorer and more disadvantaged backgrounds. That was a crying shame, not least because at least two of those who got in in place of Laura Spence were from ethnic minorities, and one of those later went on to get the top place in her final examination, above all other students across the university.

There is a danger in emphasising that Oxford and Cambridge are exclusive. I do not think that they are, although they are likely to be more exclusive if people say that they are because it will put off students who might otherwise be encouraged to go there.

David Chaytor (Labour, Bury North)

On that very point, does the hon. Gentleman accept that since the Chancellor's statement about the Laura Spence case, the proportion of students from under-represented backgrounds attending Oxford and Cambridge has increased almost year on year? The deterrent effect of the Chancellor's statement that he is criticising has not taken place.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

The hon. Gentleman is completely wrong. My memory of the statistics is that the number of students at Oxford and Cambridge from under-represented groups had been increasing year on year for some time and that the year after that case, the number at Oxford fell, although it increased the following year. I think that there was one year immediately after the Chancellor made those remarks when the percentage went the wrong way at Oxford, which perhaps proves my point.

However, the problem does not lie just with the students. It is impossible for the Minister, through the use of OFFA or by any other means, to force either the parents or the schools to do anything to encourage young people. That point has been made. It is important that, as far as possible, parents and schools encourage those from the under-represented groups to see their future as one in which they go to university. It is impossible to use OFFA to achieve that. The problem is a fundamental one in our society as a whole and it cannot be solved simply by introducing a higher education Bill.

We have a real problem in our society in trying to ensure that everyone of talent and ability sees university as part of their future. That is damaging and it will difficult to overcome while we have a society that is still class-based to some extent—we still speak of the working class, the middle class and the upper class and people still think of themselves in that way. Sadly, until we overcome that problem—a problem I would dearly love to see our society get rid of—it is not going to be possible to overcome the problem as a whole.

We have to work at the problem from a huge number of different angles, and doing that purely from the point of view of access to university is never going to be enough. Access to university has a part to play, and my party accepts the need for universities to plan better access—that is a part of the process and is therefore worth while in itself. It is, however, only a part, and I suspect quite a small one, in the total process of widening participation among youngsters from less privileged backgrounds. I hope that the Minister will accept that it is only a small start in what has to be a long process of improving the situation.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

On a point of order, Mr. Gale. Given the nature of the discussions that have taken place in the Committee in recent days, I think it will be helpful to draw its attention to the comments made in the Chamber this morning by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury. When I asked him to give an undertaking not to claw back money raised by the universities through fees in the allocation of university grant, he declined to do so. That will be a matter of great concern to the Committee.

Mr. Graham Allen (Nottingham, North) (Lab) rose—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. That may or may not be of interest to the Committee, but it is certainly not a point of order for the Chair. Unless the hon. Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) is ingenious enough to turn it into a proper point of order, we will have to proceed with our consideration of the amendments.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

Further to that point of order, Mr. Gale. What I have to say has absolutely nothing to do with the intervention by the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell at Treasury questions this morning; it relates to the point that I made to the Chancellor. I think that we need a lifelong learning account, similar to the children's trust fund that is being set up by the Chancellor, which will help to ensure that people, such as mature students, have a nest egg that they can use to

go on to further education. No doubt that, too, will be of great interest to the Committee, Mr. Gale.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

That may well be so, but I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman has signally failed the ingenuity test. It is not a point of order for the Chair.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

This has been an interesting debate. I had not intended to contribute, but I heard the contributions from hon. Members on both sides this morning, and I think that I have a contribution to make. I look forward to hearing how my remarks go down.

I agree with some of the remarks made by the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell this morning, when he said that there was already a good deal of good practice in universities. I believe that that is the case. Last summer, Cambridge university admissions tutors invited me to look at some of the schemes that they were putting in place to improve access to the university. I clearly remember that there was a taster course taking place in the week that I visited. I went to meet some of the students who were taking part in that course. It had been paid for by the Sutton Trust, which is an excellent organisation, chaired by Peter Lampl.

I spoke to one of the students, a young—I think that she was about 16—black girl from an inner-city comprehensive school in Hackney. I asked her how she was enjoying the course, and she said that she was having an absolutely wonderful time and that it had opened doors for her that she had not imagined. I asked her how she had come to know about the course, because most of the students were there through their schools. She said that her school had not brought it to her attention. She had seen an advertisement in her local paper. She took the advertisement into school and asked, ''Do you know anything about this?'' The school did not. She said, ''Do you think I should apply?'' She was told that she might as well, but there was no great enthusiasm from the school. The staff did not think that she would get on to it, and they did not think that she was the sort of student who should apply to Oxford or Cambridge anyway.

That example illustrates that there are young people out there with initiative who are prepared to grasp the opportunities that are offered to them, and that schools could do a much better job of encouraging young people to apply to Oxford and Cambridge. It also illustrates that the universities are beginning to reach out to try to raise those young people's aspirations. I do not know what happened to that young woman. I hope that she applies and becomes a student, because she could make a terrific contribution.

I also want to draw attention to campaigns that have taken place in the past. Both Oxford and Cambridge run the ''Target Schools'' campaign. It is highly organised and well run. Under the scheme, students from the university go into schools and encourage people to apply. They talk about their experiences, their qualifications and the advantages that they are getting from university life. They

encourage younger children—usually around the ages of 14 or 15—from the schools to apply.

In Cambridge, that scheme is run entirely by Cambridge university students union. As far as I know, the university has contributed financially, but not in other ways. The scheme is run by the students. I recall that, about seven years ago, I got to know one of the students who was organising the scheme. I suggested that we collaborated on it, so that he would make available to me the list of schools to which they were writing to ask them to participate in this scheme. I would then write to the Member of Parliament for the school's local area, and encourage them to encourage the school to participate. As a result of that, I discovered that many of the schools involved in the scheme were grant-maintained or public schools. Although students thought that they had a fairly comprehensive list of state schools, most were not.

That campaign has been successful over the years, however. I would also like to mention briefly the Group for Encouraging Ethnic Minority Applications. Among the lots of good work that GEEMA does, it has one day on which it invites students from ethnic minority backgrounds into Cambridge university to take part in taster courses, to participate and to talk to students and members of staff from ethnic minority backgrounds. I have attended this day on a number of occasions. There is always an excellent atmosphere, and it is a very good way of encouraging young people to apply.

I have been critical of the low number of students from lower-income backgrounds at Cambridge and Oxford. However, this is not uniform throughout the universities. We tend to talk about standard or average applications, but we can look at the success of King's college, Cambridge, for example. I do not know the current figures but, in the past few years, the proportion of students at that college from state school backgrounds has hovered around 90 per cent. That fact is not very well known and, of course, it is balanced by other colleges that do less well.

I recall inquiring into this to find out how it was that King's was more successful than other colleges in attracting students from state school backgrounds. I learned that King's had identified some state schools with which it wished to have an ongoing relationship, whereby the admissions tutor got to know the staff at the school and the good students were invited to the college to make sure that they knew what they were applying to. That ongoing relationship meant that the college received a number of high-quality applications from those state schools. That seems to me to be very good and worth replicating.

I went to another admissions tutor, who shall be nameless, and asked why he did not also do this. He replied that the problem is that King's has now bagged all the good state schools, and there are none left for anyone else. We must try to overcome such an attitude. I do not think that that person is an admissions tutor any more, because things have moved on since then. However, the case that I have

described indicates the importance of good access plans, and it may be that those access plans involve establishing relationships with a number of state schools so that those students know the college to which they are applying, and have a good idea of the staff and the university lecturers.

In the past, quite a lot of the collaboration between Cambridge colleges—and Oxford colleges, I am sure—and schools has involved collaboration with independent schools. I suppose that that is perfectly understandable. When somebody has done a degree at Oxford or Cambridge and then goes on to teach in the independent sector, they will try to keep their relationship with the admissions staff at their college, so that when they have good students, there is someone for them to contact and provide with a recommendation. That is how bias creeps into the process. It is very important that we have good admissions policies, as well as good access plans.

I have not tabled any amendments and I am not suggesting that the Government should change their proposals for OFFA. I want to tell another series of anecdotes, though, to illustrate why it is important that we have proper admissions policies. In the 1980s, I was the admissions tutor for the joint honours degree in combined science at Anglia polytechnic university, then called Cambridgeshire college of arts and technology. I admitted about 150 students each year and I decided that, if I was going to do that properly, I should find out what makes a good student and how it was possible to identify their characteristics from a selection interview, a reference or an application form. In about 1981, I attended an extremely good course at the London university teaching methods unit. I learned interview techniques—what not to do as well as what to do—and about what made a good student.

In my intervention on the speech of the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel), I said that there was a great deal of academic research that showed that the correlation between A-level results and degree classification is not at all strong. In fact, it is almost negative in many subject areas. Only in maths, physics and chemistry is there a good correlation between A-level grade and final degree classification. A-level grades might be some indication for those subjects, but they give little indication for other subjects.

One of the best ways of identifying which students will make good students is to note those that have good study skills. The school that crams its students, by making sure that they are intensively taught and have little free time, is not likely to produce students who do as well at university as that which gives students projects to do, expects them to go to the library, find out information for themselves and learn how to organise their time successfully. Knowing that changed my interviewing procedure markedly. I used to ask people in detail how they studied and what interests they had. If a student was interested in the subject area, I would find that they had spent a great deal of time pursuing that interest outside their formal academic studies. In my experience, that often led to students who got much better degrees than those who did not do that.

The point that I am making is that it is excellent that OFFA can require universities to produce access plans that encourage applications. However, having encouraged those applications, it is important that the university is sensitive to how to interview those students to ensure that the good ones get selected. As the hon. Member for Newbury was saying, it should not be a matter of luck. The great danger is that when university lecturers—often academics and not staff specially trained in interviewing—interview a student, they tend to go for those who are articulate. Articulacy is better among those students who are middle class and public school educated. That is where much of the bias creeps in. If people can be trained to ignore articulacy and look instead for real potential, they are more likely to pick the students who will do well in their degrees.

I accept that admissions is not part of OFFA's remit, but I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister will encourage universities to train their interviewers and make sure that people understand what makes a good student and how to identify that student's potential when they come for interview. Nothing would be more damaging than encouraging many more applications from students from lower-income backgrounds and then finding that they did not get accepted because of university interviewers' prejudice about their lack on articulacy. Such students might not be good at expressing themselves.

On the subject of students who are under-represented and have tended to do badly in previous years, on Wednesday 25 February 2004 at column 452W, my right hon. Friend the Minister answered a parliamentary question tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Helen Jackson) on Monday 8 December 2003. She asked about the age profile of first degree entrants to UK universities in 2003–04, five years ago and 10 years ago, broken down by age groups. The number of people under 20 applying to university has continued to increase. In 1994–95 it was approximately 180,000, and by 2002–03 it had risen to 235,000. The number of people aged between 21 and 30 has remained about static, although it has fallen by a few hundred.

The age groups that we should worry about are 31 to 40-year-olds and 41 to 50-year-olds. There has been a marked drop in those categories. In the former group, the figure fell from 16,000 in 1994–95 to 14,500 in 2002–03. There could be many innocent explanations for that. It may be that that age group had more opportunities to study at the age of 18 and therefore took up their education at an earlier age. It is worth looking behind the statistics as well as at the raw figures. Those students could have been put off by the up-front fee and they might benefit from some of the Government's proposals in the new student support package.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. I know that the hon. Lady feels passionately about the subject and has a real knowledge of it, but, with respect, she is going wide of the mark. I have been listening with anticipation for the word OFFA, and I have heard it only once recently.

Anne Campbell (Labour, Cambridge)

I shall come back on track. I hope that OFFA will look for a sign that universities will target those groups of students whose numbers have declined in recent years—such as 31 to 40-year-olds—in the access plans.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

We have had a long debate on amendment No. 24, which I support. It has been characterised by a good deal of thought and a measure of passion in connection with securing the widest possible range of opportunities for students, be they from disadvantaged backgrounds or not. I am happy to accept the good will displayed in all contributions.

As I had time to reflect on what I might say, I cast my mind back and calculated that it is almost exactly 41 years since I first initiated my studies in moral philosophy at Oxford university. I was, to my knowledge, the first member of my family to attend university, and that was not necessarily on merit. I remember a distinguished lawyer saying of my late father that he had the best non-legally trained legal mind that he had ever encountered. Thank goodness we are in the business of providing more opportunities for people to realise their potential and for the nation to realise its potential. That is not a matter of contention.

I mentioned moral philosophy because I want to clarify some of the concepts that have emerged. I shall raise two specific issues and end with a few general points that are more political, but not intentionally party political.

First, time refines one's memory of one's studies. The one thing I remember from moral philosophy was the first lesson that I learned in the first tutorial: to say that something is good is not by itself an argument for passing a law to promote it; nor is saying that something is ipso facto bad an argument for promoting a law against it. We have an interesting clash between the voluntary principle of securing an agreed objective and the statutory route for so doing.

Secondly, there is the matter of regulation. One or two hon. Members, particularly from the Labour Benches—to be honest, I have in mind the hon. Member for Nottingham, North—may have underplayed the panoply of regulation and, if one wishes to call it so, interference, which is already available to the Higher Education Funding Council for England in its interface with institutions.

At the most simple level, there are separate bands according to the type of course and the monitoring of a variety of objectives. HEFCE has been charged in the past with monitoring the Government's agenda to widen participation and the payment of the so-called postcode premiums. HEFCE and the Higher Education Statistics Agency keep score and collect a variety of statistics, on which the hon. Gentleman drew. I appreciate that we will debate the matter later, but he says that we should inspect higher education institutions as Ofsted does in schools. There is already a mechanism for inspection through the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, which acts as a control on the spending of public money.

There are no absolutes in the debate on complete regulation or no regulation. The questions relate to

who should regulate, whether regulation needs a separate body, and how regulation should be carried out. In that context, I was fascinated by a letter, which became available to the Committee today, from the Minister to the hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Mudie) in the light of his comments at our last sitting. The context is transfers of private fees between institutions—where a student transfers from one to another—and the possible problem of fees remission, for example. The Minister said that the current system, in which universities largely exercise self-regulation, works well. That was interesting, and I mention it because it is clearly set in a narrow context. The Minister may not want to confirm that and he will have to argue why he needs a statutory regulator in the wider context of access.

The Minister continues the letter with the sentence that caught my eye and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Collins). He said that one of the themes of the higher education White Paper and the Higher Education Bill is deregulation, so the Government will not impose additional regulations in that area. If the director of fair access is not a regulator, I am bound to ask what on earth his purpose is. Of course he is a regulator, and we have to consider how he will operate.

When we discussed particular cases, it was genuinely illuminating to discover that the regulator is likely to operate better if he does so at a level of generality—I presume that that means working on plans and their implementation—rather than at a specific level, which, in shorthand, I shall call the Laura Spence level. That case, which caused shock and horror, reminds me of a conversation with a former admissions tutor at Oxford university some years ago which stuck in my mind. He told me that there were three places for applicants to read medicine at his college, but that there were 24 applicants, all of whom would have three As at A-level. He asked, ''Where do I start?'' That is why it is difficult for the Laura Spences of this world to get into such universities or, for that matter, other universities—it is not just courses at the ancient universities for which there is strong demand.

I wish, if not to draw a distinction between tests of academic ability and potential, at least to touch on the substance of the amendment of my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell, which deals with them. I am not sure why we have moved away from using the word ''merit''. I suspect, rather impishly, that as the Prime Minister has been using merit as the metric and saying that that is what he lives and dies by, so I have become less attracted to it. In a way, I am attracted to the idea of potential, which, together with the concept of academic ability, is included in the amendment. I concede that potential does not immediately track existing output and may need to be measured in several different ways. That is entirely proper. The hon. Member for Newbury nods. He made a particularly interesting speech on the subject.

It occurs to me that our discussion is not just about the over-prepared, over-privileged, privately educated boy going up with a golden future ahead of him. Sadly,

it could also be about someone who got tremendous grades and then perhaps was involved in an accident or suffered some injury or illness and was no longer able to perform effectively. That is the downside. The counterpart is the person from an unpromising background who could do far better than his grades indicate.

Kali Mountford (Labour, Colne Valley)

I am following the hon. Gentleman's comments closely. He makes a good argument, but I do not understand what, in the range of potential, merit and academic achievement on which an individual student may be assessed, is precluded by an assumption of fair access.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

I am not saying that anything is precluded. My point is that the matter is complicated and that it is better to make an academic judgment. As to access, there is no question whatever about not wishing to encourage fair access. I tried to explain that at the beginning of my comments. The argument is not about the ends but about the means for securing the ends. I do not want to try your patience, Mr. Gale, but this point is germane to the amendment. I was discussing potential and I hope that university admissions tutors take it into consideration. I have no reason to think that they do not. They want their pupils to succeed and to draw themselves up to their best ability.

A set of concepts is embedded in this issue and needs drawing out. I have identified four aspects that make up the progression of someone who achieves their potential by the end of their degree course. The first is aspiration. It is not fashionable on new Labour Benches to quote from socialists, and I shall not inflame the Committee by introducing quotations that I have not used before, but I commend a phrase of the late Aneurin Bevan, who was nothing if not a strong believer in equality of opportunity and access. He used to talk about the ''poverty of aspirations''. I quote that because, throughout my time as a Minister, those words were often on my lips. I did not mind repeating them, because he was right.

What is important is the ability of people to say, ''You could do this.'' As with the girl from Hackney, mentioned by the hon. Member for Cambridge (Mrs. Campbell), it is great if they can do it, but they need to be drawn out and given an opportunity. That is not at issue and my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell spoke about it. It is almost the most important thing. I do not think that the issue is even the grades that people get at a bog-standard comprehensive—to use an offensive phrase—but the mindset that says, ''We can go on and do this.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

I have always wanted to do this, because the hon. Gentleman is so good on quotations, but the person who said ''poverty of aspiration'' was not Nye Bevan but Ernest Bevin.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

I stand corrected. My view about Ernest Bevin, for whom I also have considerable regard because I think that he was a real bloke, was that his problem was the poverty of aspirants. There we are—I grovel before the Minister's superior

knowledge and I am glad that he has put the Committee right. I genuinely did not know that.

This is a serious issue and we need to make people think about it more seriously. We need to give them the opportunity and, rather than arguing between us, we should put it into their minds that they can take that opportunity.

The second issue is that of access plans: what is put together and what is written down. I do not mind the concept of access planning if it is done by the institution. I may be fond of Oxford university, but I hope not exclusively so. University College Northampton, which is up the road from me and which I know well, has done a tremendous amount in working on its access to the local community. I do not think that it is unique in that, but it does a great deal. I mentioned Staffordshire university earlier in connection with access for people with disabilities and for ethnic minorities, and it does excellent work. Such work is done better by the institutions, rather than regulated from the centre. However, that may be a philosophical difference of view that we have.

I concede that the admissions process is not, formally, in OFFA's remit, but that is a point on which I will wish to pause in a minute. Finally, and I do not think that this should be overlooked either, there is the academic process itself. The Minister gave me an answer some time ago, which I have not referenced for this discussion, but it made me concerned that OFFA would strike into the delivery of the academic process. In a sense, OFFA is almost bound to do that, because it has an obligation to monitor the delivery of access plans.

I think of difficult circumstances in which a university might be in academic difficulties and needs to merge two courses, including two that, for academic reasons, have different fee structures. If a university ran out of resources and faced a difficult choice, should it sack its lecturers or renege on its bursaries after giving some notice? I can see that the Minister is sensible to those points, but they are difficult ones. Whatever it said in the access plan, if a course was taught in a particular way, it could be inimical to the interests of the individuals involved—for example, people with disabilities or ethnic minorities. Those are, in a sense, a list of the ground rules for discussion.

The first specific point relates to the point that was explicit in Government policy and, even more so, in the draft guidance to the director—the question of subsidisation of bursaries. If I am right, above £2,700 of fees, universities will be expected to give to the maximum limit of £3,000 to make the difference, which would mean up to £250 available for bursaries. Leaving aside the question of whether they can afford that—it is a separate issue that I am not contending—there is an important issue of principle, at least in one sense. I am surprised that it has not been touched on. Through this mechanism, the Government are asking student A to make a contribution to the fee remission or bursary of student B. The Minister may be surprised that, at that level, I find that perfectly reasonable. When I have discussed such a concept with independent schools, they have said that typically 5 to 6 per cent. of the fees of an independent school are put

aside for bursaries for access—to use the same phrase—for students who are less advantaged or run into difficulties at that school. There is an element of cross-subsidisation.

I should not be forgotten that, in the structure that the Government would establish, the subsidy would go from the family of current student A to current student B and it would not relate to the means of the student when he graduated and would be repaying his normal loan. It would be a charge on his student loan account however much or little he earned later, so there is an implied inequity in it. The Minister should at least explain to the Committee how the implicit cross-subsidisation is defensible, and that nobody will be able to say that it is a compulsory tax from student A to student B and a denial of human rights.

The question of the application of the access regulator's regime concerns me even more. The objective in the introduction of the Secretary of State's draft letter of guidance states:

''We, as a Government, are determined to ensure that access to higher education is broadened, not narrowed.''

That is an entirely non-contentious aspiration, but we need to know the coverage of it.

The Minister will remember earlier and very constructive debates about part-time students, who account for 40 per cent. of the whole, and about postgraduates. We might have gone on to talk about second-time-around first degree students paying their way and foreign students. It is an interesting paradox that many institutions now rely on foreign students outwith the European Union to bolster their finances—they are a profit centre, not a loss leader.

I am not clear, although the Minister may be, whether OFFA has any remit for such students. Is its remit for students resident in the UK or the European Union who are reading a first full-time undergraduate degree? The regulatory mechanism relates to that category—the conventional three-year first degree student. I am not clear whether OFFA is meant to take into account in access plans what is happening to all students—foreign, postgraduate and part-time students and those in the other categories that I mentioned.

It is clear that the regulatory mechanism impacts only on the regulated sector. The issue becomes particularly pointed in relation to the European Union, to which my learned hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere (Mr. Clappison)—the good lawyer that he is—referred to briefly. As I understand it, the issue relates to a European concept rather than a ministerial one. The European Union has created a common space for students to move around and, since the Gravier judgment, with which the Minister will be familiar, there is a common regime of support for those students. I must be careful, because my hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell has reminded me in private conversation that Gravier bites not on student support, but on tuition fees and the fees regime.

I am sure that you, Mr. Gale, would become extremely impatient if we were to widen the debate to include tuition fees to foreign students, so I note and

accept your warning. What I am saying to the Committee is that, like it or not, the Minister must produce a regime for students in other EU member states, and we may want to return to some of these matters in relation to the repayment of student loans and bankruptcies at a later stage.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

I hope that the hon. Gentleman is not suggesting that there is a Brussels Gravier train.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

Indeed, I am not. There may be, but it does not arise on this amendment or, amazingly, in my train of thought.

If I may pin the Minister down on what I think is an important issue, I see no reference—either in the Bill or in the draft letter of guidance to OFFA—to whether EU students are included. I presume that the Minister has it in mind that access plans for universities—which have no territorial reference, other than a territorial location in England, hence their regulator being the director of fair access at HEFCE—will not include a report on EU students who are not United Kingdom students, or even, as a sub-set issue, on EU students who were resident in other parts of the United Kingdom transferring across the boundaries between the parts.

It is an important point, and the Minister should give thought to whether OFFA's remit runs to those considerations, and to the wider issue of students from outwith the EU, probably paying full fees, who are on exactly identical first-degree courses to those who are within the regulated sector. If OFFA is going to have to look at the whole shooting match, it will make a considerable difference.

To return to the practical world, I remind the Minister of the concern I expressed on an intervention. There is also the issue of who would be a disadvantaged student if overseas students could be taken into account. We could have a situation in which the Estonian was preferred to the Etonian in our universities.

In conclusion, I shall make some general points about this discussion. First, it is widely agreed that we wish to encourage access and participation. My hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh (Mr. Francois) produced a powerful intervention on that point. We will not argue that point and, in fairness, we have not had the class war engaged on it—we agree. I remind the Committee that Benjamin Disraeli referred to the two nations in this country and, like the hon. Member for Nottingham, North, I am concerned that, despite the fact that we have empowered so many young people to go to university, we are still missing out on some people. I can find some non-fashionable bits of my constituency that have these problems. We can all do that; it is not an issue between us.

Secondly, improving access cannot be a unilateral process on the part of the universities. This is absolutely critical, and this point kept coming back in the debate. The universities can play their part, but unless there is compulsion, they cannot force disadvantaged students through their doors, even if they wish to. I am thinking of John Maynard Keynes

and the famous remark that re-stimulating an economy was rather like pushing on a string. One cannot do it. It may be possible to encourage and it is certainly possible to provide information, role models, and to be less stuffy than was the pattern in the past. All universities are now engaged in doing this.

The third point is that it remains better if the universities conduct this task through their own plans, just as it is better for them to form academic judgments as to who should be admitted to them. Furthermore, if there is to be a regulator—in fairness to the Minister, despite the strictures I have given about the coverage of the regulator, this is not drafted as a heavy-touch, teeth-ridden document; it will depend on what happens in the event—it is better that regulation is done as generally and as objectively as possible.

Coming back to merit, potential and admissions, there is the problem of how anyone can exercise judgment in these areas, alongside the growing practice of judicial review and a readiness among our constituents to take up litigation wherever they can. It is usually the articulate, learned and determined middle classes who will avail themselves of those opportunities. At least we are better off if we stick to the generality.

My problem with the mechanism that is being set up, quite apart from or perhaps because of the way in which it has come into existence, is that different agendas are hidden behind it. There is an agenda that wishes to promote the class war, although, thank goodness, it has not surfaced in this debate. There is an agenda that is anxious to intervene on admissions and to change the pattern of admissions for reasons that have little to do with academic merit or potential and are driven by malice or otherwise.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

Would my hon. Friend consider it important that the Minister, when he clarifies what he means by fair access, could tell us how the Government define groups that are under-represented in higher education, which is clearly integrally linked to the issues we are discussing today?

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

I agree with that. I accept the Minister's encyclopaedic knowledge of the labour movement. I also accept his good will in the matter. There are many people who would like to intervene on the specific and there are lots of people whose agendas are not quite as objectively motivated as they may appear. I saw a few signs of that from those on the Labour Benches whose views are dripping with interventionism in this matter. If that happens it will damage the universities. It will be demeaning to the students who are admitted and it will not achieve the growth in potential that we all wish to see.

My biggest worry, my fundamental reason for opposing these proposals, is not so much the proposals themselves although, as my hon. Friend said, they need clarification, it is what they may lead to. First, there may be specific controversies, which will then generate heat for further and damaging intervention of a specific kind. Secondly—this has been touched on a little—if they do not work and if there is not a huge

bouleversement in the socio-economic characteristics of university entry, those who are interested in social engineering will come back to the charge. They will argue that they have to do the job properly: the regulator's remit will have to be re-jigged or the Secretary of State will have to give him instructions. At that point, all the Minister's fair intentions and all his assurances will be switched off. That would be a bad day for our universities, for our students and for academic freedom.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

Much as I sometimes, albeit infrequently, fall out with my party, it does not half take a good session in Committee with the Opposition to make one realise how wonderful one's own party is. Hearing privilege being defended in such a nice, polite way, makes me wonder why we do not go back to the old feudal system. We would know our place. I have been in the House long enough to remember when the disability legislation passed through Parliament and I hear resonances of some of the speeches that were made then about access for disabled people. The hon. Member for Daventry described our views as dripping with interventionism. I am all in favour of intervening, because my money is funding most of these universities and I do not see any reason why I should not intervene, ask questions or have a transparent system. All that I am after—but it is not acceptable to the Opposition—and all that the Minister is after is fair access. The Opposition are opposed to that; they seek to delete it from the Bill.

This has been a good debate; I would like to see more debates on the issue. It is one of those corners that is not often reached in Parliament; a corner of British life that has been left undisturbed. ''Keep giving us the money, don't ask any questions, you can trust us.'' That sounds like the Fees Office to me. The Fees Office is tightening up, so I do not see why we should not tighten up.

The Opposition want to remove fair access and insert something about merit and potential. Potential is a wonderful word. I am a great football man. No one in this room would agree on the potential of one player. If we all sat down and decided what that potential was, everyone would have a different opinion. It is a lovely word if one wants to keep the flexibility one has enjoyed for 100 years. Let us not base the criteria just on merit; let us throw in flexibility, because it gives us a good back door out. With the guillotine coming some time this afternoon, I fear that we will be prevented, even under your skilled chairmanship, Mr. Gale, from reaching other parts of the Bill.

I should not have thought that anyone would fall out with the governors over an access plan promoting higher education under fair access, or promoting equality of opportunity in connection with access to higher education. Would any Committee member suggest that it would be wrong for the governing body to take measures to attract not admissions—good God, that would be going too far, but we will let prospective students send a letter so that we can turn them down because of their potential—but

''to attract applications from prospective students who are members of groups which . . . are under-represented in higher education''?

I should have thought that that was reasonably accepted all around as a key part of fair access, except that when the Chairman pushes us on and we reach clause 31, the Opposition have tabled amendments to both those provisions, deleting the reference to under-representation and changing ''must'' to ''may'' on just the question of promoting higher education on the grounds of equality.

As we part the veils and the discussion continues, we see not class hatred but disdain of my class. I speak as one of those described as non-traditional, non-fashionable or non-academic. I am probably the only member of the Committee able to speak on the matter, because I am the sort of person to whom the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell referred. I do not have any class hatred, but the Conservative party has class hatred for my type, because your party—not your party, Mr. Chairman; well, it is—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. This Chairman is of no party, Mr. Mudie.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

Absolutely. When you are a rebel like me, you are in a similar position, Mr. Gale. The Conservative party has run universities in that fashion and kept my class and my people out, but I do not have any hatred; I just want a place at the table. I am perfectly happy with—

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

The hon. Gentleman seems to be missing two fundamental points. The first is that there are Opposition Members from non-traditional backgrounds who have benefited from the opportunities that university provides. The second is that universities around the country have, for decades, offered people from ''his class'' the opportunity to better themselves, and they continue to do so. They should take credit for the success that they have had in doing so.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

Sometimes in Committee there is a tendency to over-emphasise when responding to speeches made in such a fashion. I simply made the point that university admissions have never been a subject of contention or openly discussed. If I were to ask Committee members what the admissions policies are, they would reply that that would depend on the university. I may know Leeds, but I do not know Manchester—not that I would want to know Manchester, even less Sheffield—but setting those policies has been left up to each institution. They generally spend vast sums of public money as they wish. We are now asserting our right to know what on earth is happening, especially against the background of certain groups in society not being properly represented.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I am feeling a bit sore about the hon. Gentleman's accusation that any attempt to leave out parts of clauses may be an indication that we do not want to see better access for under-represented groups. As has already been mentioned, there is a problem over the definition of under-represented groups. Therefore, it is fair enough that we should test the Bill in terms of what it means. It could, for instance, mean that the group of people called Mudie were under-represented, but I do not think that that is quite what the Government intend.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

I except the hon. Gentleman from criticism on those grounds. The issue of fair access, as listed in the Bill, deserves and needs padding out. We have had early signs of the battle that will take place when that is attempted.

I speak on behalf of the people in my community. Some people in the Department have discovered the poor recently. It has put steel in their backbone. Steel is needed—though that does not apply to the Minister. When fair access is defined, I want to make sure that it is fair access. Some of the practices that we have seen over the decades should be put to rest, and deservedly so.

James Purnell (Labour, Stalybridge and Hyde)

Does my hon. Friend agree that very few people defend inequality of opportunity, but people's commitment to equality of opportunity is tested by the actions that they take. He asked about Manchester. My constituency has average GCSE results, but is significantly under-represented at university level. Putting that right is not social engineering—it is social justice.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

I could not agree with my hon. Friend more. I would like to spend a few moments—I assure the Whip is will only be a few moments—looking at that issue.

I was disappointed to read the references to access in the statutory guidance. I have attacked the Government on that matter. The Opposition threw away an opportunity there. In the second paragraph of the introduction, the Minister spells out that,

''The judgments that you will exercise, in ensuring that universities that decide to introduce tuition fees above the standard level do so without jeopardising the aim of widening participation''.

I was saddened when I read that.

When we took office in 1997, we attempted to widen participation with a carrot. We put additional money on the table for any university that took youngsters with certain postcodes. As we have heard in the debate, that measure has signally failed—despite increased numbers since 1997. Only 1 per cent. of the increase was from my socio-economic class; my area. The privilege that has been defended will be defended fiercely, and I look for fierceness from the Government. If we believe in widening participation, the measures are not cover or window dressing for an exposed flank because we have included tuition fees, to which the second paragraph of that document refers. We have to do that because one of the attacks that we will face is that the increase in fees will damage widening participation, so we should do something about that. However, when it comes to the detail on approving an access agreement and the things that will be in it, I am slightly saddened by the weakness in that area. I want to touch on outreach when I have finished this point.

To be fair to the Minister, when I look at the White Paper—much as I have criticised it as being just a few pages added to the central theme of variability—I have to eat some of my words. On admissions, there are two

pages—pages 72 and 73—which make interesting reading. Paragraph 6.20 states:

''We intend to ask HEFCE, working with''

the others

''to examine this issue in detail''.

It goes on to say that the discussions and the various suggestions about admissions may

''form a pillar of the Access Agreements discussed below.''

Sadly, that all seems to have disappeared from the legislation and the guidance document.

The issue is not only applications, but admissions. Admissions are the true test. They are financed with public money, which should not be invested unless admissions are clearly being operated transparently and fairly across the various groups in society. The White Paper was strong, but the guidance document is weaker, and the Bill is as weak.

I think every Committee member cares about the issue. If we are to have a united country and a happy country, it is necessary that everybody has equality of opportunity, and can participate in things, prosper, and get the best for their families. A certain group of people have not been able to do that. I want the Minister to reassure me that the measure is not just a cover for variable fees, that we will take it very seriously, and that the access agreement will cover applications and admissions and will involve some searching questions that will help us to achieve our objectives.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

I accept, of course, the passion that the hon. Gentleman rightly brings to the subject. However, does he not appreciate that if the test is to be transparency and objectivity, as he wants, the danger is that it will be more difficult for academic admissions bodies to exercise their discretion, including in favour of the disadvantaged student? We may well end up in a situation in which they fall back on A-level performance because that is the only thing that is measurable and could get them past a judicial review or the intervention of the regulator.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

I have been thrown somewhat by the fact that I am surrounded by Ministers. I do not know whether that is bad news for the Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education. Perhaps something happened at lunchtime. Am I supposed to move along the Bench?

I have been asked a serious question, but there is a shortage of time. If we had time to discuss more clauses and an opportunity to push the matter, we could have an important debate, in which hon. Members would love to participate, especially Labour Members, who cannot join in for reasons known only to my hon. Friend the Member for Halton (Derek Twigg).

I want to follow up on a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North. The outreach element has been criticised at times, but it is very important. I care passionately about my inner-city constituency and youngsters who do not have a chance, but I do not speak about them in order to get them a back door into university. The 50 per cent. target and even the widening participation scheme—

the provision of funding that is related to postcodes—can be an offensive, patronising and unthinking way of widening participation. The worst thing that someone can do to a youngster is to send them to a university when they cannot cope. There are high drop-out rates and individuals are destroyed if they are put in a place with which they cannot cope. We see it happen here. Some people get sent to Parliament, cannot cope and it destroys their personality. University comes at a more vulnerable stage in a person's life.

To have social engineering in that crude fashion does not do anyone any good, but outreach is important. If I compare Leeds university with Leeds Met university, I find that Leeds Met is wonderful in its widening participation and outreach activities. It is aware of all the different groups: Bangladeshi, Pakistani, white working class, those from the estates that no one ever goes to unless accompanied. Leeds university is remote in every way and is probably more representative of the older, more established universities.

My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North said something that needs to be embedded in the thinking of the Department for Education and Skills. It was accepted in an earlier debate that the ability of youngsters to get into university starts with where they are born and to whom they are born, how many books are in the house, how they are talked to, how they are played with and so on. The process starts at nursery, but we are beginning at the end. We are rightly berating universities for not doing more in the way of outreach. I would berate the primary schools for not reaching out into the nurseries, because links can be made if the primary school knows the youngster before he comes to that school.

The great gap for working-class youngsters happens when they move from the comfortable primary school to the big, impersonal high school. When that happens, performance goes down. We all know about that in the education world, but what on earth do we do about it? The brighter kids fight their way back and the drop is not as fierce. A lot of the younger kids—those aged 12 to 14—leave; they just disappear out of the system. They are on the streets and we lose them for a long time.

Eleanor Laing (Conservative, Epping Forest)

If the hon. Gentleman forgives me, I want to agree with everything he has just said. Does he agree that it would be better to spend taxpayers' money on those early years of a child's education—[Hon. Members: ''We are.'']—rather than on an artificial target of 50 per cent. going to university? As he said, it is wrong to force people into university just because of some artificial target when they might be better suited to a further education course. The right way to affect a child's life chances is right at the beginning of their life, not when they are 18.

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. I hesitate to set a dangerous precedent, but we are supposed to be discussing OFFA, and I have not heard that word very recently.

George Mudie (Labour, Leeds East)

Thank you, Mr. Gale, for rightly bringing me back on track. I appeal to the hon. Lady not to limit herself to agreeing with what I said in

the past 10 minutes. What about the 10 minutes before that?

I take the outreach work very seriously, and I hope that OFFA will pursue that. It does matter; it is not a sop. Youngsters see university as a strange world up on a hill, and it is not part of their world; it belongs to another group of people not related to them, and is strange, worrying and expensive. If the outreach process gets those youngsters into university so that they can see that it is filled with ordinary people and is a nice, exciting place, we will have gone a long way to widening participation.

Simon Thomas (Plaid Cymru, Ceredigion)

I apologise to members of the Committee, particularly the hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Mudie), because I may miss the later part of the debate owing to a long-standing engagement this afternoon. However, I want to support just about everything that he said, apart from one thing. I also oppose amendment No. 24. I listened with interest to the philosophical ideas of the hon. Member for Daventry (Mr. Boswell) and although he said some important things, they do not read across well to the Bill's implementation.

My concern is that OFFA will not be strong enough. It will be a paper tiger and will not achieve increased participation from the poorest and most disadvantaged in our society, which is what the Government say they want to achieve. A couple of days ago, we had an exchange involving the hon. Member for Bury, North (Mr. Chaytor), the Minister and myself, in which it was acknowledged that the proportion of people from the most deprived groups at university had increased by a measly 1 per cent. We all accept that that is not good enough. The question is how OFFA and related provisions in the Bill can increase that participation.

The real work is now being done by the Higher Education Funding Council for England and the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales, through widening participation. In that respect I disagree with the hon. Member for Leeds, East. He said that we could not take people from postcode areas and socially engineer them into university, but that is what we need to do, even though there are some challenges. HEFCW has set a target for higher education institutions in Wales to increase the numbers coming from the 100 poorest communities in Wales—the 100 community first areas—from the current 8.5 per cent. to about 11 per cent. In other words, the proportion of young people at higher education institutions from those areas is to reflect the general proportion in the population as a whole, according to academic ability. That point needs to be made, but it has not so far been addressed.

I do not think that anyone in the Committee believes in eugenics, so surely no one would seriously say that a person's intellectual potential is decided by postcode. Wherever a person lives, they must have the same potential for intellectual merit for university purposes as someone from any other part of the United Kingdom. The differences come from opportunity, culture, education, what is available in the home and the opportunities that a child receives from his or her first day in nursery and onwards. I

agree with the hon. Gentleman about that. It is right to set clear targets for higher education institutions to attract both applicants and admissions from those poorest communities because, no matter how we look at the issue, they use taxpayers' money. I should like that to be promoted by the Bill and OFFA.

The draft regulations to which the hon. Gentleman referred do not apply to Wales yet—the situation there will be different. However, my reading of the regulations is that OFFA will not do what I described. That will still be the responsibility of HEFCE and HEFCW, which is basically the widening participation and funding route. Admissions are not addressed in the plans, which is why amendment No. 24 is not only wrong in principle, but wrong in practice. OFFA will not be doing much admission work. The plans are at a higher level, although I am concerned that they are at too a high level and not firmly integrated with the day-to-day admissions work of universities.

The problem is not as simple as telling a higher education institution, ''You must have x admissions from the 100 poorest communities,'' or whatever, because those people will not be ready. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that they will not be ready to enter university on day one and suddenly cope with the range of expectations of them. I am sure that he was right about Leeds, but there has been excellent outreach work in Aberystwyth, going into communities, locally and throughout west Wales. Summer school work and other schemes have been undertaken to attract pupils to becoming familiar with the university environment and studying, as the hon. Member for Cambridge said, before they take the plunge into university life.

The ability is there; it is innate in our population. The problem is to unlock that ability and to ensure that the poorest people and those in the communities that least expect their young people to go to university have the opportunity to be fast-tracked. If we must do that to ensure better equity in society, I agree with the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (James Purnell) that that is not social engineering, but social justice. I support that fully.

There are problems with OFFA. I am worried that it will be a bureaucratic sledgehammer to crack a nut. It might be better to concentrate on building and enhancing the widening participation plans in HEFCE and HEFCW.

My final point is that there is a downside in Wales, and that is a message for all of us in England Wales. None the less, I support the identifying of the 100 most deprived communities—the community first areas—and working in those communities to encourage young people to consider university as part of their future. Many communities in Wales, particularly in rural areas, are outwith those 100 wards but have sub-wards or sub-areas with particular difficulties—for example, transport. One of the problems with postcode work is

that we forget about the wider community setting in which people live.

Many communities throughout south Wales and in the declining ex-mining valleys of south Wales are not included in the 100 community first areas, but suffer from the same poverty of aspiration. We must work with the higher education institutions to ensure that they do not just meet their social engineering targets, but that they look at the wider aspects of widening participation. That target for higher education institutions is a challenge. We are trying to address that in the Bill by encouraging a much closer correlation between public expenditure and the public good that we expect from that expenditure. I see nothing wrong with that. Although I have serious questions about how OFFA will benefit many parts of England—it is for English Members to criticise or accept that—the tools are right within the framework of the Bill. That is why I hope that the Committee will resist amendment No. 24.

Mr. Mark Francois (Rayleigh) (Con) rose—

Alan Johnson rose—

Roger Gale (Conservative, North Thanet)

Order. It is the paramount duty of the Chair to protect the rights of Back Benchers, but we have been debating this clause for a very long time and I notice that the Minister rose, as he is entitled to do. It seems to me that it would be appropriate at this point to hear from the Minister. It will then be for hon. Members to determine whether they wish to speak again. However, if the Member in charge of the lead amendment rises to his feet to wind up the debate before 5 o'clock when the guillotine falls, I shall feel obliged to call him.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Thank you, Mr. Gale. As our sitting will finish at 5 o'clock, it is important to respond to some of the points that have been made and to some of the specific questions that have been asked. I realise that the debate is not over and that the quality will deteriorate in the next few minutes, but it will pick up again afterwards. I hope that other hon. Members will have a chance to speak after me.

What strikes me is that we have had a high-quality debate, which is extraordinary because the argument made by the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell and other Opposition Members was that we should have no regulation whatsoever and many of the arguments from Labour Members were that we should go further. Nevertheless, the points of agreement were more numerous than the points of disagreement, and I want to explain why we set so much store by that and will try to calm some of the concerns expressed by Opposition Members that the provision will be obnoxious—to use the words of the hon. Member for Hertsmere—and to reassure Labour Members that it will not be ineffective and that we have achieved the right balance.

The hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell obviously feels passionately about this issue. He said that we were trying to tell universities what they could and could not do, that these were social engineering measures and that we were gerrymandering admissions. My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North said that the Opposition were

building a straw man. The problem with the hon. Gentleman's comments is that the Opposition are not arguing against what we are proposing, but against what they believe we might mean by what we are proposing. In some cases, they are arguing against interference with the admissions policies of universities. We have not proposed that, and would not propose that. We have gone to great lengths to say why we agree with them that it would be totally wrong to do so. I accept many of the points made by Opposition Members, but they advanced very eloquent and passionate arguments against something that we are not proposing.

Tim Collins (Conservative, Westmorland and Lonsdale)

The Minister said—I believe that I am paraphrasing him accurately—that the Government have repeatedly said that interference with admissions policies would be wrong. Will he say why he believes that?

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

We explained that in the White Paper. We do not believe that that the reason for the poor social class mix in higher education lies with the university admissions policy. We believe that there is an admissions issue, which I will discuss in a moment, but we are quite clear that the responsibility for university admission lies with the universities and their admissions policies without any outside interference whatsoever. We said that in the White Paper.

We passionately agree, however, that the obscene social class gap in higher education—''obscene'' is the right word to use—will not be resolved by our proposals. They are not a great leap forward, and will not resolve this problem. They are not a panacea, but a contribution. However, Opposition Members are wrong to say that we are doing nothing about the other issues. We say that there are four issues, which we call the four As: aspiration, attainment, application and admission.

It is right to recall that we have made enormous strides in attainment. For example, the proportion of 16-year-olds who achieve five or more A to C grades at GCSE is up from 44.5 per cent. in 1996 to 51.5 per cent. in 2002. The number of GCSEs attained was double the national figure in excellence in cities areas in which universities and schools help us a great deal as part of their outreach activity. Five good GCSEs is a very healthy increase in attainment. However, one in four working-class youngsters who achieve eight good GCSEs do not end up in higher education. So we can solve the attainment problem, but have another problem further up the chain. This is about push and pull.

In 2003, 21.6 per cent. of A-level papers were given an A grade—the highest-ever percentage and twice the level of 1993—yet 68 per cent. of higher education entrants with three A grades at A-level are state educated, but only 54 per cent. of Oxbridge entrants are. These are the qualifications—30 UCAS points—needed to get into those universities, but there is this disparity.

According to the Russell group's own information, only 18 per cent. of the admissions to the 19 Russell group universities were from the lowest three social

classes. However, admissions are not the issue on which to focus. As the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell said, nine out of 10 youngsters who get two decent A-levels, or their equivalent level 3 qualification, will go on to university. That is very healthy, though it is interesting to know what happens to the other 10 per cent. Nevertheless, that has to be measured as a success. Then, looking at where they apply—to which universities they aspire—one finds that, of students with A-level passes equal to 30 UCAS points, 66 per cent. of the top three social classes apply to Oxbridge and only 58 per cent. from the bottom three social classes. There is an 8 percentage point gap.

We have to address all these issues. It starts with the under-fives. My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North made the very pertinent point that social class divisions start at a very early age. Research shows that, at around 22 months, the attainment of bright youngsters from lower social classes starts going down and the attainment of the less bright from a more prosperous background starts going up. These are very important issues. It is important to concentrate on the under-fives—with Sure Start and so on—and it is important to concentrate on literacy and numeracy at the age of 11. There again the attainment is really good. We are now third in the world in terms of literacy levels for 10-year-olds. Although it is still the case that 25 per cent. of primary school youngsters are not achieving the right level of literacy and numeracy, achievement has gone up from 50 per cent. to 75 per cent. since we came to government. That is all about us looking at attainment and pulling right the way through to get to this stage—investment in schools and in all the things we are doing at every level.

Then we come to higher education, which cannot take this burden on itself. It cannot be told that it is totally responsible for solving a problem that has bedevilled British society for 40 years—for time immemorial, but we say 40 years, because that is when these issues have been tracked and when they have been seen to be more important than previously.

The hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell said that if the strategy were being put forward on its own, the universities would be in revolt. He is probably right but it is not being put forward on its own. The whole point is that it is a balanced package. It is one of the arguments of the Secretary of State that the package falls apart if one element is removed. Remove the regulator and, quite frankly, the Bill does not stand up. Similarly move variable fees and the ability of universities to bring this funding stream in and the regulator does not stand up. There are other ways to approach the issue and I will come to them soon.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

If we take as read all the comments the Minister and other hon. Members have made about the injustice in the system, surely his most immediate past comment—that without fees, the regulator does not stand up—is absolute nonsense? If he believes that the measures are necessary for the university system, to say that they are dependent upon fees being £3,000 or £1,000 is neither here nor there.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

The hon. Gentleman is right. We could suggest a regulator, but if we did that in

isolation, there would be revolution. The universities would not take kindly to us putting forward such a proposal, and we would not put forward such a proposal. The reason we are putting our proposals forward is because the universities have said that they want more money. They say that could do more to widen participation and improve access if they had more funds and that they could give better bursaries if they had more funds. It is therefore fair for us to say, ''Something for something.''

We are not saying that universities are doing nothing. The Russell group is often criticised, but people should read the document that it produced last November. My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North is a great fan of the education maintenance allowance. We offer 16-year-olds from poor backgrounds £1,500 a year to stay in education until they are 18. That is another part of the chain that we are putting in place. Where did the idea for the EMA come from? It came from the Robert Ogden scholarship scheme at Leeds university—one of the Russell group. So we are not saying that universities are doing nothing. However, if we are to go through a fair bit of mild political controversy to provide the extra funding that they need, we need to go a stage further, and the regulator is the right way to do that.

The hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell was wrong about another issue. He suggested that this was a matter for universities and that the Government should not get involved. However, the Government are already involved, and we have been for some time. We are involved in the widening participation agenda, which my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, East mentioned.

In that respect, my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge gave the very graphic example of the young girl who wanted to go to university and who therefore went to a summer school, but whose teacher immediately put a dampener on things when she went back to her own school. Schools are involved in every aspect of the £158 million Aimhigher project that we have introduced over the past three years. There are different strands, and strand one gives money to schools and further education partnerships in deprived areas so that they can undertake activities such as mentoring visits and master classes. Schools are therefore locked into the whole programme, which is already in place.

The hon. Member for Hertsmere asked for a definition of broadly based intake, but it already exists. The Dearing report had a lot to say about it and suggested that there should be performance indicators to show how universities were succeeding. If we do not have such information, how can we tackle the problems and know that we are doing so successfully? In response to Dearing, therefore, we introduced performance indicators to cover several strands, one of which was access. Every university therefore has an access benchmark. It is formulaic, and HEFCE reels it off. There is no argument with universities about their access benchmark, which

takes account of which area a university is in, what the socio-economic mix is and what courses are laid on. It then shows the university what its broadly based intake should be. That is happening already.

Tim Collins (Conservative, Westmorland and Lonsdale)

Like several hon. Members on both sides of the Committee, the Minister has said that the problem lies at least as much with schools as with universities. Indeed, several hon. Members have said that it lies more with schools. The Minister has spoken about the carrots that he is giving schools. Under the Bill, however, he is giving universities carrots and sticks. What are the sticks for schools? [Interruption.]

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Someone said Ofsted, and that would be a fair stick. However, my point is not about carrots and sticks. There is a difference between access and admissions. Opposition Members talk as if we cannot do something about access without involving admissions. The dictionary definition of access is that it is the

''condition of being readily approached''.

The regulator's job will be to deal with a bit of the access part of applications and a bit of the aspirations part of the four A's that I mentioned earlier. However, everything that we are doing, including HEFCE's Aimhigher and widening participation programmes, under which it allocates £250 million, is about access. We have already accepted that there is a difference between the two terms. In those circumstances, it is perfectly fair to tell universities that this is how we shall proceed, as long as it is not done in a heavy-handed way.

To respond to the great point from the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell about me saying in Westminster Hall that the measure will have teeth, let me make it clear that the provisions will be light touch, but not soft touch. What is the point of having a regulator if it has no power to ensure that the access plan that it reaches with universities is carried out? I would argue, as the hon. Member for Daventry suggested, that this is light touch, but also a powerful mechanism. I think that, if we were to stray into the areas that some hon. Members have tempted us to get into, we would run into the situation in which we would not have the consensus working with the universities that the proposal requires.

That is not to say that we are doing nothing about admissions. We set up the Schwartz committee, which is referred to in the literature that I just held up and which the Russell group said that it very much supports. Schwartz is about considering the thorny question of admissions: not interfering in universities' control over their admission policies, but considering best practice. What can we do to assist in a situation in which admission must be by merit? How do we define merit when there is an extraordinary increase—which we are pleased about—in the number of students achieving good A-level passes? There must be some definition.

Schwartz has come up with some interesting ideas. An interim report has been published, and the final report will come out soon. The report mentioned post-qualification applications. Applying to university before A-level results are known means that

youngsters from working-class backgrounds, who generally do not have the confidence and the aspiration, might not apply to the university that best matches their talents. Post-qualification application would resolve that problem. That poses a horrendous practical problem, but in principle we accept the suggestion. That is the type of thing that Schwartz is considering, and admissions policy is rightly being dealt with in that arena.

We are considering all these issues: the under-fives, literacy and numeracy rates at the age of 11, staying on at 16, A-level and GCSE results and whatever emerges from Tomlinson. It would be a big gap in that if we did not consider, at the top end, applications and admissions.

Mark Francois (Conservative, Rayleigh)

I thank the Minister for giving way as I appreciate that he has a lot to get through. I pick him up on the point about working-class children not necessarily being encouraged to go to certain universities. Does he accept that, in many cases, that is because the schools that those children attend are not geared up to encourage them in the right way and do not always give them the right guidance, which they might get at other schools? The responsibility lies heavily with the schools as well.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

The hon. Gentleman may have been out of the Room, but I accept that. I know from the experiences that he mentioned on an intervention that he comes from that sort of background and has first-hand knowledge of it. School support is essential, but the point that I am making is that because the Bill does not refer to everything that we are doing, it should not be argued that this provision is the only way that we will improve the social class mix.

Chris Grayling (Conservative, Epsom and Ewell)

This is a factual request. The Bill refers to groups under-represented in higher education, and that has clearly been an issue at the heart of today's debate. Will he clarify what the Government mean by under-represented groups?

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Yes, I can. I was going to do that, but this is a perfect opportunity. I know that the term ''under-represented group'' has been mentioned not only in Committee but has caused concern in the sector. Let me offer Members a reassurance that, as the explanatory notes to the Bill make clear, the term is not intended to have a strict statistical interpretation. It is expressing, in legislative terms, what widening participation is about. We would not, for example, expect a plan to cover every under-represented group, nor would we expect one that had provisions about attracting applications from disabled students to contain an exhaustive list of those disabilities—reference to so many visually impaired students and so on.

The institutions will be free to make their plans in broader terms, though if some wish to include more specific measures, they are free to do so. In the phrase

''to attract applications from . . . members of groups which . . . are under-represented in higher education'',

we mean under-represented relative to the situation that would be the case were access completely fair and based on ability to benefit. Let me make it clear that in this context we are talking about groups under-

represented in higher education as a whole, rather than at a particular university. I wanted to place that on the record, and I am grateful for the opportunity to do so.

Tim Collins (Conservative, Westmorland and Lonsdale)

The Minister has given a most helpful definition of ''group''. Could I just press him on what ''under-representation'' means? Does it refer to numbers of applications or numbers admitted?

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

We mean under-represented in terms of applications. On the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North, may I point out that he was out of the Room when I was paying him compliments? He has returned now that I am about to explain why I cannot accept his amendments. That is probably the wrong way round.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

I am surprised by the Minister's response to that intervention. I would have thought that one might well find that some of the more disadvantaged groups are not—in general, taking into account all universities—under-represented in applications, but they may still be very definitely under-represented in applications to the more prestigious universities. It is important for us to try to make sure that the more prestigious universities work towards getting a fair share of applications from those under-represented minority groups if they are currently under-represented, not only in terms of applications, but in terms of admissions.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

Well, if the hon. Gentleman is saying that the term ''under-represented groups'' should apply to admissions as well as to applications, I think he has a point. The specific question that I think I was being asked was about the remit of the director of access, which refers to applications and not admissions.

The result of improving the socio-economic mix among applicants, we think, will be reflected in admissions. I know that it is an issue that Conservative Members have raised—what will happen in 10 years' time if that does not occur?—but the whole thrust of the Bill and everything we are doing is about improving that level of applications. There are other issues that will consider admissions, but that is what we are dealing with here.

David Rendel (Liberal Democrat, Newbury)

There is a very important point here, and something might be going wrong. Is the Minister saying that if, for example, groups from Leeds are perfectly well represented in applications to the university sector as a whole, there is no need for any university to try to ensure that there are applications to that university from people from Leeds if they are under-represented in applications to that particular university?

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

I understand, but I am trying not to get into the statistical argument that we have tried to ensure will not be implied by these words. Perhaps it would be helpful if I write to Committee members and set out how we believe that this will work.

To turn to the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North, the reason for my asking him not to press them is not that they are not perfectly sensible and reasonable

arguments. One argument that he makes in amendment No. 195 is that we ought to define ''fair access''. We believe that ''fair access'', like equal opportunities, is a term that people will understand. The hon. Member for Newbury also raised this issue. If we try to define the term, we will create more problems than we solve. Nowhere in the equal opportunities legislation is the term ''equal opportunities'' defined. We would have a problem if we went down that route.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

Will the Minister give way?

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

No, I will not. I might if there is time, but I want to ensure that other people get a chance to come in. ''Fair access'' is a well understood term.

On amendment No. 193, which is also about equal opportunities, the director must have regard to equal opportunities anyway. When this Bill receives its Royal Assent, we expect that the Home Office will add to the schedule in the Race Relations Act 1976, for instance, that the director for fair access will come under that schedule. We cannot predict this until the Bill has gone through, however. It will have an obligation to uphold equal opportunities, and we do not need an amendment to do that.

Amendment No. 194 is about rooting out covert discrimination. Most of the problems that we face are overt. If the regulator, once appointed, believes that there are issues of covert discrimination, the director will have the ability to address those problems.

That brings me to my hon. Friend's amendment No. 268, which would remove the ability to issue statutory guidance. He implied that the regulator had to carry out the statutory guidance. We thought long and hard about whether it should be statutory or non-statutory guidance. We are sure that there has to be guidance, because the things we see in the letter from the Secretary of State are not the kind of things we can write into legislation, and traditionally we would not try to do so.

We decided that there had to be statutory guidance, but the director of fair access is free to ignore it; it is only guidance. It would be a strange director who ignored it completely, but OFFA would also be strange if we did not give guidance from the centre, given that there are so many issues, not least around bursaries, towards which we want to direct the regulator.

Amendment No. 221, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North, speaks about the director having unlimited powers; I think even my hon. Friend tabled it as a probing amendment. The director is allowed to do many things, but not, I hope, turning up at 3 o'clock in the morning at the vice-chancellor's door, saying that he wants to look at the books. I think my hon. Friend was getting at the social class mix, the finances and so on, all of which are covered elsewhere. The chief executive of HEFCE is the chief accounting officer and there are many provisions in place. There were provisions pre-

Dearing; post-Dearing there are many more to ensure that the issues are transparent.

Jonathan R Shaw (Labour, Chatham and Aylesford)

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the draft guidelines are pieces of paper but what we will have is a person whose personality will greatly shape the atmosphere of the office and its relationship with vice-chancellors and universities? Let us consider the opposite, for example.

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

I shall try not to. Let me remind my hon. Friend that the Bill gives the director the duty to have regard to any guidance from the Secretary of State. There is no question of the Secretary of State dictating to the director how he goes about his business—he simply cannot do that—but it is leaping to the other extreme to say that we should not issue statutory guidance, which is the proper thing to do. That is why I hope that the amendment will be withdrawn.

The hon. Member for Hertsmere spoke to amendment No. 235.

Graham Allen (Labour, Nottingham North)

Before the Minister leaves my amendments—I thank him for his explanation—let me say that one of the fundamental points I was trying to get across to Ministers, officials and even university vice-chancellors was the need to be clear that we are leaving the impression that there can be the power of initiative from OFFA. The legislation reads and feels as though OFFA is almost entirely reactive. That was the thrust of the probing amendments, if I may mix my metaphors. Can the Minister reassure me?

Alan Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle)

I understand that point but my hon. Friend should be reassured. There are other proactive measures from the NUS, HEFCE and others. The regulator does not have to replicate what they are doing, but he will have the ability to form his own judgments and to decide areas such as covert discrimination, which we have mentioned, that he might need to explore.

I deal now with amendment No. 235, which stands in the name of the hon. Member for Hertsmere. I hope that I have made this point clear, but I will say it again: the director will have nothing whatever to do with admissions. I am sure hon. Members will have seen that there is no reference to involvement with admissions anywhere, either in the Bill or in the regulations to be made under it. Our guidance makes it plain that admissions do not fall within the director's remit. The hon. Gentleman quoted a letter but did not read out the part that says:

''Institutions' admissions policies and procedures will be outside your remit.''

That makes the amendment unnecessary. We could set out other areas for which the director is not responsible: he is not responsible for course content or the setting of fees. Legislation should not list areas for which the regulator is not responsible, but to offer the hon. Gentleman more comfort I can say that institutions have and will retain complete autonomy over admissions standards and requirements.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned EU students. He quoted Sir Howard Newby, the chief executive of

HEFCE, at a conference this morning. However, he did not quote what he went on to say. Yes, there may be some extra students coming from the accession countries, but Sir Howard said that the numbers would be tiny—about 5,000 students this year in a total student population of 1 million. The hon. Gentleman made some fair points and did not link them to any scare stories, but we must be absolutely clear that Sir Howard was not saying there was a huge problem. He was merely pointing out one aspect of increased student numbers.

In response to the hon. Member for Daventry, I must say that universities are obliged to abide by EU law and not discriminate against students from other EU states. They have the right to study here, as UK students have the right to study elsewhere in the EU. It is a matter for universities and is not affected by OFFA, although OFFA must abide by EU law. It could not, for instance, reject an access plan because the plan gave bursaries to Spanish or Portuguese students. The balance is right and there is no need to imply that OFFA upsets it.

Tim Boswell (Conservative, Daventry)

The Minister may want to clarify this point later, but will he confirm that OFFA will not exercise any interest over wider issues such as postgraduate students or others paying full fees, who are different from the first-time, full-time undergraduate students who are part of the regulated sector?

The rest of the debate is in Hansard.