Dear Colleague,
The Higher Education and Research Bill completed its Report and Third Reading stages in the Commons this week, and begins its progress through the House of Lords on Tuesday 6 December. You can find more details about the debates that took place and the amendments that were tabled in the update attached.
Since our last update the group has been working on a number of things, Professor Paul O’Prey our speaker at the October meeting on Brexit has written a blog for us on his experience following the vote to Leave. Professor Andrew Wathey has kindly shared his presentation to the APPG last week on the Higher Education and Research Bill, where he has highlighted a number of continuing issues in the Bill for the sector, which I’m sure that my colleagues in the Lords will take up with gusto.
Our next meeting takes place on Tuesday 6 December, where we will look at the impact of social media on mental health. I understand that there little research on social media for specifically university students. Therefore the meeting should be an excellent opportunity for the group to gain a better understanding of mental health issues on campus more generally, an awareness of some research that has been done around young people, and start a discussion of how both groups can do more to address problems and utilise possible opportunities.
As you know one of the outcomes of our meeting on Brexit was for the group to develop an issue paper, this would be a combination of short essays, exploring the effect of leaving the EU, both positive and negative, covering research, staff recruitment and student recruitment. The aim would be to identify a list of key questions for those that will be negotiating on behalf of the UK, which APPG parliamentary colleagues can push.
We hope to have a paper prepared ahead of the Christmas Recess and would be very grateful for any examples, both local and national, of how Brexit may affect these areas above. Please could you send these to Kate Jackson (appug@universitiesuk.ac.uk) by the end of November.
Roberta Blackman-Woods MP
Chair, All-Party Parliamentary University Group
