“The Higher Education and Research Bill”
- Professor Andrew Wathey, Vice-Chancellor, Northumbria University, Newcastle
- Jo Johnson MP, Minister for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation, Department for Education and Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
Andrew Wathey began his comments by setting out that the HE and Research Bill was the first major piece of higher education legislation since 1992. He commented that the Minister’s thesis was that the previous regulation was designed for a different world (with student number caps and grants, for example), and needs to catch up to the reality, noting a differing view held by some, namely that the sector is getting by ok and in the current climate the Bill is not essential, but also the dangers of retaining regulation that is out of date.
Professor Wathey stated that from a broad sector perspective none of the big things in the Bill are opposed. Recognising the highest teaching quality, a manifesto commitment now rendered as the TEF, provides a corrective to the balance of teaching and research that was probably long overdue. As the REF generally is, the TEF in itself is likely to be a good thing (though by no means straightforward, and at best a proxy measure of excellence); and though the linkage to fees could drive complexity, the Government's acknowledgement that it is developmental has helped and gives the sector something to work with.
Noting publicly the welcome amendments tabled on Monday 14 November and the general predisposition of the Minister and the Bill team to listen, Professor Wathey then turned to some of the remaining worries about the Bill.
1. Competition: It is a fairly widely shared view in the sector that not only students and employers could be beneficiaries of competition in the sector but also wider society. However, he noted that competition could be leavened with collaboration. Competition alone risks waste and inefficiency; it may also benefit successful providers more than it benefits students.
2. Quality and standards: The fine-grained nature of the distinction between quality and standards is well known, and the Bill unhelpfully elides the two. In HE parlance generally, ‘quality’ relates to how a provider supports students to enable them to progress and achieve their award, ‘standards’ relates to the calibration of student attainment by a provider, and both have established definitions in the Quality Code. The provisions of the Bill move accountability substantially away from universities, in a way that is not consistent with the requirements and dynamics of autonomous institutions. The power given to OfS to rate standards as well as to assess them potentially opens the door to undesirable outcomes, e.g. the adoption of an Ofqual mind-set, or rating universities’ degrees ‘platinum’, ‘gold’, ‘silver’. What the legislation sets out to do – guarding against grade inflation, and giving the OfS a locus in the discussion of standards – can be achieved under the Revised Operating Model published by the HEFCE last March.
3. Powers of the OfS to validate degrees: With over a hundred validating bodies now, and probably more in future and all in competition, it is perhaps open to question whether this will arise. But the real issue is whether OfS can reasonably be poacher and gamekeeper at the same time. Another fundamental issue here is whether an arm’s length body of government validating degrees would, over time, undermine sector autonomy.
Professor Wathey concluded his comments by mentioning other areas, widening participation, part-time students, implications for the devolved nations, the status of royal charters, amongst others, that may need further scrutiny as the Bill enters its next stages.