My Lords, I declare my interests as set out in the register. I shall speak to Amendment 72 in my name and in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Garden and Lady Wolf. I thank them for their support and for the work that they have done on the Bill. This is the first time in my life that I have been wedged between a duke and a viscount, and it is appropriate to know my place as a baron in your Lordships’ House.
My interest in the Bill is both as someone who benefited greatly from higher education as a mature student and as someone who has taught and still teaches in higher education and has had a long-standing interest in quality as Secretary of State and beyond. I put on the record that I think that all of us in this House agree that it is right that we drive forward and drive up the quality of teaching and learning in our university sector. It has long been neglected, and the driving force of the research excellence framework has to be matched so that the experience in the classroom, in the lecture theatre and in tutorials can be properly evaluated and given the rating that it really deserves. That brings me to the nub of the Bill.
As the noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington, said, there are real issues about the nature of the metrics being used. The teaching excellence framework could well be undermined by a simple lack of confidence on the part of those who are crucially involved in it, both in teaching and as students receiving that teaching.
I have not spent as much time on this Bill in your Lordships’ House as I would have liked, although I have spoken on a number of occasions. However, I pay tribute to those who have spent and will continue to spend an enormous amount of time on it. I give credit to the Government for the way in which they have listened, reflected on and responded to suggestions so far, which has made a great difference to the quality of the Bill. My noble friend Lord Stevenson and other colleagues have spent hours not only in the Chamber but outside working on the Bill, and liaising and negotiating with the Government and colleagues. That has made a tremendous contribution and I hope that, whatever the irritations of the moment about the capacity of the House of Lords to bring about change in legislation, the Government will continue to want to listen and learn, in particular in relation to the metrics of the TEF.
I have a great deal of time for Chris Husbands, the vice-chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University. He is reviewing the trial of TEF 2, as I understand it is now called, and no doubt he will bring forward positive proposals for change. But if there is no proper way of taking forward that change, what guarantees does anyone have that the process will have a satisfactory outcome? Changing the nature of the way in which the TEF is being taken forward by the Government at the moment, and dealing with concerns about the narrowness of the metrics and about the process of how future change will be dealt with, explains why the amendment includes references to the role of Ministers and of this House and the House of Commons through statutory instruments. Providing for proper transparency and accountability is important; that is why we should have a continuing interest in and concern about what is taking place.
The nub of the amendment is that change must take place in the lecture theatre and through the process of learning, not from outside. It has to be driven by, and created and expanded from, what is taking place, and from spreading best practice in higher education generally. There is a great deal of good practice as well as some extremely shoddy and unacceptable teaching. As the noble Baroness, Lady
Wolf, said in our debate on Monday, it is based on the presumption that this is about students. If it is about students, you would expect student bodies to be in favour of the proposals—but they are not. You would expect universities to be universally in favour of them—but they are not.
I just want to refer to the Faustian deal that Universities UK and the old HE body appear to have made with the Government. I have no idea how it came about. Much of what is in the letter sent out last week is highly commendable, but the timing and its presumption that the deal has been done are unworthy of those with the highest academic standards at their fingertips and the best interests of the sector at heart. So let us presume that we have made great progress, although a great deal can still be done. Let us hope that Ministers have the confidence to continue listening and reflecting so that they can bring to bear the wisdom that has been evident both in this House and beyond, and will be prepared to adjust and to deliver something that we all want to see: considerable improvement not only now but in the future so that we can provide the kind of support for teaching that has been evident for research for so long.
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I shall finish on a crucial note. The reputation of our universities is of course affected by the investment in and the outcome of research—but, in the end, universities and higher education were created from and have built on the most fundamental element of all: scholarship. It has been about building a theory of knowledge and the ability to impart it—and to do so well— with clear communication and with engagement in all forms of learning, including new distance learning, the use of information technology and the ability to move forward effectively.
The amendment seeks to generate further progress and to be a driving force for doing just that. Yes, we are in favour of considerable improvement; yes, the TEF could be a mechanism, if properly improved, to do that; and no, it cannot be seen to be doing it if it is too narrow.
I will draw attention to the ranking positions, which were mentioned by the noble Duke, the Duke of Wellington. There was a bit of a giveaway in the debate on Monday when the noble Viscount on the Front Bench mentioned the vice-chancellor of Nottingham Trent University. I declare an interest because one of my stepdaughters got a first-class degree from Nottingham Trent three years ago and I have a great deal of time for the university. The giveaway was in what was quoted from the vice-chancellor, who clearly believes that the kind of relative appraisals and rankings proposed will lead to people adjusting their view of reality about the holistic overview quality of universities in this country.
We on this side of the House know all about people who believe that they can set aside reality and that people will go with them—but you cannot. So the relative judgments to help students know what type of university they are going to and what they are going to get are fine, but relative outcomes are not suitable in terms of a judgment of the ranking of universities across the board in this country. What is, is—and
universities should be judged holistically on what they offer and the outcome measures they provide, not on what the comparator is with another institution of a particular type. Therefore, we need to be clear that in future we will want to lift the quality in every aspect of higher education, whatever the background and historic resonance of the university. In the end, we want people to know that quality means quality.