Image: HM Treasury [CC BY-NC-ND 2.0], via Flickr
Bridget Phillipson’s initial comments on fees, public spending and international students draw mixed response
The new education secretary’s suggestion that the Labour government is not planning to increase tuition fees or public funding for universities could lead to allegations of complacency, a senior sector figure has warned.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4 on Wednesday, Bridget Phillipson acknowledged that universities were “facing significant financial challenges”, but said there were “no plans” to put up the cost of university for students or to give universities more money from the public purse. She did, however, back international student recruitment to help put institutions “on a more sustainable footing”.
Nick Hillman, director of think tank the Higher Education Policy Institute, told Research Professional News that the comments could come back to haunt the education secretary if an institution found itself in serious financial trouble in the coming weeks.
“I do recognise that the secretary of state was perhaps caught off guard in the interview and also that her higher education minister [Jacqui Smith] is still getting her feet under the table,” he said. “But these remarks were still disappointing, given the stark contrast with the messaging before the election.”
Speaking before the general election, Phillipson said universities would be a “day-one priority” for Labour in power.
Hillman said: “If a university falls over after a bad clearing period, say, the words will be endlessly replayed as evidence of complacency.”
Paul Ashwin, professor of higher education at Lancaster University and deputy director of the Centre for Global Higher Education, was also concerned—although not surprised—by the comments.
“This is in line with what I thought would happen before the election—that the incoming government were likely to initially try to avoid dealing with the funding issue in higher education whilst they focus on other educational priorities, such as early years and the teacher-recruitment crisis in schools,” he said.
“I still think that events are likely to force their hand in the form of institutional closures, given their very negative impact on students and local economies. At that point, higher education will suddenly become an urgent policy priority and we are then likely to get an interim settlement followed by a review of higher education funding.”
International rescue
There was a more positive response to Phillipson’s words on international recruitment, with Rachel Hewitt, chief executive of the MillionPlus group of universities, among those voicing optimism.
“A change in government rhetoric towards both international students and to universities and higher education more generally is long overdue, so for the new education secretary to back international recruitment so early in her tenure is hugely positive,” Hewitt said.
However, while recruiting more students from overseas might help to stabilise finances, it would not be “a magic bullet for an unsustainable funding model”, she added, in light of frozen tuition fees, rising costs and a fall in international recruitment hitting universities’ pockets hard this year.