What are the most significant challenges facing the higher and further education sectors? How will your proposals address these?
Lia Nici: From a UK perspective, I believe our most pressing challenge is to ensure that we have a workforce equipped with the skills required for our country’s needs. As you can see, I’ve shifted the focus away from the challenges faced by the further education (FE) and higher education (HE) sectors to what our nation truly needs. The challenge for the FE and HE sectors is to ensure that they are effectively training and educating individuals in the specific skills required in the UK. This approach is essential to provide opportunities for high-quality, well-paying jobs, enhance our nation’s productivity, and promote social mobility by enabling individuals to embark on long-term careers without being burdened by unnecessary debt for extended periods.
Jonathan Gullis: I’d like to see increased attention on digital skills across higher and further education. The nature of work is changing as technology evolves. Work patterns have shifted in my lifetime and have accelerated in the last five to ten years. I think a key challenge we face is navigating the digital landscape and understanding the impact new technology has on job creation – and ensuring that our education landscape prepares us for that. That’s why one of our proposals focuses on the importance of introducing short training modules that enable the upskilling of workforces in new skills, particularly digital skills.
Would funnelling less academically capable students down vocational pathways undermine the positive progress that has been achieved in improving parity of esteem?
Lia Nici: No, the intention is not to limit academically capable students from pursuing degrees. Rather, our goal is to encourage more vocationally capable students to consider courses that are directly relevant to their chosen careers. Our proposals are about ensuring that those who are well-suited for academically rigorous higher education courses pursue them. For most active learners who thrive through hands-on experience and are better suited to vocational learning, we aim to provide rigorous vocational opportunities.
It's essential to shift away from a defensive stance influenced by strong university lobbying. Instead, we want to guide individuals towards courses that are suitable for them, courses they will enjoy and benefit from in terms of career prospects. What we want to avoid is students enrolling in university courses that aren’t the right fit, resulting in both dissatisfaction and the burden of at least £30,000 in debt. This is the essence of our policy.
Jonathan Gullis: On the contrary, I believe emphasising the value of vocational pathways are encouraging more people to pursue them will serve to enhance the positive perception of vocational routes. What we’re saying is that vocational routes are incredibly important and can lead to exceptional outcomes for people from a variety of backgrounds, and that it is outdated and wrong to believe university is the only path to success.
Does transforming underperforming universities into Institutes for Technology not risk being a regressive policy that will see us return to the polytechnic model?
Lia Nici: I’ve had numerous discussions with colleagues in the New Conservatives about this, as some were advocating for letting institutions revert to being called polytechnics. To me, it seems like a matter of semantics. If an ex-polytechnic excels in providing vocational undergraduate or graduate courses without altering their offerings, they can call themselves whatever they please without changing what they deliver. However, some institutes may benefit from becoming institutes of technology to set themselves apart from similar universities. It could be advantageous for some organisations, while for others, it may not hold much value. Allowing institutions to make that name change if they wish seems like a sensible approach.
Jonathan Gullis: I think it’s important to consider the end result we’re hoping for. Institutes of Technology should not be seen as knock-off universities, but worthwhile places of learning in their own right that cater to specialist knowledge. It’s true that we’ve lost the distinctive role of technical and vocational higher education since the polytechnic reforms, but new technical and vocational offerings need to cater to the needs of today, not the early 90s. If more places were able to offer shorter and more flexible courses, I think that would be a progressive step forwards, not a regressive step back.
How would you ensure that support for apprenticeship offered by SMEs, regardless of Levy usage, is sustainable in the long term, given the potential influx of SMEs participating in apprenticeship programmes?
Lia Nici: The basis of the report was to scrutinise our investment, amounting to hundreds of billions, in student loans for undergraduate courses. Many of these courses fail to yield the desired outcomes for both students and employers. By redirecting a significant portion of this investment, roughly £400 billion, we can address the current outstanding student loan debt of approximately £209 billion. By allocating even half of this towards bolstering vocational programmes and apprenticeships, we could increase support tenfold compared to what we currently offer.
SMEs, due to their size, typically require only a limited number of apprentices at any given time this approach appears to be a practical and feasible way to reallocate funds away from the 50 per cent of individuals pursuing traditional university education and towards a smaller, more targeted group where we can maximise the value of apprenticeship programmes. This shift aims to ensure that our investments generate a more significant impact on skills development and workforce readiness.
Jonathan Gullis: The New Conservatives think this would be sustainable under our proposed framework if up to a fifth of young people opted for apprenticeships and we saw an approximate 15 per cent reduction in the number of people attending university. To be realistic, it will take time before more than 20 per cent of school leavers opt for an apprenticeship, and it will take time before we have more apprenticeships offered than what we can fund. University funding currently matches demand – that should be the same for apprenticeships.
How do you allay concerns that your proposals for fixed repayments after graduation will discourage those from low-income backgrounds from attending university?
Lia Nici: This policy doesn’t discourage individuals from lower-income backgrounds from pursuing higher education because it’s not about one’s socioeconomic background but their academic ability. If someone has the appropriate academic qualifications, they can attend university regardless. Another aspect of our policy involves incentivising students to choose degrees to crucial sectors like the NHS or engineering, designated them as approved courses with a national demand.
Under this approach, if a student decides to study a degree that the country urgently needs, they wouldn’t have to repay their student loan; the government would fund it because it’s in the national interest. So, we should be cautious about assuming that those we want to achieve social mobility are not academically capable. We have many highly gifted individuals who can excel in rigorous academic programmes. The link between social mobility and academic ability is somewhat of a misconception.
Jonathan Gullis: Those from low-income backgrounds should have nothing to worry about. Fixed repayments after graduation, after allowing for a few years to find your feet, will discourage students from studying a degree for the sake of it. If you’re bright and get good grades, then you shouldn’t have any concerns about being able to afford loan repayments as your degree should lead to a graduate-level job.
Widening access to higher education has been a key focus of the Conservative Party for many years now. We are committed to that. If you think that your degree won’t lead to a graduate salary, then that’s telling you something about the course – not about you or your background.