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Meeting of the Parliament 27 March 2013

27 Mar 2013 · S4 · Meeting of the Parliament

Item of business

Post-16 Education (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1

Smith, Liz Con Mid Scotland and Fife Watch on SPTV

We can all agree that this is a very important time in further and higher education. There are a huge number of challenges involved in facing up to a fast-changing world and in ensuring that our colleges and universities are fit for the future as regards their competitive edge, their flexibility and their ability to adapt to the needs of an ever-increasing diversity of students.

We should not underestimate the scale of that challenge. It was quite right that the Scottish Government was mindful of whether government had a legislative role to play in assisting with meeting that challenge. The Scottish Government, in conjunction with colleges, universities and the Scottish funding council, needed to decide which policies would best deliver excellence in our institutions, would maintain and enhance their international reputations and would respond to the economic and social needs of local economies. I hope that that decision is based on building on the current successes of our institutions. If a legislative route was seen to be desirable, it would be clear in its intentions, practical and acceptable to the institutions involved.

It was against those criteria that the Scottish Conservatives set out to examine the Post-16 Education (Scotland) Bill. At the start of the process we were genuinely open-minded, largely on the basis that we had sympathy with some—albeit certainly not all—of the main policy intentions. As time has gone on, and following lengthy committee meetings examining a large amount of evidence—meetings that were ably and objectively chaired by Stewart Maxwell—we have increasingly come to the view that this is a bad bill. It is a bad bill not just because of its poor drafting; it is a bad bill because of the complete lack of clarity about the relationships between the new structures, which is particularly the case with regard to colleges. The bill has botched the balance between public accountability and autonomy, and it is a bad bill because there is so little evidence that it is needed and is able to deliver on the intentions behind it.

Alastair Sim of Universities Scotland summed it up well when he said:

“the bill has come adrift from the policy intentions.”—[Official Report, Education and Culture Committee, 19 February 2013; c 1977.]

I agree. Apart from those presentational problems, which formed a substantial part of the evidence, there are, for the Scottish Conservatives, some major policy issues with the bill, and I will consider those in the context of an increasingly competitive international situation for our universities.

Good governance is not in doubt—indeed, I do not believe that it ever was. If there was compelling evidence and serious examples of bad governance harming education and holding back our institutions, there might be a case for new legislation. However, the policy memorandum did not identify any such problems, and Professor von Prondzynski was at pains to say that he thought that the existing structures were “excellent”. That begs the question why the Scottish Government is so intent on such an unnecessary overhaul.

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Meeting of the Parliament 27 March 2013

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