Meeting of the Parliament 14 January 2016
As I have said to people repeatedly, our universities are and will remain autonomous. There is nothing in the bill as introduced, nor will there be anything in the bill after stage 2, that will advance ministerial control in any way. As I proceed with my opening remarks, I hope to outline fully to the Parliament how the Government will remove or reduce any regulatory powers that are deemed to be no longer necessary.
As is noted in the Education and Culture Committee’s stage 1 report, the bill
“contains relatively few provisions but has generated ... considerable ... comment”.
Our response to that has been to listen to those who support the bill and those who do not. I am grateful to all stakeholders for the views that they have offered and their participation in the meetings and workshops that we have hosted.
I welcome the committee’s support for the bill’s general principles. On Monday, I wrote to the committee to respond to its report and to set out the Scottish Government’s full analysis of any risk that the bill could present to the status of our higher education institutions as private not-for-profit bodies, as classified by the Office for National Statistics. The Scottish Government does not hold the view that the bill adds to any existing risk of reclassification of HEIs as public bodies.