Hansard

I welcome the group of stakeholders who are in the public gallery. They comprise students, staff, the chief executive of Dumfries and Galloway Council, and people from the Crichton Development Company and the Crichton stakeholder group. We have a good representation of people who have a strong view on the future of the Crichton campus.

When Dr James Crichton died in 1923, it was his wish that his considerable fortune should be used to create a university in Dumfries. His widow, Elizabeth Crichton, tried valiantly to have his wish fulfilled but, unfortunately, the existing Scottish universities opposed the creation of a rival in the south. Instead, a psychiatric hospital, the Crichton royal, was created. For many years, it won international recognition as a centre of excellence.

When the treatment of people with mental health and learning difficulties moved away from institutionalised care, the opportunity arose to make Elizabeth and James Crichton's dreams of a university campus a reality. In fact, one of the ancient universities that had opposed the establishment of a university in Dumfries—the University of Glasgow—spearheaded the new development by signing the first Crichton accord in December 1996. Since then, the Crichton campus has grown into a unique collaboration between higher and further education partners: the University of Glasgow, the University of Paisley, Bell College, the Open University and Dumfries and Galloway College. It has been the topic of several debates and questions in the Parliament.

Each partner brings its own different and expert contribution to the joint venture, and each expands the choices that are available to students at this most beautiful of campuses. Many of those students, of all ages, would not otherwise be able to access a university-level education. The University of Glasgow's contribution to the mix is its liberal arts degree—a concept that was promoted by the former vice-chancellor and principal, Sir Graeme Davies, to provide a broad-based education and develop a wide range of transferable skills that would enable graduates to adapt in a rapidly changing workplace.

In 2000, my colleague, Wendy Alexander, who was then the Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning, allocated 150 fully funded places to the Crichton campus and made available £500,000 of capital for both the University of Glasgow and the University of Paisley. The Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council has, more recently, demonstrated support for the collaboration between higher and further education through the allocation of £30 million to enable Dumfries and Galloway College to relocate at the Crichton campus, allowing the sharing of facilities between institutions and facilitating progression between further and higher education.

Sadly, an apparently irreconcilable difference of opinion has arisen between the University of Glasgow and the SFC. In my opinion, both bear some blame for the current impasse. Unlike the University of Paisley and Bell College, which will soon merge to become the university of the west of Scotland, the University of Glasgow does not share its fully funded student places between its different campuses. It sees its operation in Dumfries as additional to Gilmorehill and not part of its core activity. Because the only fully funded places on the Crichton campus account are the 88.4 that are allocated to the University of Glasgow through Wendy Alexander's intervention, the Crichton campus's budget for the University of Glasgow shows a deficit that is calculated to be around £880,000.

The SFC argues that it is providing £147 million to the University of Glasgow this year and that it is up to the university to decide how that funding is distributed. It also allocated an additional £900,000 of non-recurring funding to the University of Glasgow last week. Indeed, the University of Glasgow has managed to turn a deficit of £10 million into a surplus of £2 million, yet for some reason the SFC does not seem to value the liberal arts degree that is provided at the Crichton campus. It has said that it does not think that the degree contributes to the local economy, despite the fact that it includes courses in such things as cultural heritage, the environment and tourism—subjects that seem to be particularly appropriate in Dumfries and Galloway.

The SFC has also criticised the course for attracting women returners—or, as they are somewhat patronisingly described on the website, middle-aged ladies. As someone who might be loosely described as a middle-aged lady, I find the phrase offensive. Strangely enough, the SFC is perfectly happy to support very similar courses that are offered at the University of the Highlands and Islands.

The Crichton campus can offer much to the delivery of the SFC's aims and objectives as detailed in its 2006 to 2009 corporate plan which, I imagine, was agreed with the Scottish ministers. The aims include working across further and higher education, improving the supply of lifelong learning, enhancing the skills and employability of local people, supplying professional development, and enhancing research contributing to the cultural well-being of Scotland. The Crichton university campus hits all those targets.

Provision at the campus enjoys widespread public support. I have with me two petitions, the first of which, raised by students at Crichton, has gathered more than 2,500 signatures. At lunch time, three students from Dumfries and Galloway presented another petition raised by college students and signed by 400 more people. There is also a petition running in the local press. That demonstrates the strength of feeling in Dumfries and Galloway about the Crichton campus's importance.

Sadly, despite all that, the senate of Glasgow University decided yesterday not to admit an intake of new students from Crichton this year, although it has said that it will review the decision in future years, depending on further developments. If there is full withdrawal, the campus will be diminished, student choice will be reduced and the other partners will be financially affected. Courses in, for example, social work, which are part-funded by Dumfries and Galloway Council to address the serious shortage of social workers in the region, will not go ahead this year. Unfortunately, there seems to have been little discussion with the council about what the implications for it might be. Prospective students have already been told that they will have to go somewhere else for their social work training.

I say to the minister that we cannot let this happen. The sad fact is that Executive investment in the south of Scotland lags behind that in the Highlands and Islands. According to figures supplied by the Crichton Development Company, compared with the Highlands and Islands we have, per capita, half the number of higher education students, one sixth of the capital investment in higher education, one seventh of the number of fully funded higher education places and one eighth of the recurrent funding. I am not criticising the Highlands and Islands for having that money; all we in the south of Scotland want is a bit of the action.

I ask the minister to help us negotiate a way forward out of this impasse. I have, for example, suggested to the SFC that more fully funded places could be allocated not to Glasgow but to the Crichton site, which could then be offered to Glasgow in return for a commitment to remain in Dumfries. In the longer term, the review of HE funding will, I hope, recompense universities for the additional expense of providing higher education in rural areas.

I believe that a solution is possible. My plea to the Scottish Executive is that it helps us to find it. After all, Dumfries and Galloway deserves it. [Applause.]