A new House of Lords report published today (Wednesday 13
September), warns that the Office for Students (OfS) and
Government are failing to act on the looming financial crisis
facing the higher education sector.
After hearing from students, university leaders, current and
former ministers, the OfS, the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA),
and representative bodies, the Industry and Regulators Committee
raises concerns about the impact of increased costs,
undergraduate tuition fee freezes for home students, and reduced
EU research funding, leading to an unhealthy dependency on
international and postgraduate fees to compensate.
The Committee’s report: “Must do better: the Office for
Students and the looming crisis facing higher education”,
criticises the role and performance of the OfS, concluding that
it is failing to meet the needs of students and is not trusted by
many of the providers it regulates. It also raises concerns that
the OfS lacks independence from the Government and that its
actions often appear driven by the ebb and flow of short-term
political priorities and media headlines.
Whilst the committee welcomes the OfS’ focus on value for money
for students, it questions the OfS’ approach to regulation and
whether it provides value for money itself to providers,
particularly when higher registration fees partly reflect the
regulator’s desire to expand its own remit.
The report calls on the OfS to:
- hold discussions with providers
more regularly about their financial situation and ensure it is
aware of the systemic challenges facing the sector;
- hold providers to account if they
do not ensure prospective students receive clear, digestible
information on their course, including its long-term costs and
approximate contact hours;
- urgently align its framework for
quality with international standards, including reinstating an
independent Designated Quality Body (DQB);
- make clear how it has taken the
institutional autonomy of providers into account when it
regulates;
- ensure that there are at least two
student representatives on the OfS' Board and open up more of its
work to student involvement;
- conduct detailed scoping work, with
students, on how it defines “the student interest,” and how this
informs its work;
- build trust with higher education
institutions and adopt a more strategic, less combative approach
to its work.
It also calls on the Government to:
- review how higher education is
funded, setting long-term, sustainable funding and delivery
models for the sector;
- consider making it a requirement
that serving politicians resign any party political whip they
hold before becoming Chairs of independent regulators;
- limit itself to providing higher
level, strategic input to the OfS, rather than overly
prescriptive guidance;
- reconvene the Higher Education Data
Reduction Taskforce to reduce unnecessary burdens on
providers.
, Chair of the Industry and
Regulators Committee said:
“At a time when the higher education sector faces a looming
crisis caused by financial instability, increased costs,
industrial action, and reduced EU research funding, it is vital
that the sector’s regulator is fit for purpose.
However, it was evident throughout our inquiry that the OfS is
failing to deliver and does not command the trust or respect of
either providers, or students, the very people whose interests it
is supposed to defend. We were surprised by the regulator’s view
that the sector’s finances are in good shape, which is not an
assessment that we or most of our witnesses share.”
