Provost's View: Brexit and a general election - choppy waters ahead?

Just when you thought national politics couldn't get any more crazy, your phone bleeps during the Easter break with a newsflash that the Prime Minister is about to make an important announcement.

I received this message while sailing with friends across Brighton bay, just north of a huge new wind farm under construction (more of which later), and this precipitated much maritime speculation on likely content.

Suffice it to say, we did land on the correct answer and, indeed, the Prime Minister, Theresa May, announced that she was calling a snap general election.

Where next for the Higher Education Bill?

The implications for higher education are potentially huge. The current government's Higher Education Bill returned to Parliament on Wednesday with the Commons overturning a number of Lords amendments and passing a number of their own amendments in lieu.

As I write this article, those changes are being debated in the House of Lords and if the Lords accept the Commons changes, it will move to Royal Assent later today.

If it runs out of time and the bill is not enacted, then presumably much that we had been anticipating may change. If it does just squeeze in, then presumably implementation of key aspects of the bill will fall to a new government, of whichever hue, and with potentially differing degrees of enthusiasm.

It is interesting to gauge one's immediate reaction to such events. There were aspects of the bill that were good and can probably still go ahead either with or without legislation, such as changes proposed to the national research landscape and the formation of UKRI, especially now that the House of Lords have added amendments to strengthen ongoing autonomy of the individual research councils.

Following the general election it is not, however, clear to me what will happen to all the proposed regulatory changes, such as the demise of HEFCE in its current form and the emergence of the Office for Students.  

I view all of this with some considerable concern, as the last thing we want is a combination of uncertainty combined with over-, or potentially confused, regulation. Whatever happens to the bill, there will be much to do, both for the new government and for the sector.

If the bill is not enacted, then presumably major changes such as the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) will be stalled, or possibly even abandoned, and the link between teaching excellence and the ability to charge higher fees will, most likely, be broken.

Our students and many of our staff will be pleased if that happens, as there have been deep concerns about linking tuition fees to the TEF. We have on many occasions expressed concerns about the TEF methodology and reliability of exactly how teaching excellence may be measured.

Higher education funding post-election

However, one important consequence will be that our ability to raise tuition fees by inflation will potentially be lost without such parliamentary assent.

Two problems could arise from such an outcome; the first is that our costs will continue to rise by a projected minimum of 2.5-3% per annum, which will put further financial pressure through the system.

To put it another way, frankly, we need the money to help keep us at the forefront of globally leading universities.

The second problem is that if income doesn't rise gradually, it will eventually create another 'threshold moment' for a future government over the funding of higher education, where a government may be forced to make a sudden, more dramatic change.

The past two threshold moments saw tuition fees rise from £1,000 to £3,000 and then to £9,000 four years ago. Threshold moments are risky and a link of fees to inflation would be my preferred mechanism of preventing another difficult and unstable moment for the sector and our students of the future.

Pushing the new government on EU citizens' rights

Another key issue for UCL over the next academic term will be the Brexit negotiations, now that Article 50 has been invoked and negotiations are being prepared.

We have to work under the assumption that a general election is unlikely to change the UK government's intention to leave the EU and we must continue to prepare ourselves for that eventuality. The ongoing rights of EU citizens currently living and working in the UK remains our number one issue, and we continue to push for this to be separated from other aspects of negotiating a settlement with the EU.

The worry here is that most documents emanating from the EU about the nature of these negotiations is the mantra that 'nothing is agreed until everything is agreed'.

I think we need to stand up and state clearly that this is complete nonsense. We are dealing with the lives of some three million EU citizens here in the UK and of another one million UK citizens living in EU countries.

We cannot reasonably leave all those people with such uncertainty for the next two years - that would be totally unacceptable and it would, ultimately, damage the future of both the UK and the EU. UK and EU politicians and officials need to get this one issue resolved as soon as possible.

There will be many other things that they can trade and negotiate about, but they should not, under any circumstances, use this issue and the people caught up in it as a bargaining chip.

A triumph for clean energy

Now back to wind farms. Last week saw the first 24-hour period when the whole of the nation's power supply was provided without any coal whatsoever. That is a real landmark achievement and a triumph for science and technology - an example of changing the world for the better.

The grid was thus supplied by wind, solar, hydro, and nuclear without any coal energy in sight. How much of that achievement we can claim as having originated at UCL is not clear to me, but some of the credit is ours and my congratulations to everyone at UCL that has been involved in bringing these clean technologies forward.

Finally, I want to comment on and applaud the celebration of science as exemplified by the March for Science, which took place in London and around the globe last weekend, with many of our UCL scientists participating in the march and taking a very active role in this endeavour.

The stated aims of the movement are laudable:

"The March for Science champions robustly funded and publicly communicated science as a pillar of human freedom and prosperity. We unite as a diverse, non-partisan group to call for science that upholds the common good and for political leaders and policymakers to enact evidence-based policies in the public interest"

Redoubling our engagement with the public

Much has been said and written about the role of universities in a 'post-truth' world and how we need to both acknowledge and accept that we have contributed to a situation whereby the views of experts have become less valued in some parts of our society.

Events like the March for Science and the ongoing work of UCL scientific community and UCL Culture in public engagement and the understanding of science are critically important. We have to do much more to explain to the public the wider benefit of our research and how we contribute to making their lives better.  

With the uncertainties of Brexit, the general election and the fate of the Higher Education bill, there has never been a more important time for us to make our case clearly about the importance of universities to the future of our country.

Professor Michael Arthur
President & Provost

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