HC Deb 19 April 1962 vol 658 cc704-22

12.32 p.m.

Mr. John Rankin (Glasgow, Govan)

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In view of the enormous amount of our time which has already been consumed, may we hope that at the appointed hour for the conclusion of this debate a little toleration may be granted?

Mr. Speaker

These are not appointed hours in any strict sense. I merely make a personal allocation, but I hope that the hon. Member, if I may say so with respect, and his fellows, will have mercy on those who follow, because everyone's time will now have to be impacted.

12.33 p.m.

Mr. William Hannan (Glasgow, Maryhill)

In view of the attenuated time for this debate, I make the promise to my hon. Friends and others that I shall try to compress what I have to say so as to afford an opportunity to other hon. Members to take part.

We welcome the opportunity of this Adjournment to initiate a debate on the need for a fifth university in Scotland. This is now a matter of great public concern and public debate in national newspapers in Scotland, in universities and, above all, in ordinary humble homes where the future education of hundreds of young people is being affected. Parents are angry because, having sympathised with young people in their periods of despondency, and having encouraged them in success, they have sacrificed financially for their progress, but now see those young people's ambitions thwarted.

Teachers are extremely perturbed at the waste of many of their ablest pupils. A new university, in present circumstances, would be a very welcome decision, but the Government, apparently, remain adamant against such progress, despite the human needs of individuals and the country's dire need for trained manpower for the future. The Treasury will not have its calculations upset because in 1954–55 the Government, or their advisers, made no effort to put in hand this essential project. We are now faced with a national disaster. I use those words quite objectively.

The Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals of United Kingdom Universities has stated its position in emphatic terms. It is profoundly disturbed at the inadequate resources provided for this purpose. The Educational Institute of Scotland is convinced that a new university is necessary in Scotland not only to provide the extra places needed, but for the development of modern ideas in higher education. It has taken the lead in convening next month a representative conference of all Scottish interests, political, social, religious, commercial, industrial and the Press.

The E.I.S. has taken the lead in the matter, because it recognises that many of the ablest pupils are being denied opportunities for university education. I quote the case of a constituent who, with four passes in four higher subjects and two passes in lower subjects, was refused entry to Glasgow University. Three or four years ago this lad would have been in, but, because of the pressure of circumstances, the pass marks had been raised and, because it took him six years to get one subject instead of five years, he is being excluded. This is a dastardly thing taking place in Scottish education. Formerly, anyone with the ability considered it his birthright, no matter how long it took him to get a pass, to go to university.

As a further indication of the perturbation which is felt, Glasgow University General Council Special Committee calls for a more sweeping advance than the Government have hitherto accepted and for the abolition—or at least the reconstruction—of the Scottish Universities Entrance Board. It calls for simplification of entrance and provision of places for all who can meet the requirements with a certificate not more difficult to obtain. It calls for better university staffing ratios and methods and to cut the rate of those who fail to graduate. It says that there is an urgent need for another university in addition to the expansion of the Royal College of Science and Technology.

The Scottish Union of Students is appalled that the original so-called expansion plan of over a year ago of 170,000 places by 1970—inadequate and ill-considered as it was—is now aimed at, not for 1970, but for 1973–4. Even if it is reached in 1970, it is calculated that there will be 9,000 places short by that time. Even the Glasgow Herald, which is not a newspaper friendly to this side of the House, must have tribute paid to it for the campaign it has waged and the attention it has paid to this grave social miscalculation in recent years.

Referring to a debate on university education in this House on 26th March, it said in a leader: it will provide a focal point for discontent, even anger, among people who have no political axe to grind… The Government's failure is in the allocation of priorities. For the Glasgow Herald to say that is really dangerous talk, because it was Nye Bevan who said: The language of priorities is the religion of Socialism. The newspaper leader also said that it is hard to believe that they really accept as desirable the version of national priorities suggested by this table of the 1962–63 Estimates and their relation to last year's Budget Estimates. Even if allowance is made for a real increase of £5.5 million in university grants, an alarming sense of values. Sir Malcolm Knox, Chancellor of St. Andrews University, said that the university expansion programme is being seriously retarded by inadequate finance. The position is more alarming by the admission of the University Grants Committee Chairman, Sir Keith Murray, that the present programme, embarked on a year ago, of 170,000 by the end of this decade will be inadequate and 200,000 places will be required to accommodate all who qualify. Even Chat may be an underestimate. How anyone can contemplate with equanimity a deficiency of 30,000 places passes comprehension when we think of the waste of human brain power and the value that that could be to our country.

Coming more particularly to the need for another Scottish university, one notes that the first sentence of paragraph 14 of the U.G.C. Report states: In the earlier years of this century when most of the civic universities received their charters… Before reading the remainder of the sentence, I want to remind the Minister and the House that Scotland had at least three universities by the end of the fifteenth century—not only in the early years of this century. In the reign of James VI of Scotland and I of England, Scotland had six universities in the sense of having separate degree-granting powers. Even by the 1820s England had only two such institutions, and those were so closely under the control of the Anglican Establishment that many English and Welsh Nonconformists sent their young people to Scotland.

It is a vital part of my case that when, later in the same paragraph, the University Grants Committee says that it has … had to take into account the differences in the pattern of expansion in England and Wales and Scotland it has not given sufficient consideration to the basis from which we start. Does the Minister sincerely believe it right that Scotland which, in the past, and with fewer resources, had five and six universities open to anyone with talent while England preferred to have only two—and those only for a privileged few—should be so handicapped, and lose the advantage she has had for centuries? It is a matter of great concern that today, when we have only four universities, we should be asked to mark time, and to forsake historical and traditional advantages whilst the less perspicacious and more slothful English authorities catch up.

These statements are borne out by recent events in this House. When my hon. Friends and I have pursued the matter of universities in Scotland we have been told to await the Robbins Report. Does the Minister think that that is an effective and adequate Answer, since it has already been decided to provide seven new universities in England and Wales without the advice of the Robbins Committee, and in advance of the publication of its Report?

It must be strongly emphasised that the Scottish system of education is different from that in England, but certainly not inferior to it. In Scotland, the universities are an essential element in that system. It is an integrated system which has prevailed for years. My argument is not based on a narrow, nationalist, parochial outlook. On the contrary, I want the Government seriously to note what I am about to say. I believe that it is the Government's policy that is provoking a tendency to an extremely undesir- able attitude, particularly in the corporate life of universities.

Students from all over the United Kingdom and, indeed, from all over the world—particularly the Commonwealth and Colonies—should be able to intermingle, but what is, in fact, happening as a result of the scarcity of places? Disappointed and frustrated, many qualified students, their parents, a few teachers and, I regret to say, some people in public life, are, unfortunately, querying why students from England and Wales and other countries are being admitted to Scottish universities while increasing numbers of Scots are being turned away.

Scotland's universities have been international since mediaeval times. It is not just the Scottish potential intake that is relevant here, but the intake of English, Welsh, Irish and overseas students. We are proud in Scotland of taking our share in world education, and it is a great pleasure for us to know that when Julius Nyerere, who was, for a time, Prime Minister of Tanganyika, went to assume his great office, he took with him his landlady with whom he lived while studying at Edinburgh University.

It would, therefore, be a tragedy if this now prevalent but latent undercurrent of resentment against incomers were to erupt into open criticism and opposition. It would be quite contrary to the natural qualities of Scots in extending friendship, tolerance and hospitality to the strangers in their midst. Nevertheless, the Government should recognise that this trend is a by-product of their own policy.

It has long been the practice in Scotland for young people to go to the university nearest to their homes. The two reasons for that were partly traditional and partly economic. We also have a tradition of concern for the provision of higher education, in order to ensure that every girl and boy with the ability, whatever their circumstances, however humble their ancestry, should have the right—the birthright—to enter university. Unless the Government recognise this deeply-held conviction—held with an almost religious fervour—they have learned nothing from our debates and the Questions we have asked, and will trample on the best aspirations and hopes of our people.

If it is to be part of the Minister's case to repeat, from previous Answers given in this House, the statement that Scotland is doing well compared with England, is that a very good basis for comparison? Why not compare us with the best rather than with the worst? The United Kingdom student population per 10,000 of national population is 19.8, but what about the United States? What about Germany, where the figure is 32.5; or France, where it is 43.3; or Sweden, where it is 39.4? From those figures it will be seen that we still have a leeway to make up. Why not apply to this problem the much-publicised policy of incentives? If, as they say, the Government want to encourage enterprise, foresight, initiative and efficiency, here is their opportunity.

Paragraph 14 of the U.G.C. Report seems to hold the argument and provide the basis for the advice that the Committee gave to the Government. The Committee says that it has had to take into account the difference in the pattern of expansion between England and Wales and Scotland because there were marked differences in the birth rate in the postwar years and that, as a consequence, the number in the 17-year-old age group in Scotland will be much smaller than in England and Wales. The first thing that drew my attention to this was the excellent memorandum submitted by the Glasgow Herald to the Committee, which facetiously commented that it was not surprising that those in the sheltered cloisters of universities should not know the facts when much had come as a surprise to those outside them.

I have had supplied to me by the Library information taken from such authoritative publications as the United Nations Demographic Year Book, the United Nations Monthly Bulletin of Statistics, the Annual Abstract of Statistics and the Monthly Digest of Statistics. I hope that the Government will not refute those authorities. They show that in every year since 1952, Scotland's birth rate has exceeded that of England and Wales, and has, in some years, exceeded that of France, West Germany and Italy. For example, in 1957 the birth rate per 1,000 of popula- tion in Scotland was 19. In England and Wales, it was 16.1; in France, 18.5; in West Germany, 17, and, in Italy, 18. If birth rate was the basis on which advice was given, a review of the situation is clearly called for. It was on such premises that the U.G.C. said that for every one additional place to meet the required expansion in Scotland, 15 will be needed in England and Wales, and that this is quite disproportionate and totally inadequate.

There is one other point that the Government should note, and that is mentioned in the Report of Sir Charles Morris's Committee on Investment for National Survival, which points out that in recent years there has been an increase of about 1.5 per cent. each year in the proportion of each 15-year-old age group remaining in local authority schools. In all schools, the figure is 1.65 per cent.

I conclude by saying that if the Government are not prepared to act in this matter they will be guilty of a great social crime. I ask the Minister to say whether the Government will reconsider their present policy and begin tackling it as a vitally urgent problem from next year, or do they intend to try to ride the storm and sacrifice a whole generation of young people as a measure of their incompetence? If so, they will have betrayed the high hopes and aspirations of thousands of young Scots who are now studying in our schools, and worst of all, they will have destroyed the faith and trust of the present generation in our word.

12.51 p.m.

Mr. Ian MacArthur (Perth and East Perthshire)

I should like to congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) on bringing up the question of a possible fifth university in Scotland. It is not many months since the hon. Member for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Rankin) raised this question similarly, but nevertheless, I am sure that it is so important in the minds of the Scottish people today that we can well do with another ventilation of the matter and another presentation of the case to the Government.

It is well-known that education holds a special place in Scotland, and that there is a larger regard for the educated mind in Scotland than perhaps is the case further to the south. The hon. Gentleman has referred to the growing concern that has been expressed in Scotland about the future of our universities. He has mentioned the Glasgow Herald, which has produced a most interesting and forceful series of articles on this question, and which has, I imagine, sent to all hon. Members copies of its very interesting memorandum to the Robbins Committee.

1 feel myself that the nature of the concern about this matter is by no means unanimous. There is quite a lot of conflict of opinion about the direction in which we should go for the next few years. As my hon. Friend the Financial Secretary for the Treasury and some hon. Members will know, I am personally inclined to the view that a fifth university will be necessary in Scotland, possibly in the 1970s. If it is found that that university is necessary, not much time remains ahead of us to do all the immense preparatory work that will be required. Having said that, would it not be ill-judged to reach a rapid decision now, influenced by the comments to which the hon. Gentleman has referred, without having before us the true and basic facts on which, in my view, that decision must properly be made?

The hon. Gentleman has referred to marking time, but I do not think that it is unreasonable to suggest that the marking time must continue for what I presume to be a short time until we have before us the Robbins Report, on which alone a final judgment can properly be made. I say this because my understanding is that the Government have not turned down the possibility of a fifth university in Scotland in time. If I am mistaken about that, and I hope I am not, I am sure that my hon. Friend the Financial Secretary will tell me. My understanding is that there has been no final and irrevocable long-term decision, as has been suggested outside this House.

As I understand it, on the evidence available, the first stage of university development in England has been to authorise the extension of the number of foundations, whereas the first priority in Scotland over the next few years has been given to the expansion of existing foundations. I see nothing unreasonable in that, provided that if the Robbins Committee shows that the need for a fifth university is proved and exists, the Government will then consider the need for an additional foundation in Scotland.

I come back again to the Robbins Committee and the need for this information, because I have been very impressed in the discussions which I have had privately over the last few months by the degree of contradiction which there is among informed circles. There are certain basic facts which simply are not available, or, if they are available, which I have not been able to find. For example, an essential question in all this is to determine the difference between the applications for university entrance, on the one hand, and the number of applicants making those applications on the other.

There is, I believe, a marked degree of duplication in the nature of these applications, and there does not appear to exist any sort of central clearing house for applications of this kind, so that it is remarkably difficult to assess how much of the demand for university places is real and how much of it is, in fact, unreal.

Whatever decision is reached on the Report of the Robbins Committee, I hope that certain other considerations will be borne in mind. I have four points which I should like to make about it. The hon. Gentleman referred to the long-standing Scottish custom of going to the university nearest one's home. I hope that, with or without a fifth university, we shall be able to dispose of this out-dated approach. We need a very much wider geographical approach now than we have had. I hope that people will not only be going to universities on the other side of Scotland, but I look forward to much more interchange between North and South and between Britain as a whole and the Continent. I should like to see a much wider international movement of people at university level than we see today.

The second point is that in university education in Scotland, I hope we shall not attach so much emphasis to science and technology that the importance of the more liberal arts is overlooked. The importance of science in the future development of Scotland is unchallenged, but, nevertheless, there is an important place, in commerce and business generally and in our national life, for the liberally-educated man, and I say at once to the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) that I do not say that in any political sense whatever.

Thirdly, if there is to be a fifth university, I hope that consideration will be given to its nature. By that, I mean that I hope it will be a residential university, based more on the tutorial system of education than on the class system, which is widely observed in Scotland.

My fourth and final point is that I trust that while these debates and discussions continue there will be less pressure than there has been—and I am as guilty as anyone—from local authorities and others attempting to draw the possible new university to their own district. What must be decided first is whether the need for a fifth university exists. If and when that need is proved, then the siting can be considered.

Although I am reluctant to say this, I believe that the wise course in this matter is to wait for Robbins, in the same way as, in other matters, we have been advised to wait for Molony. I believe that we must wait for Robbins because it is only against the background of that Committee's Report that the correct position can finally be assessed.

1.0 p.m.

Mr. J. Grimond (Orkney and Shetland)

I also congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan). I had prepared a long and extremely interesting speech about this matter, but I shall not now deliver it. But I want to make one or two points to the Government. I do not entirely share the view of the hon. Member for Perth and East Perthshire (Mr. MacArthur) that we should in all respects wait for Robbins. Certain facts of the situation are already quite clear. I do not regard a university as either a status symbol or as an alternative to light industry.

If we are to justify a fifth university in Scotland it must be on grounds not only of education, but of civilisation. The Government will say that the ratio of university places to population is high in Scotland, that some of the older universities—particularly St. Andrews and Aberdeen—can be extended. That is true. I would favour the extension of St. Andrews and Aberdeen, where some of the Departments are too small.

But let the Government be under no misapprehension that this is a measure likely to lead to economy. If the Government want to extend the universities while, at the same time, keeping up quality, they will have to spend a lot of money, particularly as the hon. Member for Perth and East Perthshire said, in providing some form of residence for students. In this respect, I draw the Government's attention to paragraph 17 of the latest report of the University Grants Committee.

Why is it that staff are leaving our older universities to go to new universities in England? Why is it that lecturers can be found fairly easily for York and Sussex, quite apart from Oxford and Cambridge? There is a tendency for the highest quality of Scottish lecturers to seek employment outside the country altogether. The reasons are fairly well known. The new universities give such people the chance to develop their own syllabuses and their own methods of running departments. The facilities in many respects are much better, and those who go to the new universities feel that they have a better chance of promotion and more chances of influencing decisions taken in the faculties or the departments.

A new university in Scotland would enable experimentation of this sort to be carried out there, and would also provide a place in Scotland to which some of the lecturers and even professors now leaving Scottish universities could go to enjoy more scope for developing their own teaching methods and research.

If the Government turn down the idea of a new university in Scotland they must tackle this matter. The University of Edinburgh has itself appointed a committee to look into its future. The Government must realise that they must inject a greater degree of experimentation into Scottish university education and create better prospects for promotion, teaching and research, and even better living accommodation for lecturers, otherwise they will not keep the high quality lecturers on whom the universities depend.

Of course, the real trouble is money. It is not the only trouble, but without money the four Scottish universities cannot expand or experiment or offer attractive positions to younger lecturers. New professorships must also be provided, which would help in promotion. The provision of a new university would allow some experimentation. Perhaps it could consider the development of a general degree, possibly for people at a slightly earlier age—which would be very much part of the Scottish tradition together with a rather longer course. To get this injected into the older universities under the present regulations is not too easy a matter.

It is for this sort of purpose that I hope the Government will give favourable consideration to the development of a new university. I am not saying that we could not do a great deal with the existing universities, for we could. Some facts are known without waiting for the Robbins Committee. I hope that the Government will say that their minds are not closed about this and that, if they are to put off a decision on a new university, they will do something to rectify known troubles and difficulties in the older universities.

1.6 p.m.

Mr. John Rankin (Glasgow, Govan)

The hon. Member for Perth and East Perthshire (Mr. MacArthur) reminded me of the debate we had nine months ago on this topic. On that occasion, time did not lay a restraining hand on us as it does today. I, too, must make brevity the very soul of my speech.

The hon. Gentleman reminded me also of something else. This was the disappointing answer which we got on that occasion from the Financial Secretary. I hope that the months which have intervened have given him time for meditation to try to understand the problem a little more fully now than he appeared to do then. I hope that, at the end of this debate, we will have a much more informed, and a better answer, than we had at the end of the debate last June.

The hon. Member for Perth and East Perthshire made two points on which I agree with him completely. But I will qualify one. He wants a residential university. I do not think that we will get that right away, but I hope that it will be our aim. I desire it to be fully residential, because if a university is to meet the needs of our day it must be a university which will allow students of all races and of all colours to intermingle, and it must provide for the student body the opportunity of having a campus life, which is almost nonexistent in Scotland today.

Since last June—indeed, for some time before it as well—we have had an immense outflow of literature from academic and non-academic sources supporting the idea of a fifth university for Scotland. It is clear to all of us who have studied what these people are saying now, and have said in their memoranda, that they are not making the claim without the factual proof that I agree is necessary to establish it. There may be one or two things which we do not know, but there is no lack of information.

According to the University Grants Committee, £72.7 million of public money is the total income of our universities. That establishes, in my view, the claim that Parliament must take a closer interest, and have a greater say, in the work of the universities. In that way, the hon. Member for Perth and East Perthshire could have the additional information which he said he would like to get.

I disagree with the hon. Gentleman about the Robbins Committee. Are we to establish in this House the principle that what we do depends on a committee?

Mr. Hannan

It applied to the Licensing (Scotland) Bill.

Mr. Rankin

My hon. Friend should not distract me. I am seeking to confine myself to a short time and I do not think that the Licensing (Scotland) Bill analogy will help in this debate. We have had lots of information about Scottish universities, and here I want to pay tribute to the Report by the editor of the Glasgow Herald. He speaks on this issue for Scotland in paragraph 4 of the Report. "We therefore urge the committee"—that is, the Robbins Committee— to recommend that a new university should be established in Scotland and that Glasgow's Royal College of Science and Technology, under whatever name it may choose, should have the full autonomy and degree-granting powers of a university. Those are the claims that are being made in Scotland today; and Scottish Members express the hope today that those claims will have greater effect than they had a year ago and produce better results.

In this present session of 1961–62 Edinburgh University had to reject 250 students, quite apart from the large numbers who were not accepted for medicine, science and other faculties. I hope the hon. Gentleman will not say that these were not bona fide applications. Glasgow's rejections were smaller, though substantial. But in every case each of the students rejected for arts possessed the certificate of fitness for entry into a Scottish university. Surely it is a terrible criticism of Scottish higher education that the Scottish Universities Board should say to a student that he is fit to receive a university education, that he should be granted a certificate to this effect, and then to hear the Government tell us there are not sufficient places in which to put these boys and girls.

As my hon. Friend has said, they are denied the application of a principle that is deep in Scottish educational life. If a person is fit for a university education he ought to receive it. These students have certificates of fitness. The stangest thing of all is that the certificate of fitness granted on behalf of all the university bodies in Scotland will be accepted as conferring the right of an applicant to enter a Scottish university; which right he may be denied by another university. That is to say, Edinburgh may take the student. St. Andrews may refuse to do so. That is a very strange anomaly.

We may say that a person is fit to be educated in a university, but often there is no chance of doing that in Scotland because Edinburgh University, for example, can expand very little. The same applies to Glasgow University. It is ill-sited for expansion; and because it could not expand to meet all the numbers proposed its grant was reduced in September of last year. This is surely a further substantiation of the claim that if we are to provide for the requirements of Scotland in the realms of higher education a fifth university is absolutely essential.

1.14 p.m.

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Sir Edward Boyle)

I should like to say, first, that I am well aware, because I read the Scottish Press regularly, of the concern felt about this matter; but I hope that all organs of public opinion in Scotland will realise the difficulty in which the House has been placed through circumstances entirely beyond its control. Occasionally we are accused—particularly the Government—of dealing in too short a way with subjects when really, through no fault of our own, the House is under conditions of difficulty.

I should like to congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) for raising this topic today. I shall, of course, consider the figures that he mentioned. I want to make only two comments initially on his remarks. I think that he said, first, that the target of 170,000 university places was a Government commitment for 1970. I do not think that we ever said that. The Government statements have always referred to the early 1970s. This figure was made a specific commitment for the first time by my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury in the last debate on the universities when he specifically related it to the year 1973–74. I think that was the first time that a specific date had ever been associated with that target.

The other point the hon. Member made, in which I was interested, was that the statistics show that the Scottish birth rate since 1952 has been higher than the English birth rate. Speaking as something of a keen student of these questions of population, I again say to the hon. Member that the known birth rate figures for both England and Scotland were taken into account in reaching the U.G.C. estimate. But, of course, it is still true that the rate of increase in the number of 17-year-olds will be smaller in Scotland than in England.

While I agree that we should not be too ready to discuss matters which are still under consideration by the Robbins Committee, there are some matters which we should discuss even perhaps before the Robbins Committee has reported, and I am very glad that we have had three debates on university education within a year. I have no doubt that the Robbins Committee will take due note of the greater interest taken by the House of Commons in these questions. But it remains true that the Government hold firm to their decision that no further universities in England, Wales or Scotland will be nominated before the Robbins Committee reports next year. On that point, the Government's decision remains firm.

Mr. Rankin

It is wrong.

Sir E. Boyle

A good deal of concern has been expressed not only in the House, but in the Scottish Press, too, about the scale of university expansion in Scotland. May I say, as an Englishman, that I appreciate what Scottish education has contributed to education not only in Scotland, but south of the Border as well.

England is enormously indebted for very many fine head teachers from Scotland — particularly headmistresses, perhaps. Certainly, we all have much to learn from the great tradition of thought in Scotland, and particularly what I happen to be especially interested in, the tradition of the Scottish enlightenment of the eighteenth century.

Unlike the situation south of the Border, the Scottish student with the bare minimum entrance qualifications has traditionally had little or no difficulty in finding a place in a university. Over the past five years the number of students has increased by 20 per cent. to the present figure of over 18,000, of whom—this is important—over a quarter come from outside Scotland. While the pressure on places has grown, and will doubtless continue to grow as a result of the tendency to stay on at school longer, it is fair to say that pressure is still less severe than it is in England.

With the increased Exchequer grants which have just been announced for the coming quinquennium I expect that the Scottish universities and the Royal College of Science and Technology will be able to provide for further substantial expansion of student numbers. Until a clearing house for applications has been established, it is impossible to say how many qualified applicants are at present unable to find a place but I believe that this has been a substantially smaller problem so far in Scotland than it has been in England.

As I said in the general debate the other night, one has to consider the very considerable expansion which is taking place in the central institutions and colleges of education. The 15 central institutions—that is, excluding the Royal College of Science and Technology because its statistics are included in the university figures—at present accommodate about 4,000 students in advanced courses which are broadly comparable to those courses leading to a first degree. This number is planned to rise to between 6,000 and 7,000 by 1970, which will be an increase of over 50 per cent.

The seven colleges of education—the teacher-training centres—have at present about 5,500 students and these colleges are being expanded to accommodate at least 6,500 students by 1967. So there will be provision by 1970 for about 13,000 students in higher education outside the universities, about half as many as are in the universities themselves. It will, of course, be for the Robbins Committee to consider what are the most appropriate lines of development for the different types of institution concerned. I think that, when one looks at the picture as a whole, Scotland is not being unfairly dealt with in the increased provision of facilities which has been made and which is being planned.

Looking ahead to the future, I believe that by the year 1973–74, to which the Government expansion figure is related, it will still be true that the native demand, so to speak—the demand by Scotsmen for places in Scottish universities—will be more than met. But, of course, it has always been the Government's view that university expansion must not be considered merely in relation to England, Wales and Scotland, but must be related to the United Kingdom as a whole. After all, it is part of the tradition of Scottish universities to receive people from south of the Border, and this will certainly continue.

The Government's plans throughout have been based on a Great Britain figure and, as hon. Members will remember from the debate which we had the other week, the Government's point is that during the bulge in the birth rate the same proportions of the relevant age groups will go to the universities as today and then from 1966–67 onwards a substantially higher proportion of the university age group will be able to find a university place.

Scotland's needs have been fully recognised and the recent confirmation by the Government of the future level of the university building programme means that Scotland will receive its 10,000 places additional to the number mentioned in 1961 when the programme was first announced. Indeed, as a result of the continuous review of the programme carried out by the University Grants Committee, the amount allocated to Scotland has risen since last June from £9.3 million to £12.5 million and the additional 10,000 places to which I have just referred virtually represent the equivalent of two new universities.

I was interested to hear what the Leader of the Liberal Party said about new universities as opposed to existing universities. We must await the Robbins Report on this point, but I assure the right hon. Gentleman that, in so far as the Treasury has any voice in these matters, we are very well aware of the question of relative costs of expansion in new universities compared with existing universities. When an existing university is expanded beyond a certain point the problem of arrears and obsolescence becomes rather acute. A new library has to be built, not just for the extra students, but for all of them. I do not say that as a hint on what will be recommended, but merely to show that that important point has not escaped us in trying to get as much money as possible for essential expansion.

I am sorry that I cannot say more than this to the House. We had a debate on this matter two or three weeks ago, when the Government explained their target for the United Kingdom as a whole. We told the House that we intended to deal, during the period in which the bulge is affecting universities, with the existing problems of the relevant age group getting a university place, and we hope to show that a substantial improvement has been made when we get to the end of the present quinquennium.

I am sure that many people would agree with what my hon. Friend the Member for Perth and East Perthshire (Mr. MacArthur) said in his interesting speech, namely, that we must not lose sight of the importance of liberal studies in the universities. We tend to talk about liberal studies and the sciences as though they were separate things. The intellectual aspect of mathematics has always been considered a part of the traditional curriculum for abler pupils, and that is as it should be.

I am sorry that I cannot say more than this, but I am very glad that much more interest is being taken today than ever before in the subject of university expansion. My right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary made it plain in his speech that not only were the Government prepared to consider university salaries again next year, but that the whole question of the recurrent and non-recurrent grants and how they were working out would be considered again in two years' time.

On the particular question of a fifth university, we must wait for the Robbins Committee's Report, because the Government have made it plain that, until its Report is published, we are not going to designate any new universities.

Mr. Rankin

May I intrude on the courtesy of my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Boyden) for a moment to make a correction?

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Robert Grimston)

The hon. Gentleman has not the right to speak again. He can ask a question before the Financial Secretary sits down.

Mr. Rankin

I should like to make a correction in my speech, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I said that £72.7 million was being invested in the universities. I should have said that 72.7 per cent. of their income came from Parliamentary grants.