Student Unions

HC Deb 01 December 1981 vol 14 cc130-1

10. Mr. Nicholas Winterton

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will seek to alter the arrangements made for the financing of student unions so as to make subscriptions to them voluntary rather than mandatory.

Mr. Waldegrave

With the exception of Oxbridge junior common rooms, there are no subscriptions to student unions, which are now financed through the recurrent income of their parent institutions.

Mr. Winterton

Does my hon. Friend agree that a growing movement within SACUM—Students Against Compulsory Union Membership—believes that part of Tory philosophy is responsible freedom? Does he not believe that the case of Paul Soden, who was excluded from Manchester polytechnic because he was not prepared to pay that part of the annual subscription that was due to the students' union, is quite wrong, particularly as he qualified and was eligible for admission to the polytechnic? Will my hon. Friend give this case and the whole matter of voluntary membership his urgent attention?

Mr. Waldegrave

The Department is indeed giving the whole matter urgent attention. I think that at the back of my hon. Friend's mind are worries about political and other activities that do not appear to be connected with the original purposes of student unions. I believe that Mr. Soden was unwilling to contribute to the students' union that part of the fees that he calculated to be necessary. That would be a difficult precedent to accept, because students might then regard themselves as free not to contribute that part of their fees which, for example, they regarded as covering other departments that they did not use.

Mr. McNally

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that it is worrying to hear that the Department is urgently considering this matter? Is he further aware that the "loony" Right of the Tory Party has been sniping at student unions for more than 20 years? Is he also aware that, apart from the odd tomato, the cultural, athletic and education benefits to be gained from such unions are part of a student's overall education? Does he agree that the student movement has produced at least as many distinguished Members of this House as has All Souls?

Mr. Waldegrave

The hon. Gentleman has more direct experience of "loonies" in politics than I. Indeed, they have driven him out of the Labour Party. There is a real question to answer about ultra vires activities by student unions, and this is a more complex question than that of mere membership of student unions, which are normally recognised in the charters of universities or the orders governing polytechnics. We are looking seriously into that question.

Sir William van Straubenzee

Is it not a fact that in a large number of institutions of higher education the student union is, for example, an integral part of the feeding arrangements of students? Surely it would be as sensible to have voluntary subscriptions to unions as it would be to have voluntary subscriptions to chemistry laboratories or libraries of medieval French.

Mr. Waldegrave

As always, my hon. Friend makes my point more elegantly. There is much to be said for his suggestion.