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'The fees payable by overseas students doing a course of further or higher education in Scotland shall not be more than the fees payable by students from Scotland.'.—[Mr. Canavan.]
§ Brought up, and read the First time.
§ Mr. CanavanI beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
This is an important issue, which concerns not only overseas students but Scottish students and students from other parts of the United Kingdom. The viability of many courses in colleges and universities in Scotland is being affected by the increased discriminatory fees that are being charged to overseas students.
If the Minister is unable to accept the new clause I hope that he will at least conduct a survey throughout all the colleges in Scotland for which he has responsibility, either directly or indirectly, and use his influence with the Department of Education and Science to ascertain exactly what is happening as a result of these massive increases in fees for overseas students.
§ Mr. Barry Hendersonrose—
§ Mr. CanavanNo. I am not giving way.
Hon. Members receive many communications from the National Union of Students, the Association of University Teachers and other organisations, especially about science and technology courses. There is a real threat to their existence. If they ceased to exist, home students as well as overseas students would suffer a severe disadvantage.
In Scotland we have always prided ourselves on the fact that our higher education system is not merely a national system, a regional system or a parochial local system, but an international system. I know that the Minister is not much of an internationalist, or much of an educationist, but I ask him to listen to the views of those in the colleges and universities who are concerned about these issues. Why should he follow the poor examples of the Department of Education and Science in everything that it does?
§ Mr. Alexander FletcherI cannot accept the new clause, but I am happy to tell the hon. Gentleman that we are studying carefully the impact of full-cost fees on the numbers of overseas students coming here, which so far, in Scotland, appears to have been quite small. We are also studying how the money that we can manage to make available for overseas students can be applied in the most effective way. Indiscriminate subsidies of the sort that the new clause would produce are no answer to the problem.
§ Question put and negatived.