Polytechnics and Colleges (Grant)

HC Deb 15 March 1989 vol 149 cc220-1W

Mr. Andrew Smith

To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science what was the total Government grant both to the polytechnics and other colleges in each of the last 10 years; and if he will express each annual change and the total change since 1979, in real terms with 1979–80 = 100.

Mr. Jackson

Block grant to local authorities is not hypothecated to particular services or institutions.

The total allocations from the advanced further education pool plus capital expenditure by local authorities on polytechnics and colleges in England each year since 1979–80, (a) in cash terms, and (b) indexed in real terms as measured by the gross domestic product deflator, are:

Financial years	(a) Cash £ million	(b) Index
1979–80	465	100
1980–81	493	89
1981–82	519	86
1982–83	614	95
1983–84	634	94
1984–85	657	92
1985–86	703	94
1986–87	748	97
1987–88	810	99
1988–89	887	102

Expenditure1 per full-time equivalent student2 at 1986–87 prices indexed to 1979–80
	Financial Year
	1979–80	1980–81	1981–82	1982–83	1983–84	1984–85	1985–86	1986–87
Universities (Great Britain)
real terms	5,126	5,533	5,355	5,502	5,542	5,484	5,349	5,276
indexed (1979–80 = 100)	100	108	104	107	108	107	104	103
Polytechnics3 (England)
real terms	4,179	4,207	4,001	3,777	3,421	3,300	3,255	3,325
indexed (1979–80 = 100)	100	101	96	90	82	79	78	80
OMEs (HE) (England)
real terms	3,451	3,588	3,493	3,376	3,444	3,398	3,121	3,170
indexed (1979–80 = 100)	100	104	101	98	100	98	90	92
1 The figures for universities are for Great Britain and are based on recurrent expenditure financed by UGC grants and tuition fee income for home and overseas students. The figures for polytechnics and OMEs are for England and are net recurrent institutional expenditure per full-time equivalent student. This includes direct and indirect costs of providing tuition but excludes financing cost of capital expenditure, student support and central administration costs. As the relevant expenditures are differently defined it is not possible to give an overall cost per student.
2 The numbers of full-time and part-time students have been expressed as full-time equivalents. It is not possible to separate out the costs of full-time students.
3 The figures for polytechnics include a small proportion of FE work.