How long is a piece of string? Reflections on British higher education since 1945

Abstract

Professor Campbell Stewart writes 'Current government policy on universities appears therefore to be determined primarily by the cash available'.' He echoes William Waldegrave in the House of Commons on 22 June 1981, 'The fundamental principle is how much money is available'. But Professor Stewart chooses not to debate the adequacy of this criterion for determining educational policy, any more than has Waldegrave or any of his successors. The truth is, of course, that the amount of money available is the amount the government chooses to make available the length at which it cuts the string. This choice is evidently affected by judgements on macro-economic questions (How is the economy and its growth moving? What will be the various effects of withdrawing different proportions of GNP for expenditure by governments?); but once those macro-judgements have been made, the micro-decisions about the detailed allocations to different activities for which governmental funds are required ought to be based on judgements of worth or importance not solely derived from economic or financial criteria. To balance the worth or importance of education in general or higher education in particular against the need to provide for the air defence of the country, or the desirability of a health service available to all, or the urgency of investment to reduce the pollution of the earth's atmosphere, is a task of daunting complexity. Governments frequently do not attempt it, and the allocations actually made are as likely to reflect the bargaining skills or the political strength of particular ministers, or the prejudices of the most weighty, as much as any reasoned consideration of the issues involved. It is not part of Professor Stewart's brief to contemplate these strategic matters, but decisions about them are helped by explanations by experienced persons outside government of the reasons why a particular activity may be thought to have value. Professor Stewart allows himself to be excessively modest in eschewing even this: so that on the financial cuts of the past ten years we are left (apart from untypical irritation about the methods of the UGC in 1981 -