The University Grants Committee on the threshold of mass higher education of mass higher education

Abstract

The paper contrasted the golden era of university-state relations from 1919 to 1962 when the University Grants Committee (UGC) was regarded as an ideal neutral buffer and its informal modes of procedure were widely praised, with events of the past ten years when events emanating from both the state and the UGC have caused increasing malaise inside the university sector and have convinced some academics that the UGC has become an arm of the state. Among the state actions examined were: 1. Mr. Henry Brooke's public rejection of UGC advice concerning the 1962-67 quinquennial grants (1962); 2. the decision to transfer the UGC from the Treasury to the Department of Education and Science (1964); 3. the decision to drop the Joint Permanent Under-Secretaries in the DES, one of whom served the university sector (1965); 4. the decision to encourage academic links between universities and colleges of education, but not to change the latter's fiscal or administrative status, as recommended by the universities (1965); 5. the Woolwich speech on the binary system and the DES White Paper on the Polytechnics, with no university consultation on either (1965); 6. the Government decision to accept the recommendation of the Public Accounts Committee to give the Comptroller and Auditor General access to UGC and university records (1967); 7. Mr. Crosland's announcement of the raise in overseas students fees in the universities (1966/67); 8. the activities of the Select Committee on Education and Science (1969); 9. the report on university salaries of the National Board on Prices and Incomes (1968); 10. Mrs. Shirley Williams' "13 points" for improving university productivity (1969); and 11. The DES Consultative Paper on the financing of student unions (1971). Among the UGC activities examined were: 1. the re-introduction of earmarked grants;