Commenting on Lord Mandelson’s speech at the CBI’s higher education summit yesterday, Alice Hynes, Chief Executive of the higher education representative body GuildHE, said:

“It is encouraging to hear Lord Mandelson acknowledge the importance of keeping up the pressure to widen access to higher education, and the critical role played by the sector in increasing social mobility in Britain.

“However, it is also worrying that he believes that tighter fiscal constraints on higher education, otherwise known as funding cuts, will not have an impact on quality. While we are ready to do what we can to diversify our sources of non-public income as he suggests, this will mean industry playing its part.

“GuildHE institutions work closely with employers and professional bodies and are therefore well placed to provide courses that will give our graduates the critical skills the British economy needs. But we are concerned that so far the Government’s view of what these skills are seems to be too narrowly focussed on STEM subjects, overlooking in particular the needs of the creative industries and those that will be helping to deal with the consequences of climate change.”

For more information, please contact:

Alice Hynes

GuildHE Chief Executive

Tel: 0207 387 7711

Email: alice.hynes@guildhe.ac.uk