Official Report: Minutes of Evidence

The Deputy Chairperson (Mr Buchanan): You are very welcome to our Committee today. We are glad to be here. We are going to leave it to you to give us your briefing.

Professor Patrick Johnston (Queen's University Belfast): Thank you, Chair, and thank you to the Employment and Learning Committee. You are very welcome to Queen's. It is a real pleasure for us to host you, particularly in our new graduate school, in a building from the 1860s that has been brought into the 21st century and is the centre of all our postgraduate activity. I hope that you enjoy the environment and enjoy the day at Queen's.

You are obviously coming at a time of challenge for the higher education (HE) sector. The higher education sector in Northern Ireland competes globally. It is part of being global. Our mission and vision as a university is to be a world-class, international university based here in Belfast, recruiting the best, most talented students and staff. Most importantly, all that we do is focused on the needs of society. It is about impacting and connecting with communities and society locally and globally and bringing the two together. That is really the mission of our university — being world-class and international but being right at the heart of what goes on here in our society.

Of course, that mission is one that is now really challenged in a lot of ways. As the graph shows you — it is from the research that Universities UK published in Westminster earlier this year on the Northern Ireland HE sector — the level of disinvestment in the higher education sector now has left us about 11% behind funding in Scotland and closer to 18% behind the level of funding in England. Those are figures from the early part of 2015. In this academic year, which has just started, we have further absorbed an additional 8·6% decrease in our public funding level to the university, whereas the English sector will see a 9% growth. Given what I have already said, we are not just competing against universities in the rest of the UK, Ireland or elsewhere. We are actually competing globally to both attract and retain the talent pool that will drive us forward.

The real challenges are the consequences of that disinvestment over the last four years. I know that you are well aware that both universities have had to reduce student numbers by over 2,200 places. We are also now in the process of reducing staff numbers by close to 450 people. I suppose that the most worrying thing is that the funding gap that already exists between ourselves and England, Scotland and Wales will get worse. We have shown here a prediction that, over the next few years, the funding gap between us and England is likely to get closer to £80 million rather than £45 million per annum. In our view, that has very significant consequences for wider society.

Despite those challenges and that very challenging climate for any HE institution, this university has continued to grow and to develop its quality and reputation internationally. Over the last three to four years, we have significantly expanded the number of places in STEM-related subjects by 380, so it is not far off 400. Indeed, during the intake of students this year, we prioritised the protection of STEM places in order to continue to try to achieve that. Our student experience is very highly rated. In the most recent 'Times Higher Education' poll, it was rated at number 15 overall in the UK. Our completion rates for students are high: 92% leave here with a degree. Very few leave the university. Most importantly, over 94% of our students are in employment or in further studies within six months of graduating from the university. The university experience is an education that is leading somewhere, impacting for the vast majority of our students and getting them onto that first major rung of the employability ladder.

One thing that we are particularly proud of is the level of volunteering among staff and particularly among the student body. We have over 11,000 students involved in close to 200 clubs throughout the students' union. We have close to 6,000 students directly involved in volunteering activities right across our society. That is really impacting day-to-day, not just locally but as far away as Kenya and Zambia. In the homework clubs, over 140 students currently give of their time, intellect and effort to work in some of the most deprived neighbourhoods in Belfast today. They work with students and their parents and families to help them through homework and help them to learn. That is just one initiative that we are particularly proud of, but it embodies the quality of our students and what they are about.

As a global university, we have increased our reputation very significantly over the last few years. We are now a top-10 research institution in the UK. We were number eight for research intensity in the research excellence framework (REF) exercise, which is the national exercise that was published in December 2014. We are number one in the UK for knowledge transfer partnerships, creating over 1,500 jobs, particularly in the SME-type sector. We are extremely proud of the fact that we are the sector leader in gender equality in the UK. We were the first university to get a silver award from the Scientific Women's Academic Network (SWAN), and the institution has retained that this year. We are particularly proud of the promotion of women in STEM subjects and in the academic environment more generally.

The capital investment by this institution has been very significant over the last 10 years. All you have to do is look around you to see that and to see what is going on. We have invested over £350 million in capital investment projects, such as the McClay library; Riddel Hall; the new graduate school; our new centre for experimental medicine, which will focus on cures for diabetes and genetic diseases; the new school of biological sciences, which will house our institute for global food security; the new computer science school just up the Malone Road, which, I am sure, you will have driven past from time to time; and our new law school, which you walked past when you came in.

Those are some of the ongoing projects, and, indeed, we have other projects that we are currently considering for further investment as part of developing and expanding our world-class campus.

We also now have a number of recognised global research institutes that are addressing some of the major challenges that society faces. I will highlight some of those here, and there are others that we can talk about. One is the Institute of Electronics, Communications and Information Technology (ECIT) for the development of new innovative technologies. I shall give you an example of that: the software behind the set-top box that sits in your living room and controls your television was developed here in the university and, of course, is used all over the world today. The picture that you can see is of Máire O’Neill, the youngest-ever female professor at this university and an international star now in engineering and technology research.

We have a real focus on new medical treatments in areas such as cancer, diabetes, eye diseases, cystic fibrosis and bronchiectasis. We have new drugs that have been developed in Belfast and are now being trialled in Belfast and across the UK for the very first time in some of these diseases. Indeed, we have had clinical trials leading to the approval of drugs in diseases like cystic fibrosis where drugs have not been approved for close to 20 years. That work has been led by us.

We also have very significant international work on global food security and in environmental sciences around global food security and global food health; for example, the removal of arsenic from rice. Over two thirds of the world eat rice every single day. Arsenic levels in rice are very high and lead to diseases including everything from dementia to cancer, so Andy Meharg and colleagues including Chris Elliott have developed new technology to remove arsenic from rice. That is now being used worldwide. We also, of course, have the leadership of Professor Chris Elliott, who led the review of food safety for the Government for the UK as a result of the horsemeat scandal. That review was published in 2013.

That is just some of the impact of the work that is going on at this institution, and those are some of the reasons why we are now consistently in the top 200 of global universities. It is a position that we intend to maintain and further improve on.

As for impacting directly on our society here in Northern Ireland, the major impact is that this institution very significantly impacts at so many different levels for local society. As an institution, we have a turnover of close to £300 million a year. We have 23,000 students through our gates every year, and we have close to 3,500 staff. The important thing is that we generate a total of 10,250 jobs in our economy each year. These are not our data; this is from the review of the HE sector that was done by Universities UK. We generate that number of jobs in our local economy as a university, and that is specific to Queen's. Most importantly, we also generate £1 billion for our economy each year. That is the return to our economy. The public investment is now closer to £90 million than £100 million, but, to our economy, we return £1 billion each year. There is a very significant return on public sector investment by this university to our local society.

The challenge now is that we have a globally competitive higher education sector. In particular, Queen's is very globally competitive and will become even more globally competitive going forward. The challenge is to maintain that and to sustain the level of impact that I have just described going forward. One of the bigger challenges for all of us is the challenge for Northern Ireland: it is the challenge to grow a knowledge economy. If we do not grow a knowledge economy, we will not be competitive in the UK, on the island of Ireland or more broadly. The reason for that will be the following: we are not investing in our young people. Forty per cent of our 18-year-olds have to leave Northern Ireland and go elsewhere for higher education. Less than 30% of those will return to Northern Ireland, in part because the jobs are not there and in part because they have started to put down roots elsewhere and develop their career in other countries or in other parts of Ireland or the UK. If we maintain that trajectory, we will not be able to continue to grow small businesses and middle-sized businesses at the level that we really need to to grow our economy, and we will not attract foreign direct investment. Foreign direct investment comes to countries that have a vibrant and dynamic higher education sector, with the highest-quality graduates. It is the graduates — that workforce — who really attract investors. Together, we really have to begin to look at how we address that challenge for Northern Ireland. Over the next five to six years, it will become a major issue for us.

Thank you very much for listening to me. I am happy to take questions.

The Deputy Chairperson (Mr Buchanan): Thank you, professor. Do any of the other folk want to say anything?

Professor Tony Gallagher (Queen's University Belfast): No.

The Deputy Chairperson (Mr Buchanan): OK. Thank you, indeed, for your presentation.

I want to commend Queen's on being up there in the world, leading in technology, knowledge enterprise, medical science and all those things. Queen's is one of the greatest universities worldwide, and that has to be commended. We commend you and acknowledge the good work that is being done.

We find ourselves in tight financial times at the moment, and it is regrettable that student numbers have to be cut. I have no doubt that Queen's did not take that decision lightly. I am aware that you attract funding from outside areas. Can more be done? Have you looked at ways in which you can increase funding from outside bodies and other areas?

Professor Johnston: Yes, we can, and we do. We are obviously now very focused on growing the postgraduate side of the university and reaching out internationally, as well as enhancing the student experience of what we do at undergraduate level. We certainly can and will grow the postgraduate side, and we will grow international numbers. However, the fundamental thing is that, if you do not invest in your own people — those international students are likely to leave — you will not be seen as a vibrant educational training sector for the wider industrial sector. There is a real dilemma for us, in that we sit in a global market for education, quality and students, as well as for the recruitment of foreign direct investment and for how we then grow smaller indigenous companies. That is all down to the talent of graduates. The things that this university achieves are achieved through our students and our graduates, who go on to do great things.

The Deputy Chairperson (Mr Buchanan): In your opinion, how much more do we need to invest in our youth? You say that we are not investing enough in our students: how much more do we need to invest in them?

Professor Johnston: Currently, close to 40% of students cannot get a place in universities in Northern Ireland. If that number was around 20%, I would be very relaxed, because that creates a dynamic of turnover. However, I am very concerned about a situation in which more than a third of our population — two fifths of our 18-year-olds — have to go elsewhere. Of course, if they were all coming back, that would be great, but they are not.

Scotland is a net importer of students from around the world. That is actually one of the things that drive its economy. It does better than any of the other home nations in higher education because it imports. It sees that as a benefit to what it does as an economy.

That is how we need to begin to think about higher education. It is an investment for the future, not just in our people but in the wider economy. We need to possibly change the mindset about higher education. It is linked to that dynamic of how we grow economies. It is linked to that dynamic of how we attract international people to come to Northern Ireland and spend three or four years here and then go back home and disseminate what a great place this is to be, to learn, to work etc. Of course, that has its own knock-on beneficial effects. I do not know if that answers your question or not, Tom.

Ms Sugden: Thank you for your presentation. Just being in this building shows us the successes of Queen's. I heard the recent announcement that you are one of the top universities in the world, in 200th place. That is fantastic; well done.

I was quite unhappy to see your slide in respect of a knowledge economy. You had the three universities together, but I do not think that this is a case of you competing with one another. It really is a case of this being about the bigger picture of higher education generally, and how we focus in on that.

Obviously, I have an interest in Ulster University and what is happening there, because of my constituency. I would be keen to hear your thoughts on how that impacts the knowledge economy, because of the loss of the school of languages and the business school now going up to Magee, which I would not be too happy about either.

I would also be interested in hearing your thoughts about maybe reintroducing some sort of higher education oversight body, almost to act as a buffer, a two-way street — not just a one-way street — in respect of the accountability between the Government and you. That body could lobby on your behalf. I do not necessarily think that happens, and sometimes the message that you are saying to us could be lost, because it sounds as if you are almost trying to satisfy your own ends — I do not mean it like that. It would act almost like a buffer, so it could be a bit more impartial.

I would also be keen to understand how you are maybe working with the further education (FE) colleges. The school of modern languages is now gone in Ulster University. Those courses could perhaps be provided in the FE colleges, maybe in a kind of foundation-type degree that is offered in other areas. I am very concerned about the loss of skills in Northern Ireland, and I do not think that it is necessary. There are opportunities in other areas, if we just think outside the box a little bit more than we are currently doing.

Professor Johnston: There are a lot of questions there, Claire; let us see if I can remember them.

First of all, just in general, I deliberately presented this as a higher education sector issue. Obviously, we are taking out the Queen's piece of that to show you what we do, but it is the same challenge for Ulster University. It is also a very good university. It complements what we are very well; we are different universities. We work with Ulster University quite closely, and we are driving that complementarity. When you stand back and look at both universities in Northern Ireland, you see that they are both of very good quality. Yes, Queen's stands out — I would say that — but it stands out for some of the reasons that you and I have said.

The decisions that Ulster University has had to make are obviously issues for its leadership and governing body. I cannot really comment on those, except to say that they are the types of very tough decision that both universities now face, involving sustainability, the number of students applying, the wider impact on the economy etc. We as institutions — both institutions — now have to address those in serious ways. Yes, there will be subject areas that we might not want to lose, but, because they are not sustainable any more, the quality is not there or the students are not looking to go into the courses, we will have to ask whether they are viable and sustainable for the future.

I do not believe that there is a need for an advocacy-type board. We are part of the Russell Group, which is a very strong advocacy group throughout the UK for the top 24 research-intensive universities. It influences government policy right throughout the UK. We are members of Universities UK, which, again, links us with all the universities and speaks with largely one voice. We are also members of Universities Ireland. The issues in Southern Ireland are very different from ours, but we are members of that. So, we have bodies that actually represent the university sector very well.

I have forgotten your final question.

Ms Sugden: It was about the connection with FE colleges.

Professor Johnston: We have very good relations with FE, and we are making those even stronger, whether it is South West College or Belfast Met. Those relationships need to be strong. FE colleges are not HE colleges; they are very different. One of our biggest categories of students coming in through foundation programmes and other programmes is now through colleges like Belfast Met. We meet regularly with them. We also have combined programmes reflecting some of the things that I was talking about in the health sector, as well as in the energy sector, and working with some of the colleges and linking them into some of the research projects etc. Those relationships need to be strong. However, the emphasis of HE is at a very different level. For a university in the top 200 or top 1% of universities in the world, it is at a very different level in terms of quality.

Ms Sugden: Just to come back to the higher education oversight body, from my point of view as an elected representative, given that one third of universities' funding comes from the public purse, I want to ensure that that is being spent correctly. I would entrust that in the universities in what they are doing, but, for me, it would be good if there was some sort of independent body that could say that. I was very deliberate when I said that that could be a two-way street, so that, with the challenges that you are now facing, there would be a specific body that could create influence for the universities in respect of the Government. Am I right in saying that Northern Ireland is the only region of the UK that does not have that specific body? That was something that was taken away in the '80s.

Professor Johnston: I am not aware of the existence of that body in other parts of the UK, to be candid.

Mr James O'Kane (Queen's University Belfast): I think that you are referring to funding councils, which is completely different. Northern Ireland never had a funding council. It had an advisory body many years ago. The key thing is that the sector in Northern Ireland is very small because of the reasons that the vice chancellor has articulated. Building on the earlier point: we are the only region of the UK that is a net exporter of students. Wales, England and Scotland all at least have a balanced economy in that they provide the number of places for the number of 18- and 19-year-olds wishing to access higher education. So, we are the only part of the UK that is an exporter. It is somewhere close to 40%.

The issue that you raise is something that clearly will have to be addressed as the restructuring of Departments takes place. The plan is to create a Department for the economy. That is going to be a much larger Department, with the merger of what currently is DEL and DETI. The key is this: does it add value? You are talking about a two-way process. It sounds as if that could potentially have some benefits, but you have to do the business plan case. Does it add value to the process? Or does it consume further expenditure and scarce resources through bureaucracy? That is not, I think, what either of us would wish to see.

Ms Sugden: On my FE point, it is more from the perspective that we have to address the reality that we are in, but we do not want to lose the skills as well. I take your point that FE colleges are not higher education institutions, but we need a way of ensuring that we maintain and develop those skills. From a social point of view, a lot of people who tend to go to an FE college instead of a higher education facility are going towards vocational routes, which is what the FE colleges would tend to be associated with, and the Committee has seen that. In a way, it is about trying to find a solution to the problems that we face by seeing whether the FE colleges could fill that gap. I know that the colleges are having difficulty getting bums on seats, whereas those seats could maybe be filled from the places that we have now lost from the university. That may be a simple, uninformed way of putting it, but it is something that I would like to see universities looking into.

Professor Johnston: Somebody will have to pay for those too —

Ms Sugden: But they are arguably not as expensive.

Professor Johnston: It is essentially the same set of issues in that regard. Places have to be paid for; that further education has to be paid for. If you want to be globally competitive, FE colleges will not do that for you. They are very important. They will produce technical skills, but they will not produce the leaders of tomorrow in volume.

Ms Sugden: They could if they had that strong connection with a Russell Group university like yours.

Professor Johnston: They could, certainly. There could be complementarity there, absolutely, but what I am saying is that the danger for us as a Russell Group university is that we actually are no longer a Russell Group university in eight or nine years' time and no longer in the top 200. Hopefully that never happens. Why is that dangerous? It is because the first thing that happens is that your world-class staff disappear. The second thing that happens is that students, who are very switched on today, begin to see that you are dropping down and they go elsewhere for quality, too, because they now have to pay for it etc. There is a very different milieu in the university sector generally. We now have people from Northern Ireland going to the US for higher education — in small numbers, but there are people doing that, which you would never have seen before. What my colleagues and I are trying to do is create an international university that actually retains the best and the brightest here, and they get international experience at the same time.

Professor Gallagher: We need to avoid the risk of saying we can move the seats around in the current set-up when actually the bigger problem and challenge, as the vice chancellor has already said, is that we are the only region of the UK that is disinvesting in its young people right across the piece. The FE colleges, universities and schools all play a hugely important role in producing skills and enhancing the human capital in Northern Ireland. The role that they all play is massively important, but we are disinvesting right across the piece. That is the real challenge. If we just move things around a little bit, we will not actually address that challenge. That is key.

Mr O'Kane: I will build on your point. Ladders of progression are what Queen's University is about, in a sense, providing the opportunities for students to progress through from FE colleges. The issue here is that we are having to cut back the number of places that are available, so the number of places potentially available to students through that route is being cut back. As my colleagues have said, fundamentally, there is a resource issue. If you do not invest, you cannot grow the skills base, which is what Northern Ireland requires if it is to have a globally competitive knowledge economy.

Ms Sugden: I suppose that it is really about how to address the loss of skills. The Ulster University is now not offering that skill. Is there somewhere else that can offer that? I know that it is not directly associated with you. I take the point about ladders of progression, but, if we get people with skills and get them into jobs, perhaps they can have that progression while they are in employment. For me, the endgame is employment. Yes, of course Queen's University is a really important part of that, as are the other universities, FE colleges and further education in schools. It is about taking it all through that route. It is that bigger picture. We have to look at all areas of society and see how the different institutions facilitate their needs. I take your point.

Professor Johnston: Claire, I think that the point that has just been made is that the important thing with the level of cutting back of the budget, which is a problem not just in the HE sector — I am presenting it because I am in the HE sector — but in the FE sector as well, is that we are not investing in our 18-year-olds. We are not investing in the people who might, through a foundation programme or whatever, get into the HE sector and accelerate or, as you say, get into a business, a job, and then suddenly develop themselves in the workplace. That first rung of the ladder is slowly but surely disappearing for a lot of people. My biggest concern is that it will be for the most disadvantaged areas of society that the first rung on that ladder disappears first. That is the real tragedy of all this.

Ms Lo: Thank you for your presentation. The funding gap that is growing between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK is really concerning. You are right in saying that. While the UK's fees have gone up to nearly £9,000 or £10,000, we have kept ours at nearly £4,000 per year for our students. The Minister has announced the Big Conversation initiative. I am sure that you will very much take part in it. What do you see will be the necessary changes for funding higher education?

Professor Johnston: I welcome the Big Conversation. It is important that we have a conversation as a society to really debate these things because they are so fundamentally important, as we have been talking about. Really, the bottom line, however, is that we will have to invest more. There will be different things. If the public purse given to higher education is not going to increase, we will have to look at other sources of funding, whether that is from the private sector, some form of graduate tax or some sort of loan system and whether it is means-tested. We cannot afford those issues. They have to be on the table for discussion, unless we turn around and say that we will increase public investment back up to where it was so that we can actually move forward as a sector, start to grow and get that number down to closer to 20%, rather than 40%.

Those are the issues on the table. A lot of people feel that I want £9,000 fees here: I do not. I am actually asking for proper funding to remain globally competitive and impact on our society, but we have to go through an analysis and a discussion of what the right model is. We cannot fob it off for too much longer, because of some of the issues that we have already talked about. We are going to erode the sector and our competitiveness. The FDI success that we have had recently will disappear soon. Our economy is stalling. Those are really big issues for us, probably for some of you and certainly for me. My kids do not work in Northern Ireland any more. They are working throughout Europe and elsewhere, because the jobs are not here for them. I am sure that is the story for many other people in the room. Part of the reason for that is that we are not investing in our 18-year-olds.

Ms Lo: As you say, it is not sustainable in the long term to see 40% of our young people — the brightest young people, whom we invested in educating in schools for many years — shipped off somewhere else. They stay somewhere else to build the economies of other countries and regions. That is something that we all have to be mindful of.

Mr F McCann: Thank you for the presentation. It was very enlightening. Growing up on the Falls in west Belfast, my father always drummed it into us that education is the greatest thing in the world and the greatest gift that people can get. Watching and listening to the presentation here this morning enhances what he said many years ago. It is sad that we are sitting here talking about cuts to education across the board and the impact that those have.

I know that an element of the presentation was about the £80 million gap that has developed and the impact that it has here. I also know that we are facing fairly serious economic difficulties and problems. Quite often in my own constituency I speak to and work with groups of young people. I try to encourage them to go into education, but because of the backdrop of the levels of education that they get, the fact that they go into low-paid jobs almost removes the possibility of going to university for them at all.

It is trying to work out in your own mind the best way to push that ladder further down and open up those opportunities. The big things in people's minds are whether their dole is going to be cut next week, whether they will be able to afford a uniform for the kids to go to school and what job they will go into. Is education uppermost in their mind, trying to deal with the serious drug problem that is out there? Those are the big things that affect it. I am trying to explain to people that, over and above that, if they get an education it can lift them out of poverty, but I think government is only one element of it. There are a number of elements that we need to pull together.

I know that a number of young people, from an early stage in their education — say, coming to the end of secondary school — actually look outside here. Many of them do come back, but they look outside here. I think that is more to do with the adventure of going to university rather than remaining in Belfast. I think that is a fact of life, but I do agree that we need to do something more to encourage young people to get onto that path of education that will lead to places like that and give them the opportunities. It is how that fits in with everything else that is going on at the one time.

Professor Johnston: I echo everything that you said and completely endorse it. We have a general education problem that starts at the age of three and goes all of the way through. In Northern Ireland, we have a bimodal distribution: we have the best in the world in primary and secondary education, and we have the worst. We have not really acknowledged that. There are inefficiencies in our system that need to be addressed honestly and openly and put on the table, because they are harming society and they have been for a significant period. You cannot have parts of this city where a four-year-old is deemed educationally subnormal. That is an indictment of society. That is the case in several sectors of north and west Belfast, where we have a significant percentage of kids who fall into that category — before they get to five years old. That is what we are up against. That is one end of the spectrum.

The growth dimension, the way we get people out of this, as you have said, Fra, is to empower them. Education empowers them and gives them knowledge and the use of knowledge to grow themselves and those around them — their families and societies — to give them hope for the future. Absent that, you have the immediacy of some of those problems that you talked about. They are immediate problems, but this is stepping back and asking how we should plan for the medium to long term for the things that can produce higher wages and companies that come in offering jobs right across the sector, give a level of leadership and bring back some of our best and brightest. Unless we begin to do that, we will remain a very low-wage type sector, with jobs that do not take people out of poverty and actually, possibly, abuse them. Education, in my view, is really important in the long run.

Professor Gallagher: Fra, you are absolutely right about the importance of encouraging young people to see education as providing opportunities. What we are currently doing — the current direction of travel, because of the contraction of the system — makes it harder for those young people to get into the higher tracks in the education system. That actively discourages them. In Northern Ireland, we are not blessed with gold mines or oilfields; we have no natural resources like that. The biggest, most important resource that we have is our people. That is why we have to grow a knowledge economy and invest in our young people, whether through schools, FE colleges or universities. That is the only way that we will get significant economic growth and provide opportunities and jobs in the future.

Mr F McCann: I agree entirely with everything you say. Once a year, the Falls and Divis areas make the Falls Youth Providers awards. A couple hundred young people with their parents turn up. I book the Long Gallery or the City Hall for them to go in. It is amazing to go in and look at the wealth of talent that exists in our young people and a lot of the adventures that they are involved in. However, then it stops. There is a level of disconnect somewhere there. I have heard Tony speak before about the continuity of education right through, but, for many people, the poverty that exists in many of the communities and the difficulties make a lot of them just drop out. It is how you reconnect primary, secondary and university education to encourage people to go into it. I know that; I have met many of the students who go out and do the homework clubs and work in the communities. However, in many ways, that is not enough. It is how you get that growing connection that allows people to lift themselves out of what you are talking about. Poverty is the big thing out there at the minute. Look at the economy: the vast majority of people are in low-paid jobs, so they find it difficult to survive. Future cuts to tax credits will have an immediate impact on many thousands of families across the North; so will welfare reform. You hope to draw your future students from these communities, but they are under attack at the present time. How do you deal with that?

Professor Johnston: I continue to agree with what you have said. We are looking at this carefully. We have junior and senior academies, homework clubs and showcases for kids from disadvantaged areas and secondary schools. We have some programmes for kids to enable them to get into Queen's. For example, in medicine, which is one of the hardest subjects to get into, we ignore GCSE results if they have been to secondary schools. If they have done very well at AS, we just focus on that. These are issues that we need to continue to work at, for all the reasons that you have said. The bottom line is that, unless we invest in that education infrastructure in a joined-up way, we will not address some of the issues that you have highlighted.

Ms McGahan: Thank you for your presentation. I agree with you that the level of disinvestment in our higher education system is a very serious issue. As you know, we get a block grant, and that has remained static and has seen cuts year on year. That is the nub of the problem. You said that the mindset towards higher education needs to change. Can you outline practically what needs to happen regarding that? The Minister made calls for the business sector to shape the future of higher education. That was in the 'Irish News' a number of weeks ago. Perhaps you can elaborate on that.

I also agree that there are a lot of inefficiencies in the system. As an MLA, I listen to constituents who are participating in a Steps to Work programme that it is simply not working. They are being given newspapers that are out of date and are expected to look for jobs. It is totally frustrating. We are banging our heads against a brick wall. If the money was spent correctly, we could have more investment in higher education, but we are banging our heads against a brick wall. We have flagged up concerns about some of these government programmes that are doing absolutely nothing to improve people's quality of life.

I represent Fermanagh and South Tyrone, and, from an outside point of view, I can never understand the problem in Belfast. You have universities sitting on top of each other, as well as jobs and industry. We have to travel a considerable distance to get jobs. During our canvassing last year, that was one of the biggest issues. There are no jobs in rural areas. To go to university, you have to travel considerable distances. In fact, Fermanagh and South Tyrone had the highest rates increase in the North of Ireland, yet we are driving an hour to access acute services. To me, that is a massive inequality for rural areas.

Fra touched on intergenerational poverty, and there is a government strategy on delivering social change. Maybe we need to go back to that strategy. Maybe it is not doing the job that it should do in tackling intergenerational poverty. Otherwise, we are wasting our time.

Professor Johnston: Again, I agree with a lot of what you said, Bronwyn. Intergenerational poverty is part of the wider dimension that Fra mentioned. The environment that you are in puts you in a straitjacket, you do not have the opportunities, they are not easily there and, unless your parents and wider family are pushing you hard down that educational route, it is too much of a struggle, financially and otherwise.

On the issue of geography and access to Belfast, there are wider issues about road networks and rail networks. Those are part of a set of wider infrastructure issues, part of which universities can, of course, help solve because of the types of technology and things that we do. However, in a society of two million, there are three very good universities and one that is world-class. The fact is that you need to preserve those, in the sense that they are iconic and are the things that create reputation. It is hard to recreate that all over the place. Why? Because there is a critical mass and an international dimension. There are all the facilities. We have 267 buildings in the university. Think of the amount of manpower and effort. Those are all there for our students. They are part of that whole student experience that our students rate so highly. If you go to the McClay library, you will see that expressed in a very physical way in terms of those services. You cannot create that everywhere, so that learning environment is really important.

In Northern Ireland or elsewhere, people usually travel elsewhere to go to university, particularly if they come from small towns or rural communities. However, that does not mean that universities cannot or should not be connected to those communities. We are currently engaged in a number of projects — educational programmes as well as research programmes— with South West College, and, as I said, we already have that with Newry and Belfast Met. As an institution, we need to reach out. We recognise that and are doing that, but we also have to preserve and push the quality agenda so that our students get the best available type of education that they would be able to get elsewhere in the world.

Ms McGahan: On the point you made about infrastructure, Patrick, the infrastructure is not there in Belfast to carry the volume of traffic, and accessibility is one of the measures of poverty in rural areas.

Professor Johnston: I absolutely agree with you.

Mr Hilditch: Thanks, Paddy, for your presentation. To turn it away from directly to the students, there was an indication of the consequences as the situation pans out, including the potential of almost 500 job losses. Where does that sit? How is that being managed, and how does it impact on Queen's?

Professor Johnston: We have a voluntary severance and voluntary early retirement (VSVER) scheme — a voluntary redundancy scheme — that is working its way through. Probably within the next couple of weeks, we will know the outcome of that. That will define the number of people who applied for it and whom we accept leaving the university. We have to have an eye to who might apply. For example, if I applied for it — well, maybe they would let the president of the university leave. [Laughter.]

You have to look at the person, the role they play or their subject area. We cannot let people leave just because they have applied for it. We are in the last few weeks of that, and we will then see where we sit.

We have to make these savings. We have already taken this through the business of the university to the senate. My hope is that we are able to do it through a VSVER scheme. If we do not, we will have to do it through further performance management, which we are implementing in the university anyway through the appraisal mechanism. We are also looking strategically across the whole university, to go back to a point that a number of you have made, at other subject areas and schools. We are doing that currently. We did it for this year's intake based on whether people had met the entry requirements that we asked for. We did not close down any subject areas. We have a process under way of looking at schools and subject areas, their competitiveness, the number of students applying for them and the quality issues around them, and questioning whether they are sustainable and whether they are things that are really critical to our sector and our society. Over the next couple of months, we will be making some additional, very challenging decisions, and that process is well under way.

Mr Hilditch: Yes. The lost knowledge is a worry as well. You have acknowledged that the staff here are world-class.

Professor Johnston: Yes they are, and it is the last thing that my colleagues and I want to have to do. We did not go lightly to senate with this plan; we deliberated on it back and forward extensively before we did. The discussions that we are having as part of the further strategy project group are very difficult.

Ms Lo: May I just jump in there? You talked about cutting the number of students to 2,200 and looking at the qualifications of this year's intake. Is the 2,200 number based purely on financial terms?

Professor Johnston: The 2,200 number comes from both universities. We have targeted 290 this year and a total of 1,050 over the next three years. That will be the loss from Queen's. The remainder is the loss that has been announced from Ulster University. That is where the 2,200 comes from. We based this year's intake — 2015-16 — on whether students attained the A-level grades that we had asked for. We did not allow any slippage on that. As I said, we tried to prioritise subjects such as STEM, for example.

Going forward, we are not going to take the salami-slicing approach that we have this year. We are going to ask, and are in the process of asking, the really tough questions about what areas we believe are not sustainable or viable or do not have the right quality dimensions. We have not finalised them yet; we still need to have a lot more discussions with colleagues throughout the university in relation to that, but we will be making those decisions over the course of the next two months.

Professor Gallagher: On your specific point, these reductions in intake are a direct consequence of the budget cuts to the universities. If there are additional budget cuts, then the intake will be reduced still further, so the opportunities for young people from Northern Ireland will be reduced still further.

Ms Lo: So you are reducing core student numbers, but you are not cutting courses.

Professor Gallagher: We will have to. We have no choice but to cut some courses and programmes, because of the current direction of travel. We know that in a year or two's time the university is going to look different; there are things that we are doing now that we will not be doing in a couple of years' time. We have no option.

Ms Lo: Well, the headline for UU, of course, is cutting the whole languages department. You could be doing something like that.

Professor Johnston: We certainly could. I am not suggesting for a minute that that is where we would be cutting, because I do not know. We will look at this from an institutional point of view, and we will look at the impact on Northern Ireland. We will obviously have some discussions with Ulster University in that regard as well, in relation to those areas that we might be cutting. That is where we are now. We really have to begin to ask questions about sustainability. We do not have the money to fund unsustainable courses for the long term. That is, unfortunately, the position that we find ourselves in.

Mr O'Kane: I think that it is important just to emphasise that the current plan, in a sense, that our governing body has agreed is purely in response to the 8·6% cut in 2015-16. Any future cuts, if you like — as you know, we have a CSR to be announced this autumn — will have implications in terms of further reduction. Clearly, there will be consequences, but you can see the broad strategic framework within which we will be planning going forward.

Mr Anderson: Looking at your slides, Patrick, there is quite a gap between England and us. When you look at 2015-16 — you touched on this, James — funding is down another 8·6% here and England is 9% up, further widening the gap. You mentioned, Patrick, somewhere along the line, how much longer we can sustain this. The question I ask you this morning is this: how much longer can we sustain this? If we are not getting the students to stay here — I know that the big companies, such as Almac and things like that, down in my constituency, need those students, and we need them to have the proper degrees and education. So I ask you this today: how much longer can this be sustained, before we get funding from the public purse, which is very difficult at the present time? Is there something that you are not doing at the moment that you could do to sort of get it from outside sources? That was already touched on by others.

Professor Johnston: To the first question, the honest answer is that I do not know how much longer but, as you can tell, I am very worried. It is not 5 years from now; it is probably at the most in that sort of time span. We are seeing a very dynamic and different change in the HE market, and I use that terminology deliberately, as a country, and actually even within Europe and more broadly. You have the spectre of the MaSN cap being lifted in GB — in England — and we still have it capped, so that is a real challenge for us. One of the reasons that we have been able to do some of the things that we have been doing is that we have been driving the quality. People can see the quality, and we will continue to do that.

The other factor is that we as an institution are aggressively growing the international and postgraduate market. The postgraduate market in Northern Ireland is too small; even on the island of Ireland it is too small. We need to grow that internationally.

If that is not successful, we as an institution are in real trouble. We as a society are already in real trouble, and you heard comments from this end of the table that partly reflect that. You cannot export 40% — it was 33% — of your young people and be a dynamic, knowledge-driven economy. You cannot do that.

Singapore is investing in its kids going across the world in a targeted way and then bringing back the cream of the crop. Everybody else gets an education through its technical colleges and universities. It educates everybody to the age of 21, so it is investing in education. Scotland invests in education through the public purse; England has a different model. Germany invests in education. Those are direct competitors of ours, and we are not investing.

The challenge for us is that our talent base, not just at the age of 18 but at other ages, begins to leave. The issue is not just recruitment but leadership leaving, which creates that dynamic, creates recruitment of other people and creates ideas. That is why foreign direct investment, with quality jobs, comes in. Quality jobs lift the economy, but low-paid jobs trap people for life, which is the problem.

Mr Anderson: Is it fair to say that you have painted a somewhat grim picture this morning?

Professor Johnston: Yes, I have.

Mr Anderson: We need to cut to the chase here and get your perspective on this. Can you do more to attract outside resources that you can manage to ease the situation somewhat as we go through a difficult period for the public purse?

Professor Johnston: The answer is that that is the challenge that we as an institution accepted a year ago, because we recognised, even before we got into this much broader debate, that for us to grow as an institution, we would have to drive international connectivity and attract talented international students here. Does that help Queen's University Belfast? Of course it does. Does that potentially help wider society? Of course it does — to a point.

We have a system that allows 40% of our 18-year-olds to disappear by not investing in the higher education sector. That is what we are doing. By not investing amounts of money in the HE sector that are comparable with those invested by your next-door neighbours, you fundamentally begin to create some of the wider problems in society, which are also important, that have crept in to some of the questions.

We create low ceilings. We call something "leadership" that is not leadership. We do not use international benchmarks in the manner that we should to tell us what global leadership is. Even in industry, we are happy to have an economy that is what I call a lifestyle economy rather than something that is virtuous and really growing, particularly for middle-sized companies. Part of the reason for that is that we do not have in volume the people to give that type of leadership to this economy. Today, we do not have that type of leadership. The reason for that is that many left when they were 18 years of age, and less than one third of them ever came back. The reason why they do not come back — I am somebody who did come back — is that the opportunities are not there for them when they are in their mid-30s and have family responsibilities. They will no longer take that first rung on the ladder; they are looking for the sixth rung on the ladder, and we do not have those jobs in volume to attract back the international talent from Northern Ireland that is out there and that I meet when I travel, as I do quite a bit. That is already happening.

Mr Anderson: Is it also the case that, if we do not have people with good qualifications, we could end up bringing in people from outside to do the quality or high-paid jobs?

Professor Johnston: We are already doing that, because foreign direct —

Mr Anderson: In a bigger sense, because of the situation that you are telling us about today.

Professor Johnston: Yes, absolutely.

Mr Anderson: Is that a possibility?

Professor Johnston: It is not only a possibility; it is happening today.

Mr Anderson: I know that it is happening, but could it happen on a bigger scale?

Professor Johnston: Yes, it will happen on a bigger scale.

Mr Anderson: That is really concerning.

Professor Gallagher: That goes back to an earlier point. We have the resource in our young people; we have that talent pool. As a society, one of our urgent priorities is to invest in that talent pool properly. As it is, we are driving more and more young people out. Let us not forget that, when we drive them out and they go to university elsewhere, they are paying considerably higher tuition fees than they pay here. They obviously think that that is a useful enough investment for their future, because they are prepared to do it. What sense of responsibility do we have for those young people by what we are forcing them to do? A range of things need to be taken into account.

Mr Anderson: At the start of your presentation, you talked about 94% of graduates either going on to further studies or employment: what is the breakdown of that?

Professor Johnston: Seventy-three per cent of our graduates get into jobs that are allied to the courses that they have done, so they are in very good, well-paid jobs. We know that graduates —

Mr Anderson: Is that in Northern Ireland?

Professor Johnston: It is in Northern Ireland and more widely in the UK and Ireland. I do not have the breakdown for how many get directly employed here.

Professor Gallagher: The vast majority are in Northern Ireland.

Professor Johnston: That is a very good statistic for us —

Mr Anderson: It is a pretty high figure.

Professor Johnston: It puts us in the very top range —

Mr Anderson: As long as you are not one of the 6%.

Professor Johnston: Exactly.

Mr Anderson: It is a high figure.

Professor Johnston: We are very proud of that and want to make it even better, but it speaks to the quality of getting a degree programme from Queen's, which we intend to protect. We also have a lot more industry working in our courses, and that will evolve even further. We now have work placements for a huge number of courses. We have students taking a year out, and we have students working for six to eight weeks, whether as part of the City Scholarship Programme or the Washington Ireland Program, and that is transformative. When you meet those students, you suddenly realise — wow! — that has had such an impact on them. Some who were on those programmes five or six years ago are now working in the most prestigious jobs in the world. That is one of the privileges for me when I travel to meet those guys and see how a work placement in the financial district in New York — the New York Stock Exchange and those types of jobs — or working in Transport for London or the big investment houses in London have suddenly transformed the lives of those kids who never dreamed that they could do what they are doing today.

The Deputy Chairperson (Mr Buchanan): You talked about how we needed to open up the discussion and put the issues on the table for funding and the way forward. Do you think that we also need to put discussions on the table about what courses we should be running? Today in Northern Ireland, for example, it is a well-known fact that too many teachers and lawyers are being trained. Do you think that there is merit in discussing that? Could that change the situation slightly?

Professor Johnston: There is certainly merit in having a conversation about what society wants from degree programmes. I will take the law programme as an example. Most people who go into law do not go on to practise law but end up doing different things. The important thing is that we are not training technicians in a university but training people to develop deep analytical skills and the potential for leadership. That is what a university is about. They may develop technical skills alongside that, and those are transferable. The big difference in society today compared with 25 years ago is that the kids coming out today will have six different careers, and they need to be lifelong learners and have the tools to learn adaptably and move on. That is the type of society in today's knowledge-based economy.

The Deputy Chairperson (Mr Buchanan): How does raising the bar for students tie in with the widening participation strategy?

Professor Johnston: We take students who get the grades that we want, no matter what their background. In the Russell Group, we are at the very top, with 33% of our students coming from the lowest three socio-economic groups. We are proud of that, and, if we can do anything to make that higher, we will. Students have to attain those standards to get in. As I said, we look at the secondary education background in particular to see whether we could do something there. Our junior and senior academies now work with some of those schools throughout the Province in trying to enable kids to get to university by working with them at 13 years of age and inspiring them. Indeed, if you saw the projects that these kids are doing at the age of 13 when they spend a week in the university, it would really get your mind spinning. It is fantastic to see what they are doing.

The Deputy Chairperson (Mr Buchanan): We will take questions from Bronwyn and Anna. I ask you to be fairly brief because we are well over time.

Ms McGahan: Are you aware of a report from the Office for National Statistics that shows that Britain is lagging behind in productivity? That impacts on us. It is a key measure for creating a sustained rise in living standards. One of the barriers to that is investment in higher education, so maybe you should look into that. I will certainly read that report.

Professor Johnston: Paul Johnson is the author of that report. Let us be absolutely clear: I am comparing us with England. If I compare England with Singapore, the US, Canada and Germany, there is a 25% difference in investment in higher education, so I am not comparing Northern Ireland with something that is at the front edge of supporting universities and higher education. We underinvest. As a country, our return on investment in higher education is absolutely outstanding, whether it is in science, technology or whatever. Across the UK, we underinvest in higher education.

Mr O'Kane: In the UK, of the four regions, we are fourth.

Professor Johnston: By a long shot.

Mr O'Kane: You are referring to the overall UK investment as a percentage of GDP, which is well short of the G8 comparators. In the UK, Northern Ireland does not even match that 0·8% of GDP.

Ms Lo: Patrick, you mentioned growing your international student numbers a few times. The Conservative Government have been putting more and more restrictions on immigration and quotas for overseas students. How does that work for you?

Professor Johnston: It is a real challenge. It is well up on our risk register. International student numbers are vital for this institution in moving forward. The creation of a smaller number of English language training centres and exam centres over the last year has not helped. Students wait a very long time for visas. I will give you one statistic: in the last three years, the number of people from the Indian subcontinent coming to the UK for higher education has dropped by over 50%. We have real challenges. During the summer, I was in Beijing, and it was thrown back to me that the UK is no longer seen as a favourable place. Guess what is happening? Students are now applying to the US and Canada. The UK is beginning to lose its position in international recruitment for some of the reasons that you mention. James, you might want to take this on.

Mr O'Kane: We would very much welcome the Committee's support. As you all know, there is a bit of a battle going on in the Conservative Party in that the Home Secretary has a particular view. You might have heard her statement yesterday at the party conference. It is fair to say that the Cabinet does not share her views. The big issue is whether international student numbers should be taken out of immigration figures. We believe that they should be taken out, as does Universities UK. If the Committee were able to support that, it would be very welcome.

Mr Buchanan: Thank you very much for coming today and for taking questions. We ran over time by quite a bit.