We now come to the main business. I inform the House that I have selected the amendment in the name of the Prime Minister.

I beg to move,

That this House believes that universities should be solely and wholly in charge of their own admissions policies, without regard to any externally imposed quotas, targets or benchmarks; affirms that access to higher education should be determined on the basis of academic merit, not social, economic or geographical background; welcomes and supports the efforts of universities to seek out, find and encourage talent in all parts of society, endeavours which long pre-date Government intervention and which are threatened, not encouraged, by it; recognises that attempts to force universities to use politically-determined criteria threaten academic excellence and independence alike; notes that the Government's policies on these issues have sparked deep-seated anger and resentment among universities, whose leaders have in consequence warned Ministers not to interfere with university admissions policy and even openly contemplated self-privatisation as a means of escape; regrets the appointment of a University Access Regulator who has declared himself to be of the view that the principal issue facing higher education is class; and urges the immediate abolition of the Office for Fair Access and the removal of state interference from issues which lie at the heart of university independence, freedom and standards.

The debate is about excellence, independence and freedom. All are essential prerequisites for the standing of the UK's world-class universities, all are the fundamental bulwarks of achievement in both research and teaching, and all are profoundly under threat from the Government's misguided policies. As ever, the Government try to have it both ways. They try to send different messages to different audiences. The Minister is all reassurance, all charm, as he naturally would be inclined to be, when he is speaking to an audience of academics. When he is speaking to an audience of his Back Benchers, he is breathing fire, he is determined to change things, and he will not put up with what universities are doing.

A classic symbol of the confusion, whether deliberate or unintended, at the heart of the Government's policies appears on the Order Paper, in the amendment to which the Minister will speak. The Government accept the first few words of the Opposition motion. In particular they accept

"that universities should be solely and wholly in charge of their own admissions policies".

Excellent. Admirable. What could be better than that? But unfortunately they delete the next words, which read

"without regard to any externally imposed quotas, targets or benchmarks".

It is difficult to see how universities could be in charge of their admissions policies if they were to have regard to

"externally imposed quotas, targets or benchmarks".

Perhaps it is the words "quotas, targets or benchmarks" to which the Government object, but later in their amendment, referring to statistics that have recently been published, they say they abhor

"the recent misinterpretation of those indicators as targets or quotas".

So it is not the word "target" that they object to, or the word "quota". Perhaps it is the word "benchmark" that they object to, except that the Minister is on record as saying:

"Universities will not be penalised for failing to meet their benchmarks",

so it is difficult to see why those words are deleted from the Opposition motion unless, as we all suspect, the Government want universities to be obliged to have regard to externally imposed targets, quotas and benchmarks.

That is at the heart of the debate today—whether our universities will improve their quality, their international reputation, their ability to research and their ability to attract the best minds not only nationally but internationally, if they are subject to external interference on a wholly unprecedented scale. Let us remember where all this began: in a very unfortunate speech made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the subject of a student named Laura Spence. The Chancellor chose to take the view that he, as someone who had no experience of Oxford's admissions policies, was in a better position than experienced Oxford admissions tutors to judge who should and should not be admitted to a course which was heavily oversubscribed. After announcing that he, as the person in charge of the nation's purse strings, concluded that Laura Spence should have been admitted, he failed to tell Oxford which of the exceptionally well qualified alternative candidates would have had to be ejected to make way for Miss Laura Spence.

Throughout the process, the Labour party in government has attempted to use university admissions policies as a party political football, a means of scoring with Back-Bench Members and reassuring core activists that it remains a socialist party at heart and retains the old class war instincts.

For the avoidance of doubt, will my hon. Friend make it clear that he supports the principle of equal opportunities for all, and that, when people are qualified to go to university, from whatever school but especially from state schools, they should have the opportunity to do that?

I agree with my hon. Friend. The Conservative party has always believed in equality of opportunity, whereas the Labour party believes in equality of outcome, which is fundamentally different and bears no relationship to merit.

It is extremely generous of the Opposition to allow children from state schools to go to university. Does the hon. Gentleman admit that questions about admissions to our leading research universities need further examination to guarantee the equality of opportunity that he endorsed? Does he genuinely believe that there is there no problem in the admissions policies of our leading research universities?

The hon. Gentleman puts the case in a characteristically light, welcome and subtle way. Nevertheless, his comments go to the heart of the debate. I am sure that he knows that admission to our leading universities from state schools is lower now than 30 years ago. Academic selection in higher education is the unsurprising result of doing away with academic selection in secondary education.

To the charge that a problem exists, we contend that universities do their level best to get people of all social backgrounds through their doors. I have never met a university vice-chancellor, teacher or don who wants to teach those who are more stupid than they should be. They want to teach the most able and most academically talented. They are determined to do that. However, Conservative Members believe that the state has no role in telling universities whom they should admit and whom they should not. If we followed the route of the state's dictating admission, it would lead to a profoundly unequal position whereby the least articulate, the least able to lobby their Members of Parliament and the least able to get the state to intervene on their behalf lost out the most.

The hon. Gentleman is right about the Laura Spence case. He showed how foolish it was of the Chancellor to cite an individual case, especially that case, because it was unfair on the admissions staff at Oxford. I hope that he agrees that Oxford faces the problem of getting enough state students to apply in the first place. That problem is not solved by stereotypes and caricatures such as the one the Chancellor used. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that judging on A-levels alone may discriminate against students from less good educational backgrounds, and that that is why the interview process is so important at some universities?

I agree almost entirely with the hon. Gentleman. As he would expect, I naturally endorse his comments on Oxford and citing a specific case. I also agree that, if universities are allowed to proceed in some freedom, they will increasingly move towards the form of selection that he suggests. He knows from his constituency experience that Oxford has invested a huge amount of effort, time and commitment in outreach programmes. Indeed, a note from Oxford that was widely circulated before the debate states that, on almost every day of the working week, some outreach activity occurs.

The university is determined to expand bursaries, and to penetrate some of the most difficult and deprived local education authority areas to encourage students with aptitude and ability—they are certainly to be found in every part of our country, from every social and economic background—to apply. It goes out of its way to do that.

Oxford is equally adamant, however, that it is for it to determine who goes there; it is not for Government, or for any Government appointee, to do so. The phrase "Get your tanks off our lawn" is being used. This is the fundamental difference between the two sides of the House: we believe in academic freedom, and we take it seriously.

We welcome what the hon. Gentleman has said about Oxford university. What we are saying is that if universities are to impose higher fees on students, they are obliged to do exactly what he says Oxford will do. We want all universities to do it. If they do not reach out and encourage groups of people from working-class backgrounds to seek admission, they should not be allowed to charge higher fees. That is perfectly reasonable.

Let me ask the hon. Gentleman a simple question. Will he name a university that does not do that?

I am not going to name a university—[Interruption.] I am not going to name a university, but that is precisely the role of OFFA. That is why we are creating the post: so that we can draw comparisons between those that are engaged in good practice, working hard to reach out, and those that are not. If the hon. Gentleman does not understand that, he ought to read the briefs with which Labour Members have been provided.

I think the hon. Gentleman's problem is that he has been reading those briefs rather too assiduously. He has no answer to the question "Which universities do not already do that?", because they all do. His justification for OFFA's creation seems to be that it will force universities to do what they are already doing, universally and fully. That is not compatible with the assurance given by the Secretary of State to the House and the country that OFFA would be non-bureaucratic and powerful, that it would make a difference, and that it would empower those who have previously been unable to go to university.

The fact is that, when pressed, Labour Members cannot come up with any example of a university that is not already doing its level best. It is clear that the creation of this institution is at best bureaucratic nonsense and a waste of time, and at worst an act of political spite and vindictiveness.

The hon. Gentleman accepted earlier that ability was distributed to all ranks of society. In his report, Professor Schwartz clearly states that

"only 26 per cent. of young entrants to full-time degree courses came from skilled manual, partly skilled or unskilled family backgrounds."

Does it not follow that if universities are trying to reach out to people from such backgrounds they are not doing very well so far, and ought to attempt to do better? That is what we are trying to encourage them to do.

What the hon. Lady seems not to recognise is that most of the groups she has identified do not take five GCSEs, and do not take A-levels. They are let down by the school system. It is not for the universities to be punished and penalised for the product of decades—for this has not been happening only since 1997—of problems with the state secondary school system. No one can be expected to put everything right among 18-year-olds when it should have been sorted out when they were between 11 and 18, or indeed probably much younger—at the primary or pre-primary stage.

rose—

I want to make some progress, but I will give way to the hon. Gentleman later.

We have talked a little about what Oxford already does. It is a great pleasure to be able—as I have not been for quite some time—to cite with unqualified approbation and endorsement words uttered by my old friend and colleague, Mr. Chris Patten. He was a very distinguished chairman of the Conservative party some years ago. It must be said that since then he has not always been in line with every aspect of Conservative policy. I am delighted to note, however, that on this issue he and we are once again of one mind. In his capacity as chancellor of Oxford university—he is also chancellor of Newcastle university—he said:

"What the government is trying to do is to press universities to make up for the inadequacies in parts of our secondary education system and what that means is they are pressing for a lowering of standards. It is as brutally simple as that."

He is absolutely right in that characterisation, and that view is widely shared by many people in the worlds of academe.

The hon. Gentleman set up an Aunt Sally in what he had to say about academic freedom: we all believe in academic freedom. However, I wish to press him on what he means by academic merit. In the words of the motion, his party

"affirms that access to higher education should be determined on the basis of academic merit, not social, economic or geographical background".

Does he mean by "academic merit" simply exams passed, or does he mean academic potential? If he accepts that admissions policies should take account of academic potential, how can they then not take some account of social, economic and geographical background?

I have much sympathy with the right hon. Gentleman on these issues, because he thinks creatively and independently. If that is the reason why he will not vote for our motion, he cannot therefore vote for the amendment, which says that the Government

"agrees that admissions to higher education should always be based on merit".

We are all agreed that admissions should be based on merit: I hope that we could all agree that it is for universities to define what "merit" means, not for politicians or politically imposed regulators.

On that basis and to be clear about the hon. Gentleman's thinking, does he welcome the practice undertaken by some universities of admitting pupils with lower A-level standards than others, because of their academic potential?

I welcome universities doing whatever they believe to be appropriate in order to recruit the best possible students for their courses. The hon. Gentleman once again makes the case that we strongly adhere to: universities are experimenting, reaching out and doing their level best already to try to obtain as wide a spectrum of talent as they possibly can. They do not need a bureaucratic and party-politically imposed regulator to force them to do so.

The gentleman who has been appointed as the Government's director for fair access is Professor Sir Martin Harris. He is a man of enormous reputation and esteem, and greatly respected throughout the higher education sector. I entirely understand why the Government chose him to take up that remit. However, it was widely felt, not only on these Benches, but through the education world and among the wider public, that it was extremely unfortunate that he made it clear in an interview in The Times on his appointment that, first, he was happy to be described as

"resolutely old Labour",

and secondly—and much more seriously—that the fundamental issue facing higher education was class. He said that

"class underlies almost all the inequalities and unfairnesses in our system, and that to focus unduly on any other variable . . . is to lose sight of what actually makes a meritocracy difficult to attain in practice. Until we tackle this issue at its roots, everything else is a distraction."

I very much regret that he said that and so do many people in higher education. There is no systematic, conscious, deliberate class differentiation in universities and it is a throwback to a different decade to believe that there is. It is very worrying that a person who will wield considerable power over our universities—to put in terms what the Secretary of State believes—should think that this country needs an old-fashioned class war. That is the last thing this nation needs as it goes into the 21st century.

My hon. Friend is right. It says in the Schwartz report in section B.5 that

"DfES analysis shows that pupils from low-income households are over-represented in schools that add the least value to pupils' performance."

That shows that it is the schools that are letting down children from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, not the admissions process.

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend, and I pay tribute to him for putting his finger, in a very systematic way, on one of the most profound reasons why many of our young people are being let down at a very early age indeed, well before the age of 18: the absence of the proper introduction of synthetic phonics teaching, which has such a huge beneficial effect on literacy and numeracy, especially for those who come from backgrounds where they are not familiar with books and whose parents may not be likely to take a primary role in educating them in literacy and numeracy. My hon. Friend is right: that is where we need to tackle the problems, rather than penalising universities for not taking someone at the age of 18 and adjusting for what may well have been more than a decade of being let down by the school system.

I entirely endorse what my hon. Friend has just said in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr. Gibb). Does he not think that a considerable part of the blame for the bad teaching of, for example, reading lies with people like Kimberley, Meek and Miller—self-professed experts in the teaching of reading and well-known Marxist academics—who are on the record as saying:

"Within the psycho-semiotic framework, the shared reading lesson is viewed as an ideological construct where events are played out and children must learn to position themselves in three interlocking contexts."?

Does that sort of rubbish not account for the destruction of the life chances of a generation of children in our state schools?

I am always both amazed and impressed at the ability of my hon. Friend to memorise large sections of text. His ability to memorise that chunk of text is even more impressive than usual, and I am delighted to say that it leads me to a different point that I want to make that relates, funnily enough, to Marxist ideology. [Hon. Members: "Ah."] Professor Crampton, who is the professor of east European history at St. Edmund Hall, Oxford university—a man who therefore knows quite a lot about east European politics in general and Marxist regimes in particular—wrote a letter to The Times a few days ago about the comments, to which have I referred, made by Professor Sir Martin Harris, the new university access regulator. He said:

"Professor Sir Martin Harris is not alone in believing that class should play a significant role in determining university admissions policy; this was also very much the view of the communist-dominated regimes which came to power in Eastern Europe immediately after the Second World War."

He continued:

"Universities were given strict quotas on how many from each class they could admit with the result that, regardless of aptitude, intelligence, interest or attainment, it became very difficult or even impossible for those stigmatised as 'bourgeois' to gain entrance into university."

My hon. Friend, in his characteristic way, has perhaps put his finger on the sinister thing that may be behind what the Government are about.

In the hon. Gentleman's little rant about reading standards, he ignores the fact that examination results at the ages of 14 and 16, and at A-level, are now better than they have ever been. We should be proud of that. It is useful that we are raising standards in the secondary sector, but I want to refer back to the class issue for a moment. Is it not true that students from non-traditional backgrounds, whom we discussed extensively during the debates in the Committee that considered the Higher Education Bill, have lower aspirations and very often, because they do not know anyone who has attended a top university, do not apply because they think that the university is expensive or not for them? We as politicians, as well as the universities, certainly have a great deal of work to do in persuading those youngsters that they can apply and that they can succeed.

The hon. Lady makes two interesting and important points. Her first point relates to exam standards, and I refer to the findings of the Government's own Tomlinson report, which indicates that there are accelerating and growing problems with basic functional literacy and numeracy among large numbers of young people who leave school with very good exam results. That is very much what employers are saying. If her view is that literacy and numeracy are getting better in this country, I wish she was right, but I am afraid Tomlinson concludes emphatically that that is not the case.

As for the point about some students from non-traditional backgrounds being put off because they think that university is expensive, what on earth does the hon. Lady think that the implications of introducing top-up fees will be in respect of their assessment of whether university is too expensive for them? I point out that the former Secretary of State for Education and Skills—now the Minister for the Arts, the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Estelle Morris)—said:

"for many lower income families the fear of debt is a real worry and could act as a bar to higher education".

Absolutely. Under the Government's proposals, students will have twice as much debt when they graduate as under Conservative proposals.

Going back to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Mrs. Campbell), does the hon. Gentleman accept that not one child who has benefited from this Government's literacy and numeracy strategy in primary schools has gone into further education, higher education or the labour market, and when people claim that there are no improvements in literacy and numeracy they miss that fundamental point?

The Minister appears to have misunderstood his own Government's figures. They indicate that the literacy and numeracy hour— an invention of the previous Conservative Government under the superb Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for South-West Norfolk (Mrs. Shephard)—did produce some notable progress in literacy and numeracy attainment levels until 2000. In other words, that was in the pipeline—it was working through—but then, at the point when it might have been expected that a Government who had been in office for three years would begin to make a difference, it ground to a halt, and in each successive year since 2000 there has been no further upward movement in literacy and numeracy standards.

I am delighted that the Minister has, inadvertently, I suspect, paid tribute to the superb attainments of my right hon. Friend the Member for South-West Norfolk when she was the Secretary of State for Education, but I am afraid that that is not something from which he and his colleagues can take any comfort or credit.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way in his powerful speech, but as a further point on numeracy for the hon. Member for Cambridge, would he like to comment on the fact that Oxford university, which has figured rather heavily in the discussions so far, has so despaired of the school mathematics system in this country that it now has a four-year mathematics course instead of the three-year course of a few years ago?

My hon. Friend makes a very powerful point; there is an issue here that needs to be dealt with in the schools system, not in the university system.

I had intended to spend a moment talking about the absurdities of the 50 per cent. target, but I do not intend to do that, beyond recording that there are now more and more academics, including Professor Michael Sterling of the Russell group, and more and more employers, including the CBI and the British Chambers of Commerce, who utterly reject the contention that the 50 per cent. target is either necessary or desirable.

That is again a fundamental difference between the two parties: the Government are obsessed with the 50 per cent. target, but we will scrap it. It is sometimes said that there is little to tell between the parties these days, but there are some big differences here. We believe in equality of opportunity; they believe in equality of outcome. We believe that universities should select on academic merit; they believe that just about anyone should be admitted. We believe in fitting the student to the rigours of academe; they believe that if they do not fit together, it is the course that should be dumbed down, not the students who should be better chosen. We believe that we should reward parents who work hard to teach their children to read, to familiarise them with books, to stretch their minds—and who, perhaps, even scrimp and save to get them better teaching. They believe that anyone who dares to encourage their children to rise above mediocrity should be ostracised and punished. We think that becoming a graduate ought to make life better for those graduates' children; they think that being a graduate means that their children should have less chance than them to follow in their footsteps. We believe in more science and more technology—more physics, biology and engineering. They just believe in more social engineering. We believe that universities should be free to decide their own admissions, their own access policies, and to run themselves. They believe that universities should be governed by an old-fashioned class warrior guided by legislators whose shoulders are groaning under the weight of all the chips, and kicked to the ground so that the state can keep its jackboot firmly on their windpipe.

Labour's old tribal loyalties and class hatreds have not gone away—they have just been hidden for a while. The mask is slipping. With an election coming, and core Labour voters to reassure, a blood sacrifice has to be made to the old socialist gods—and butchering middle-class aspirations will fit the bill nicely.

The stakes are high. The reputation, integrity and independence of our universities are in danger. Conservatives will fight for merit, excellence and real fairness. It is essential for our country that we should prevail.

I beg to move,

To leave out from 'policies,' to end and add 'a point which was repeatedly made clear during the passage of the Higher Education Act 2004 and is now enshrined in that legislation; notes that the Opposition opposed the passage of that Act; welcomes the annual publication of the higher education performance indicators which enable institutions to reflect on their own position; abhors the recent misinterpretation of those indicators as targets or quotas linked to funding; agrees that admissions to higher education should always be based on merit; further welcomes the recent report from Professor Schwartz on fair admissions to higher education; agrees that it is for institutions themselves to decide how to implement the Schwartz principles; supports the Government's policies to widen participation in higher education and open access for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds with the potential to benefit; congratulates the Government and the higher education sector on the steps they are taking to achieve this goal; notes that the most powerful driver of increased participation is to raise standards in schools; commends the new student support arrangements which will make higher education free at the point of use and fair at the point of repayment; further commends the establishment of the Office for Fair Access (OFFA) which will result in more financial support for students and more outreach work to boost applications from under-represented groups; and further notes that universities' admissions policies will be outside OFFA's remit.'.

I am delighted that we have the opportunity to debate this issue and that I am able to respond to the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Collins), who I thought made a good fist of his argument until his final rant, which was full of silliness and an avalanche of cliché. I welcome the opportunity because so much has been said about Government interference in university admissions, much of which has been entirely wrong. Considering that we have recently had a number of debates on higher education, I am concerned that the hon. Gentleman still labours under so many misconceptions. Like others whose job it is to feign outrage, fill newspaper columns and feed the open maws of radio and television, the hon. Gentleman should know that it is a little inconvenient to let facts get in the way of a good story, but I prefer facts to misconceptions. I am therefore pleased to have the chance to set things straight today, and I know that he will welcome that.

The first misconception is that the Government want to tell universities how to manage their admissions process. Nothing could be further from the truth. Admissions should—[Interruption.] Hon. Members should listen for a moment. Admissions should and will remain the sole responsibility of institutions. It is for universities and colleges to decide whom they admit and how they do it. We made that clear when we published our consultation document on widening participation in April 2003, and we have said the same thing ever since.

The second misconception is that the Government set targets and quotas to dictate how many students from low-income families, state schools and deprived areas each university must accept. It has even been said that universities are penalised if they do not meet those quotas. Nothing could be further from the truth. That myth has wafted around ill-informed circles in the aftermath of the publication of the Higher Education Statistics Agency, or HESA—

Hezza?

Perhaps that is a better pronunciation. As I was saying, that myth arose in the aftermath of the publication of the HESA performance indicators, despite the fact that HESA and the Higher Education Funding Council for England have stated that the numbers do not represent quotas, or even targets. They are simply a barometer measuring where universities are in terms of access, and where they could be, all things being equal.

I welcome the Minister's comments, but does he think it sensible of HEFCE and HESA to have changed from using A-levels as the comparator to using the Universities and Colleges and Admissions Service tariff points, which include GNVQs and AS-levels alongside A-levels, as a measure for university entrants? Does he not think that they should reconsider that decision?

I wish that those bodies had told me about those figures before publishing them. They came as a surprise to the hon. Gentleman and they certainly came as a surprise to me. Many universities have done a great deal of good work to meet the previous benchmarks and targets, and the change took everyone by surprise. I will be interested in seeing the reasons for it.

The performance indicator figures were developed six years ago by the universities and the funding council as a tool to inform institutions of their relative position compared with their peers. They are published once a year and it is up to universities to decide how to use them. The Government do not force any university to meet them, nor do the Government have any other form of access quota or target.

Far from seeking to impose admissions targets and quotas, we are in absolute agreement with the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale that students must be admitted to university solely on the basis of merit and potential. The challenge facing universities and colleges is how to measure that. That is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Skills asked Professor Steven Schwartz, vice-chancellor of Brunel university, to lead an independent review of the options that English universities and colleges should consider when admitting students. Professor Schwartz's group included members from both higher education and schools. It consulted extensively and produced a set of principles and guidelines by the sector, for the sector. That is why its recommendations have been so widely welcomed and supported, including by Universities UK and the Standing Conference of Principals.

The Schwartz report is not a way for the Government or OFFA to interfere with university admissions by the back door. It is a set of guiding principles—developed by the sector itself—that will help institutions to admit students in a fair and transparent way.

I do not want to dispute what the Secretary of State is saying on that at the moment. Earlier, it was said that in effect there are no punishments. Why is it that Northbrook college in my constituency is being penalised financially for what is called under-performing because it would not admit people who it did not think could benefit from the courses on offer?

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will give me some details on that. I do not know about that case but I will look at it for him.

The third misconception is that OFFA will have a remit over admissions or will somehow try to interfere with universities' admissions policies. I want to reassure the House that this is not true. I am delighted that Sir Martin Harris has accepted the role as the new director of OFFA. In Martin Harris, I am confident that the Secretary of State has appointed someone who respects institutional autonomy and understands very clearly the great importance of raising the educational aspirations of those young people from lower income families and of encouraging them, and those who teach them, to consider applying for entry to university. I was encouraged to hear the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale say just that, as I was pleased to hear it said by others who intervened on him. It is precisely what we have to do. We must raise the level of aspiration. I know that the poverty that we suffer from in my constituency is not economic poverty. There are poor families in the constituency, but there is a general poverty of aspirations, such as aiming for the best universities and the best education for those young people.

Bearing in mind the Minister's clarifications, will he remind the House of OFFA's budget?

As I recall, the budget for OFFA will be about £500,000 a year. I will get some details on that for the end of the debate for the hon. Gentleman.

We have heard some quotes from Sir Martin Harris, and I will give the House two more. He said very clearly:

"Access to university must be on merit (including aptitude) alone."

He also said:

"Universities are autonomous. Parliament has frequently upheld this principle . . . and we surrender it at our peril."

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will take some strength from that.

I listened carefully to what the Minister just said. He said that entry would be on merit including aptitude. That suggests that merit will have to be calculated by other factors as well as aptitude and that those other factors might overrule aptitude. What consideration have the Government given to the famous Bakke case in America? It was a defining case where somebody was refused admission to an institute of higher education and then discovered that he had scored higher marks than someone who had been given a place. The courts in America, in a keynote ruling, decided that that was an invasion of the individual's rights and instructed that that must never happen again.

I am sorry to have to disappoint the hon. Gentleman about that. I do not know about that case. I will try to read about it. The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale, who spoke from the Opposition Front Bench, and many others, through interventions, have pointed out that the best indicators are those A-levels that we have; no question about it. However, there are circumstances sometimes—it must be left to the universities in question to decide what those circumstances are—where other things should be tested as well as a straight A-level result. That is important.

Will the Minister give way?

I shall make a little progress and then I will certainly give way.

We are not simply relying on Sir Martin's respect for institutional autonomy and his willingness to work with the sector on that basis. All along, we have made it clear that OFFA will not have any remit over university admissions. That is enshrined on the face of the Higher Education Act 2004, and the access agreements, which OFFA will oversee, will focus on how best to generate and attract applications from under-represented groups. OFFA will not consider institutions' admissions policies; it will not impose any admissions targets or quotas; and institutions will propose their own milestones, or indicators of success. We expect that the vast majority of institutions will honour the requirements in their access agreements.

The Minister said that the Government would not impose targets or benchmarks, and now says that OFFA will not impose targets or benchmarks. Will he explain why he accepts the first nine or ten words of the Opposition motion, but rejects the reference to

"externally imposed targets, quotas or benchmarks"?

The core of my argument is, with respect, that the hon. Gentleman misunderstands OFFA's job. The hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), who is sitting next to him on the Front Bench, suffered with me as we read OFFA's regulations; it was my first job on my first day in post, and it was terrible. The hon. Gentleman should read OFFA's regulations and then he will see for himself. [Interruption.] He may well have read them, but he has not understood them.

The matter is important, and the Minister knows that academics and others will study his words carefully. Can I take it that he agrees that

"universities should be solely and wholly in charge of their own admissions policies",

the part of the motion that the Government amendment does not delete, and that those admissions policies should proceed

"without regard to any externally imposed quotas, targets or benchmarks"?

Does he agree with those words, and is his only objection that he thinks that we have misunderstood his policy? May I have a yes or no answer to that question?

Yes; I agree and am trying to make that point clear in my speech. It is not OFFA's job to try to impose conditions on universities. It is up to universities to decide whom they take, how they take them and how they judge them. I hope that together the hon. Gentleman and I have made that clear to the House.

I understand that OFFA's purpose is to improve and monitor universities' access plans and that if a university wants to raise tuition fees above £1,150 a year, its plan must be approved by the director of OFFA. If the director of OFFA does not approve such a plan, presumably the university cannot raise its fees, in which case he has direct power over universities' admission policies.

That point does not concern admissions within a university; it concerns raising the tuition fee. The tuition fee may only be raised to a maximum of £3,000 if Sir Martin Harris judges that the agreement between OFFA and the university stretches that university on reaching potential students who do not currently apply to university. That might involve a university doing what it does at the moment or doing more than it does at the moment. The hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Mr. Maples) looks dubious.

I would like to believe the Minister, but if Sir Martin Harris does not approve a plan, presumably the university cannot raise its fees, in which case OFFA has enormous power over the financing of the universities if it does not approve of what they are doing. It is surely incorrect to say that OFFA has no say or influence over universities' admissions policies.

The hon. Gentleman is encapsulating what is wrong with the Opposition's argument. This is not about the way in which a university conducts its admissions procedure, but about how it tries to encourage applications from parts of society that do not provide students at the moment. I will give an example of what I mean. Oxford has been much maligned in the course of this debate; wrongly, because it is working very hard in some communities to raise the aspirations of young people who may not have the confidence to go to Oxford and will wish to apply to other universities that are nearer to home or are where they think they would be more comfortable. Oxford is not getting the accolade that it deserves for doing that work. As OFFA would recognise, it is not trying to take X number of students from this social class or from that postal code; on the contrary, it is trying to reach those parts of society that universities are not reaching at the moment. That is a wholly good thing.

While we are on the subject of access plans, will my hon. Friend pay tribute to the excellent work that is done by students' unions in trying to encourage access? Every year, Cambridge university's students' union sends hundreds of students into the community and into schools to talk to students and to encourage them to apply to Cambridge. Such efforts should be rewarded and applauded.

I am very much aware of the efforts that are made by students' unions, especially in Cambridge. They do a terrific job. I am encouraged by the joint approaches that universities are now taking. They need to tap the potential of those parts of society that are not being tapped because they need high-quality students who will not drop out but stay throughout. OFFA's great role will be to encourage the debate that should be taking place between universities and everyone who is interested in trying to widen applications and increase the number of people who go to university.

Do not the Minister's comments about poverty of aspiration imply that problems lie not with universities, but with schools, and that he and his Department should examine why our comprehensives are not raising people's aspirations in relation not only to Oxbridge and the top universities, but to life as a whole?

The hon. Gentleman is right; that is what we have to do. However, I would argue with Chris Patten—or is it Lord Patten?—[Hon. Members: "Not yet."] It is only a matter of time. On the "Today" programme the other morning, Chris Patten gave an interview in which he said that the main thrust of the argument concerns raising aspirations. I do not disagree with that. However, he is wrong, and is being a bit lazy, in that he has not considered what OFFA is designed to do. There is no way of short-circuiting the problem of trying to raise standards in schools, which is the absolute priority of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards.

The Minister is being very patient and reassuring, but will he clarify one point? If a university decides that it wants to use interviews as part of its method of finding out about the quality of the candidates that are offered, would that be a perfectly proper and legitimate approach for it to adopt?

Most universities will use a mix of methods, and properly so. A-level results will certainly be the prime mover, but other factors may apply in certain circumstances. In today's edition of The Guardian—which I rarely read these days, as the hon. Gentleman probably knows—a woman writes about the difficulties that she had in getting into Oxford. She got one interview, which was pretty awful, went back to pick up her coat, and met an historian who persuaded the university to take her.

Although such chances are welcome, they should happen more rarely because they should be built into the system to ensure that opportunity and access are fairer.

Will my hon. Friend confirm that it would be appropriate for OFFA to intervene in a case in which it had approved a university's access plan that included the provision of a £300 bursary, but that sum was not provided? Surely everyone thinks that there should be a system of recourse in such circumstances. Although that situation is highly unlikely, provision to address it should exist in legislation.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for reminding the House that that is precisely what would happen. If a student entered what could be an expensive contract, yet suddenly found that the rules had changed, OFFA would have a responsibility to intervene. He is right that I would expect OFFA to take such action.

May I pursue that point? Although I fully accept that hefty benchmarks are not targets to be imposed, is it not the case that there are enormous discrepancies between the benchmarks and real situation in several of our leading universities? Does my hon. Friend think that, if more of our leading universities accepted the best practice described by OFFA, the gap between performance and benchmarks would gradually close?

I would expect OFFA to fulfil a role that would do much to spread best practice, but different universities will do things in different ways. The university of Glamorgan, which is in my constituency, has a fine record of being what it calls a "community university". It has an excellent symbiotic relationship with local industry and communities, but it is a different creature in many ways from some of the Russell group universities, including Cardiff university, which is only 15 miles away from it. I do not think that universities will be drawn more closely together or that there should be a single model or paradigm to define what a university should be. Different universities will fulfil different functions, and universities themselves should decide which students to take and how to judge that.

I am pleased that a few other universities have been mentioned, because I was starting to think that we were talking about only Oxford. Does the Minister agree that, although universities must determine their own admissions, they must also be more transparent by making what they are looking for and the way in which they will assess merit clear to applicants? Their admissions tutors need to be properly trained in, and rewarded for, carrying out that process, but sometimes they are not.

I agree with my hon. Friend that that sometimes does not happen, but the situation is getting better. Universities are taking admissions tutors and the process of admission far more seriously than before. I have been impressed by people whom I have met and I have witnessed terrific outreach and bursary award schemes. The distinguished Chairman of the Select Committee on Education and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Sheerman), seemed to agree that it was about time that other universities were mentioned. His own university in Huddersfield—although I suppose that his own university is the London School of Economics—is doing terrific work and has an especially good relationship with further education colleges. It is exploring the interesting possibility of offering foundation degrees.

We appreciate the generosity with which the Minister has given way. Is not the nub of the issue his ability to satisfy and reassure both Conservative Members and the hon. Member for Bury, North (Mr. Chaytor) on the point about the number of students from specific backgrounds who go to particular universities? He would not be satisfied unless something happens in relation to those statistics. How can he reassure the Opposition that universities will be free to carry on their admissions policies—bearing in mind what he said about attempts to bring everybody in—if those statistics do not change? If those statistics do not change, what is the point of OFFA in the minds of some of his hon. Friends?

That is a good question and a good point. OFFA must make a difference, or there is no point in its being there. I hope that the difference will be that Sir Martin Harris will be able to have such a discussion with universities, and with each individual university on a university-by-university basis—or a higher education institution-by-institution basis—to try to understand how they can further stretch themselves in reaching out to those communities. But I emphasise that that is not the same as saying that he will have any power whatever to force those universities to adopt new admissions policies, to impose quotas on them or to meet benchmarks. He does not have that power, and he will not have it.

Will the Minister then explain why, when the original draft letter to the director was presented to the Higher Education Bill Committee earlier this year, it specifically referred to the HEFCE benchmarks as something that should be taken into account?

As I said earlier, the benchmarks are numbers that, all things being equal, one would expect the figure to be at. I would expect Sir Martin Harris to want to take a range of variables into account in his discussions with universities, and that will be one of them, but it will not be binding on any university. I reassure the hon. Gentleman and the House on that.

Can I push my hon. Friend further on that? As he probably knows, having done his homework since taking his new job, the Select Committee did not want, or did not see the necessity for, OFFA. Everything that he has said in his speech seems to suggest that it does not really have a role. What would happen if a university, or a college in a university, were making decisions about admissions that were absolutely reprehensible, and everyone could see that it was swayed in a particular way? Is he saying that OFFA and the Government would do nothing, even in the case of a glaring injustice?

I can only repeat to my hon. Friend what I have already said: OFFA has no responsibility to intervene in the admissions policy of any university. However, I would expect OFFA to have an adult conversation with the vice-chancellor or the board of that higher education institution to try to persuade them that they should be considering things differently. By the way, I do not know of any higher education institution or university that is behaving in that way—looking for that kind of trouble would be perverse in the extreme and I do not expect them to do so. I was lucky to have dinner with the Russell group on Thursday evening, and I did not detect that any university was looking for that kind of confrontation, or that they saw any sense in it, as they would essentially be cutting themselves off from a huge potential reservoir of bright students.