David Ridley
If Labour’s visionary National Education Service policy is to be successfully implemented, there must be a simultaneous process of de-commodification from the top, in terms of national policy, and from the bottom, in terms of democratisation. This article sets out perspectives upon which such transformation should take place and ideas for how to move forward.
In terms of national policy, Labour’s pledge in its 2017 manifesto to introduce free, lifelong education in Further Education and to abolish tuition fees and reintroduce maintenance grants for university students in Higher Education, will do much to remove the market incentives from tertiary education.
However, alongside these funding reforms which will move tertiary education policy away from ‘nudging’ students into believing they are ‘consumers’ of education and institutions away from behaving as if they were for-profit corporations, Labour must also, once in government, establish a democratic and transparent framework for deciding how this funding is allocated and how the provision that this supports financially is organised.
Labour must abolish all market-based systems of accountability such as Ofsted in FE and the Teaching and Research Excellence Frameworks in HE. In their place, Labour should create a national regulatory body for tertiary education – intrinsically linked and co-operating with a similar body in compulsory education – that can allocate funding according to a national education strategy informed by robust and democratic feedback mechanisms. This body should have an elected board, with representation reflecting fairly the mutual interests in tertiary education: academics, teachers, administrators, parents and communities, students, trade unions, civil servants, and Members of Parliament from all political parties.
Once established, this body should begin a wide-ranging, patient and inclusive consultation with all of the above stakeholder groups, to create a framework for self-evaluation and collaboration within tertiary education. This consultation should also include teachers, students, parents and communities involved in compulsory education to identify the connections between the two sectors, how regulatory systems can complement each other and to look at how teacher education in the UK can be strengthened within the NES system.[1]
Expunging marketisation from within the system
As the commission notes, ‘since 2010 the education of our citizens has been treated as a commodity, something which can be bought and sold’ and ‘from the tripling of tuition fees in HE to the acceleration of the academies programme, the Tories have adopted a market-based approach to education and consequently the system has become increasingly fragmented, opaque, and individualistic.’[2]
However, while it is true that marketisation in tertiary education was accelerated in 2010 by the Coalition government, the introduction of market behaviours into the sector in fact began much earlier, with Thatcher’s reforms to the governance of colleges and polytechnics through ‘incorporation’ as part of the 1992 Further and Higher Education Act. By encouraging these institutions to behave like private-sector corporations, the Tories introduced powerful market norms and behaviours into the UK’s tertiary education system[3]. This is important because the introduction of an alternative system like the NES will not, even within itself, remove market behaviours from tertiary education.
Abolishing fees and loans in HE, for example, will be argued by vice-chancellors to be a move that will either mean re-introducing student numbers caps or will create a financial crisis for over-leveraged universities. This is evidenced by reactions to the long-awaited Augar Review of post-18 education and funding.[4]
Meanwhile, the Office for Students’ chief executive Sir Michael Barber has warned that the regulator will not ‘bail out’ universities in financial difficulty.[5] I have argued that, in response to institutional failure, a Tory government will seek – as it has done in FE – mergers or hostile takeovers by other local institutions, or if they were to be unwilling or unable, by private-sector, for-profit corporations, educational or otherwise.[6]
Firstly, to prevent such a scenario from happening, Labour must commit to adequately and fairly funding all levels of education through taxation. The University and College Union’s proposal to fund tertiary education through an increase in corporation tax is a sound one, as corporations benefit directly from investment in ‘human capital’ and applied research.[7] As UCU also suggests, this funding should come with conditions, such as the establishment of democratic governance and public accountability structures, including trade union representation at board level, and an end to casualised employment contracts.
Secondly, Labour should protect the public interest in universities by placing each university’s assets in a nonrevocable trust – after the model of the John Lewis Partnership – which would hold the formal legal title to the organisation’s assets.[8]
Furthermore, FE has also been devastated by funding cuts and forced mergers as a result of the Area Reviews.[9] As well as funding FE adequately to prevent the need for closures and mergers, the trust model should also be applied by Labour immediately to FE colleges.
Democratising college and university governance
As Boden and colleagues also argue, the trust model of universities and colleges would need to establish a ‘social compact’ between members of these institutions – teachers, administrators and students – and surrounding society, ‘underscoring the common ownership of the university’. They suggest ‘search conferences’ based on social science methods of ‘action research’ to begin the process of democratising institutional governance.[10]
In my own work[11], I have outlined a practice of ‘democratic collegiality’ very much in line with Boden and colleagues’ suggestions, based on the work of 20th century educational philosopher John Dewey, as well as on contemporary examples of grassroots economic planning such as the Manchester and London People’s Plans, and also earlier examples such as the Lucas Plan and the GLC’s People’s Plan for the London Docks.[12]
As part of the wide-ranging consultation for self-regulation proposed above, Labour should
Support the University and College Union, in conjunction with the Trades Union Congress, local trades councils and community organisations, to set up these search conferences, with the long-term aim of establishing new democratic forums like citizen assemblies. These search conferences would seek to find out what local communities would like to see from their local colleges and universities, in terms of local re-skilling and employment needs, but also in terms of ‘socially-useful’ research that could be undertaken by universities.
Working with teachers, academics, administrators and students, these search conferences could then bring together the needs of the community with the professional and user knowledge of those inside individual institutions to create democratic five-year plans for those institutions, much in the spirit of the people’s plans mentioned above.
Practices of democratic planning and consultation established through these search conferences could also provide the basis for self-regulation. Labour as part of its wide-ranging consultation on self-regulation in tertiary education could propose an expanded legal definition of ‘scholarship’ to reflect the practices of ‘co-inquiry’ and democratic structures of ownership and control described above.[13] This definition would recognise that ‘education’ and ‘research’ are inextricably linked at all levels of education and in society, with colleges and universities ideally becoming centres of lifelong learning, socially-useful research and community inquiry.
As in Finland, college and university libraries could become hubs for citizen curiosity and research, providing training and support for non-academic amateur and professional inquirer alike, as well as free lectures and workshops on topics of general interest.
On the basis of this definition, the consultation could propose the creation of a tertiary level National Council of Scholars – which may in future also incorporate compulsory education – with local Councils of Scholars sending delegates to national conferences to discuss and decide on national policy proposed by local assemblies, which would then be taken forward by an elected executive tertiary education body.
Co-operation, municipalisation and inclusive growth
In the long-term, once robust structures of local self-governance have been established as part of an integrated and holistic National Education Service, Labour should explore alternative models of ownership in tertiary education, in line with its alternative economic strategy.[14]
The asset lock proposed above provides an ideal transitional form towards co-operative ownership models, for example. The creation of a Co-operative University is currently being explored by the Co-operative College, and examples of co-operative FE and HE already exist in the UK and abroad, as well as in compulsory education.[15]
However, it must be noted that co-operative colleges and universities do not, in themselves, challenge the logic of marketisation.[16] While Co-operative Principles require democratic member control and economic participation, these principles are inward facing, designed to shield from the market while allowing them to operate effectively within it.
Furthermore, while co-operative principles mirror perfectly the principles of academic freedom, providing a strong foundation for the autonomy of tertiary education institutions in self-regulation by the academic profession, there is a real danger that this model would signal a return to an earlier, elitist and selective HE system severed from further and adult education.
To bring out the best in the Co-operative University model as part of a National Education Service, Labour should explore this model as part of devolved and democratised structures of municipal ownership and inclusive regional economic growth. The ‘Cleveland Model’ in the US and the Preston model in the UK both suggest how such a model of local and regional regeneration based on co-operative universities as socially useful ‘anchor institutions’ could work in practice.[17]
Democratised universities, by sourcing their services from local co-operatives while extending their extensive resources to wider communities as part of co-ordinated approaches, could become anchor institutions for genuine, democratic regeneration and positive, long-lasting social change. Where co-operative service providers do not yet exist, co-operative universities as part of a national and international network of co-operation, could provide education and financial support for local businesses seeking to explore co-operative business models. [18]
The vision of HE presented above, of democratised universities acting as co-operative anchor institutions and hubs of ‘collective intelligence’, also provides an institutional framework for the implementation of Labour’s ‘Green Transformation’ programme.[19] While Cleveland and Preston models show how wealth can be kept within local and regional communities, democratise universities acting as socially useful anchor institutions can research green technologies, help green co-operative start-ups thrive and teach young people and adults alike how to live in a sustainable and environmentally friendly way.
Devolution in its current form, however, presents a block to this vision of green, inclusive regional growth and re-generation. As Richard Hatcher argues, under the Tories, devolution has disguised a new form of highly centralised power and further cuts to public services.[20] Through the role that Combined Authorities play in distributing devolved adult skills budgets and the close involvement universities have in these authorities, the Tories also seek to use devolution to further marketisation, specifically to bring tertiary education in line with the needs of neoliberal capitalism.
Alongside their alignment with business needs, the internal structures of the Combined Authorities[21] also reflect the dominance of business over wider social interests, with the number of representatives from Local Enterprise Partnerships in most cases far outnumbering those from the community groups or trade unions and exerting a direct and pernicious influence over regional strategy and policy making.
Within the West Midlands Combined Authority, for example, LEP representatives participate directly in strategic decision-making, sitting not only on key strategic decision-making committees but also on the committee that scrutinises the decisions and policies of these committees. Furthermore, while LEP leaders have voice but no formal vote, they can veto increases to the region’s business rates, a key source of extra income for CAs.
Labour must therefore democratise the Combined Authorities and use devolved structures to transform regions into genuine ‘powerhouses’ for sustainable and inclusive growth. Alongside democratising the governance structures of individual CAs, democratic assemblies should be created to not only hold these authorities to account, but also to feed in local and regional social needs beyond purely business priorities. Socially useful colleges and universities, as suggested above, can act as democratic hubs to facilitate, organise and consolidate local knowledge and feed this knowledge into these assemblies for discussion and decision.
David would like to thank Jonathan White for invaluable feedback on an earlier draft of this article.
[1] 1 Examples of self-regulation in UK education include the National Union of Teachers’ ‘Schools Must Speak For Themselves’ framework in the 1990s and Lawrence Stenhouse’s Humanities Curriculum Project in the 1970s
[2] https://www.policyforum.labour.org.uk/commissions/education/local-accountability-within-the-national-education-service – p. 5
[3] 2 Ridley, D. (2019) Markets, Monopolies and Municipal Ownership. Available at:
[4] 3 Representatives from the Russell Group coalition of redbrick universities, for example, warned that if the 20% reduction in to £7,250 was not made up with public funding, English HE would face a ‘funding crisis.’ ‘Some institutions would likely close,’ they insisted. ‘Others would have to reduce the range of courses they offer. Higher cost subjects, such as science, technology and engineering, would be threatened even though they are producing the graduates our economy needs.’ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/2018/11/23/tuition-fee-cut-will-send-universities-crisis-leading-vice-chancellors/
[5] 4 ‘Should a university or other higher education provider find themselves at risk of closure, our role will be to protect students’ interests, and we will not hesitate to intervene to do so,’ he insisted. ‘We will not step in to prop up a failing provider.’ https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/news-blog-and-events/press-and-media/we-will-not-bail-out-universities-in-financial-difficulty-regulator-chair-says/
[6] 5 Ridley, D. (2019) ‘What if a university fails?’ Available at: https://www.redpepper.org.uk/what-happens-if-a-university-fails/
[7] 6 ‘University and College Union response to Labour Party policy consultation on a National Education Service’ (2018): https://www.ucu.org.uk/media/9439/UCU-response-to-LPF-consultation-on-the-National-Education-service-June-2018/pdf/UCU_NES_consultation_response_June_2018.pdf
[8] 7 As Boden and colleagues argue, ‘this would also create clear governance responsibilities under trust law and prevent the privatisation of publicly funded assets.’ Boden, R., Ciancanelli, P. And Wright, S. (2012) ‘Trust Universities? Governance for Post-Capitalist Futures’. Available here: https://josswinn.org/tag/bibliography/
[9] 8 According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, funding for adult education has been cut by 45% since 2009: https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/13307; The Association of Colleges reports that the number of colleges in the UK has halved since their incorporation in 1993, dropping from almost 450 to 251 in 2018: https://www.aoc.co.uk/about-colleges/college-mergers
[10] 9 ‘These dialogues would constitute a strong form of accountability, they would be informed by formal reporting, but importantly, the parties would hold each other to account through social processes and relationships which cultivate increased understanding of each others’ work life, hopes and worries.’
[11] 10 Markets, Monopolies and Municipal Ownership, and also: Ridley, D. (2018) ‘What can academics learn from the Lucas Plan?’ Available at: https://www.redpepper.org.uk/what-can-academics-learn-from-the-lucas-plan/; Ridley, D. (2019) ‘Towards Collectively Rethinking Ourselves’ https://www.oneducation.net/no-03_december-2018/towards-collectively-rethinking-ourselves-a-response-to-eric-lybeck/
[12] 11 See Just Space’s London Plan, https://justspace.org.uk/about-the-london-plan/; People’s Plan Greater Manchester, http://www.peoplesplangm.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/PEOPLES-PLAN-April-2017.pdf; Lucas Plan, http://lucasplan.org.uk/
[13] 12 Ridley, D. (2019) ‘Towards Collectively Rethinking Ourselves’
[14] 13 Labour (2017) ‘Alternative Models of Ownership’. Available here: https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Alternative-Models-of-Ownership.pdf
[15] 14 See Joss Winn’s ‘Co-operative universities: A bibliography’: https://josswinn.org/tag/bibliography/
[16] 15 As noted by the Co-operative College, market reforms actually open up for the first time the possibility of creating a Co-operative University in the UK
[17] 16 Labour, Alternative Models of Ownership
[18] 17 See Centre for Labour and Social Studies (2019) ‘A New Vision for Further and Higher Education’
http://classonline.org.uk/pubs/item/a-new-vision-for-further-and-higher-education
[19] 18 https://www.labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/The-Green-Transformation-.pdf
[20] 19 ‘Power lies with government, not just because they have imposed the model (largely through secret deals with local government elites) but also because they set the economic agenda and targets and evaluate the Combined Authorities on their performance. Devolution is licensed, conditional and revocable.’ Hatcher, R. (2017) ‘The West Midlands Combined Authority has turned its back on inclusive economic growth to tackle inequality’. Contact: Richard.Hatcher@bcu.ac.uk
[21] 20 There are currently seven CAs with Mayors and two without, for list, see: https://www.local.gov.uk/topics/devolution/combined-authorities