No—I have given way enough for the moment.
Last month, Professor Timothy O’Shea, the principal of Edinburgh University, addressed the Scottish Affairs Committee and warned that future restrictions on free movement would have a damaging impact on the sector. He said:
“Yesterday the Prime Minister said helpfully that perhaps a special relationship might be necessary for workers in the City, for the car industry. But God help me if the City and the car industry deserve a special deal, then the universities...they are more dependent on the mobility of highly skilled labour than any other sector.”
As we move towards Brexit, we have the potential for a much wider pool of international students who may wish to come to study in our universities, and we need to think very seriously about the visa solution for that. For example, there is the situation of Ireland. Under the Ireland Act 1949, Ireland is stated not to be a foreign country. What special arrangements will be in place for Irish students who want to come and study in our institutions?
I want briefly to discuss the amendments tabled by the hon. Members for Blackpool South (Gordon Marsden), for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner) and for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) that deal with their concerns about the proposed metrics in the teaching excellence framework. There was much discussion in Committee about this. As the hon. Member for Sheffield Central said, there is concern that the metrics being used give no indication of the quality of teaching. In Committee we mentioned the Scottish enhancement-led approach, which is a far more thorough and possibly better method of determining quality. Apparently, however, the metrics proposed by the Government are being pushed ahead with. We are happy to support the amendments tabled by Labour Members.
Amendment 51 would require automatic voter registration in universities. That looks like an extremely innovative idea—and for once, I have to admit, it has not come from Scotland. Perhaps we can start to consider it in Scotland.
We are short of time and there are later amendments that my hon. Friends are keen to press, so I conclude by saying that we will support the amendments I have mentioned and that I hope we can have some movement on new clause 14.