My Lords, last week we had a useful debate about the negative impact of some aspects of the present Bill on overseas students, both undergraduates and postgraduates, wishing to come to this country. That debate took place on Amendment 26; today we are discussing Amendment 49.
Ministers can be in no doubt already of the depth of concern felt in all corners of the House about the damage being done by the cumulative effect of the Government’s immigration policy to what is, by common agreement, one of Britain’s most buoyant and valuable invisible exports, and of the strong desire that Ministers should think again before imposing any further charges or burdens on overseas students.
Last week we discussed the new appeals procedure; today we are considering what I would describe as the two most worrying aspects of the Bill so far as overseas students are concerned—the NHS charge and the provisions on accommodation. It is the aim of Amendment 49 to remove the threat to this very important part of our economy by, as it were, carving out full-time students from the application of those provisions.
I shall try not to weary the Committee with too much repetition of the general points and facts about the contribution of the higher education sector to our economy and the reasons for believing that it is already being harmed by the cumulative effect of the Government’s immigration policy, about which I have spoken—and that, I add, before any impact from the measures in the present Bill has taken effect.
I hope that the Minister can respond to this: what other British economic sector, bringing in more than £10 billion net a year and rising, is being put at risk by the Government’s own policies? Is there any other industry that we do that to? The latest statistics from the Higher Education Statistics Agency show that we are losing market share to our main competitors—to the US, Australia, Canada and, perhaps not too far in the future, to France and Germany, where more and more courses are being offered in English.
Let me cite one or two of the findings from a National Union of Students survey carried out in January this year on a sample of 3,000 overseas students
already in this country; that is to say, people who will not be directly affected by the measures we are discussing today. Some 74% of them said that the proposed NHS charge would have made it more difficult or impossible for them to study in the UK, while 82% of those with dependants, who are mainly postgraduates paying much higher fees, of course, said that free access to the National Health Service was important to their choice to study here. Some 40% said that the introduction of landlord checks would have negatively impacted on their decision to study in the UK, and that figure rises to 51% in the case of PhD students. Those are pretty sobering findings.
When it is suggested that overseas students should surely in equity make some contribution to any welfare costs, it seems to be completely overlooked that such research as there is shows that the costs incurred are substantively outstripped by the benefits that these students bring to our economy. Unlike what I will call genuine economic migrants—people who come here looking for work—these people bring with them over £20,000 a year in cash which goes into our economy. They are creating employment both at our universities and in the towns and cities that host those universities, as research by the University of Sheffield shows. They often enable our universities to maintain a wider range of important subjects, such as engineering, science and mathematics, than would otherwise be the case. I do not imagine that anyone supposes that taxpayers’ money is going to be available to fill any gaps that might be caused by a shortfall in the number of overseas students who would otherwise be attracted by the excellence of our academic establishments.
I hope that I and others who are to speak to this amendment will have demonstrated why removing full-time undergraduate and postgraduate students from the scope of these measures, as Amendment 49 proposes, is not just a piece of special pleading but justified as a rational analysis of our national interest. I beg to move.