As a priority: Use the commitment to 10-year R&D budgets to launch a national conversation on R&D.

The commitment to 10-year R&D budgets will be a vital enabler for research organisations and the private sector to make more strategic decisions and investments. Despite our strengths as a nation, most of the public do not think the UK will be at the forefront of major breakthroughs. Long-term policymaking should not be seen as just a technocratic change. The government should use this opportunity to raise public consciousness of the role of R&D in society and the economy and the importance of public involvement in R&D.

As a priority: Set out a policy roadmap.

The government should signpost early on how it will sequence the planning and implementation of commitments on R&D, industrial strategy, devolution and skills. This would encourage join-up between overlapping interventions and help universities and other stakeholders marshal their expertise and resources effectively to contribute to these agendas.  

In the longer term: Use local growth plans to refocus 'levelling up' funding on economic growth.

There was a missed opportunity to adequately embed research, innovation, and support for SMEs in the UK Shared Prosperity Fund. The government can rectify this through funding directed to achieve Local Growth Plans, focussing on improving skills, driving innovation and encouraging investment in each region’s growth sectors.

In the longer term: Scale up the higher education innovation fund (HEIF) and protect its scope.

HEIF represents excellent value for money and is a tried and tested way of increasing economic benefits from the work of universities. The new National Wealth Fund will have a target of attracting £3 of private investment for every £1 of public investment; the return on investment ratio for HEIF is £8.30 for every £1. The government should avoid overly hypothecating the use of HEIF on IP and spinouts at the expense of other important forms of innovation and entrepreneurialism that lead to commercial success. The data informing allocations of knowledge exchange funding in England, Wales and Scotland should capture deeper insights on how universities support workforce planning and upskilling.

In the longer term: Implement sustained, real-terms growth in the R&D budget

This should be accompanied by an increase in domestic public investment outside the Greater Southeast and a focus on how R&D can support inclusive economic growth within every region. The UK should be a leading country in the G7 on R&D investment, but we are currently lagging behind commercially successful research-intensive nations.

As a priority: Recognise creative subjects as qualifying subjects in the EBacc and Progress 8.

Since these narrow accountability measures have been introduced, there has been a precipitous decline in creative and digital subjects being taken at GCSE, for example design and technology (-80%), music (-36%), drama (-40%) and computing or ICT (-40%). This is seriously impacting entry to creative arts qualifications at level 3 and higher, particularly for the least advantaged learners.

As a priority: Ensure professional and technical universities have a seat at the table when developing the creative industries sector plan.

Nearly three quarters of those employed in creative occupations are qualified to degree-level or above, compared to 45% across all industries. Alliance universities are leading providers of creative arts and design degrees. Our partnerships with major employers from Adobe to Netflix mean that students are gaining industry-led instruction and creative skills that will drive the nation's future innovation and enterprise. Join-up between government, industry and universities is crucial to ensuring the sustainability of the creative pipeline.

In the longer term: Attract and retain specialist teachers across creative and cultural subjects. 

Teacher shortages in creative subjects are particularly acute, and two thirds of art and design teachers are considering leaving the profession.

In the longer term: Restore high-cost funding to creative subjects.

These courses are expensive to deliver due to the specialist facilities, equipment and staff required. The 2021 cut to Office for Students (OfS) high-cost subject funding for creative arts, performing arts, and media studies subjects has disincentivised provision in these strategically important areas of the UK economy.

As a priority: Convene a cross-government health education task force to coordinate delivery of the Long Term Workforce Plan (LTWP).

Membership should include representatives from local and central government (including the Department for Education and the Department for Health and Social Care), NHS England, health regulators, professional bodies, and higher education.

As a priority: Issue guidance to ensure universities and colleges play a key role in Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) and Integrated Care Boards (ICBs).

We are calling for more strategic involvement of educators, especially in relation to the development of new roles, including non-healthcare roles, to deliver the healthcare workforce for the future and transform the NHS and social care.

In the longer term: Progress reforms to nursing and midwifery education outlined in the LTWP.

Alliance universities could educate significantly more healthcare professionals if our regulatory framework was based on outcomes and competency rather than time served. Reducing overly prescriptive practice hour requirements will free up much-needed placement capacity. We look forward to working with health regulators and the NHS to ensure that education and training requirements are fit for the future.

In the longer term: Provide access to additional capital funding for universities and colleges to invest in scaling up their simulated education and training provision.

Reforms by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), which permit up to 600 hours of clinical placement to take place in a simulated setting, have enabled students to practice rare or risky procedures, as well as everyday skills, in safe but highly realistic environments, before using them on real patients. Continued support is needed to grow simulated provision – taking further pressure off clinical placement providers.

As a priority: Increase student maintenance support.

The failure of the maintenance system to keep up with living costs is affecting access to and success at university, with over half of students working part-time and a quarter at risk of dropping out. It is vital that maintenance entitlements and parental income thresholds are uprated to widen support to more families. Means-tested maintenance grants should be reinstated to end the perverse phenomenon of the least well-off students graduating with the most debt. Modelling demonstrates this can be done at no additional cost to the Exchequer.

As a priority: Ensure the UK can continue to compete as a top destination for international talent. 

International students make a significant contribution to our universities, communities, the economy and the UK’s soft power. Effective immigration policy that clearly signposts the UK as a welcoming environment for international students is essential to the financial sustainability of UK universities. However, overseas applications have declined by more than a quarter, mostly due to political choices. We welcome the government swiftly adopting a different approach. As part of this reset, international students should be removed from estimates of long-term migration statistics. International students are not traditional migrants and should not be treated as such.

In the longer term: Restore the higher education unit of resource to the equivalent of 2015/16 levels as soon as practically possible.

Universities receive a third less per domestic student than they did a decade ago and make a loss on both research and teaching. As a result, 40% of higher education providers are expected to be in deficit in 2023/24. To put universities on a financially secure footing, the government must take the tough but necessary decision to increase domestic tuition fees; public investment in universities; or contributions from employers – or a combination of these. 

In the longer term: Give universities greater flexibility to set their pension arrangements.

The employer contribution rate for the Teachers’ Pensions Scheme (TPS) rose to 28.68 per cent from April 2024, at a cost of £125 million per year to universities. The 80 universities affected are legally bound to offer TPS. A review of pension rules across the higher education sector would save universities millions at little cost to the Exchequer, while still offering staff a fair deal. 

In the longer term: Conduct a review of all regulation that affects the HE sector to ensure it is proportionate and fit for purpose.

Universities are rightfully subject to robust regulation, but the current regulatory regime is disproportionate and costly, encompassing the Office for Students (OfS), Ofsted, and multiple Professional, Statutory and Regulatory Bodies (PSRBs). The House of Lords found this is leading to duplication and red tape. Burdensome regulation diverts university resources away from frontline teaching and student services. UA would like to see a more co-regulatory approach between OfS and other regulators to reduce unnecessary duplication and bureaucracy. Currently, the OfS is not sufficiently expert, politically impartial, or independent of ministers to be effective. We support the recommendations of the House of Lords Industry and Regulators Committee.

As a priority: Implement an immediate pause to the defunding of BTECs and other applied general qualifications.

AGQs such as BTECs provide an effective route to higher education and skilled employment, particularly for less advantaged learners. The focused review of qualifications (including AGQs) due to conclude by the end of 2024 does not provide schools and colleges with the certainty they need to plan what they can deliver in 2025/26 and to provide effective information, advice, and guidance to prospective students. To avoid young people being disadvantaged by these reforms, the government should urgently confirm that students will be able to enrol on all existing AGQs up to and including the 2025/26 academic year.

As a priority: Put mechanisms in place to ensure effective join-up between higher education teaching, research and innovation.

With responsibility for higher education teaching and research split between two ministers and departments, there is a need to ensure the government takes a holistic view of higher education, research and innovation that recognises the economic contribution of universities. 

As a priority: Reverse cuts to foundation year fees.

The planned fee cap for OfS Price Group D subjects will reduce the availability and choice of integrated foundation year provision, which has an excellent track record of enabling progression to higher level study. This will compound the negative effects of early specialisation that is a feature of the post-16 system, particularly for disadvantaged learners and those with special educational needs. 

As a priority: Establish an independent expert panel to help develop, implement, and champion the post-16 education strategy.

It is crucial that the strategy is developed in consultation with a wide group of education and training stakeholders, including professional and technical universities.  

In the longer term: Align the post-16 education strategy with a higher education funding model that is fair to students, providers and the taxpayer.

A lack of strategic policy direction for higher education and a sustainable long-term funding settlement are currently inhibiting investment and planning in universities. The development of a new strategy offers a chance for a rethink of the funding model to ensure it is fair and effective at meeting the government’s wider objectives.

As a priority: Give Skills England a clear remit and objective to cut bureaucracy.

Higher and degree apprenticeships are caught in a tangle of regulation and unnecessary bureaucracy, which is hampering innovation and dampening growth. The fact that they grew by 190% between 2016- 2022 is a testament to their value and potential. The creation of Skills England, with its convening power and wide-angle, long-focus lens, should be used to meaningfully cut bureaucracy whilst maintaining quality.   

As a priority: Commit to expanding the consultation on the Growth & Skills Levy.

A public consultation on eligible courses is an opportunity to dig deeper with a wide range of stakeholders and mitigate unintended consequences. This should include how to protect apprenticeships that are being put to great effect to train and retain staff at all ages and stages from a potential funding shortfall (particularly in the public sector and other growth sectors); how the government will continue to contribute 95% of the training costs for small businesses if demand for funding meets or exceeds what is raised from the levy; how to increase transparency from government about how levy funds are managed and spent; and whether the levy should be widened at a lower rate for more employers.

As a priority: Remove the cap on Apprenticeship Levy transfers in the meantime.

This will allow levy payers to support small businesses in their supply chains or help address local skills gaps. 

As a priority: Commit to applying a credit value to all post-16 qualifications to support lifelong learning.

Applying a credit value is a means of quantifying and recognising learning whenever and wherever it is achieved. As a first step, the government should encourage the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IfATE) to introduce an approach for Trailblazers to assign both a credit level (as they do currently) and a credit value to new apprenticeship standards.

As a priority: Factor universities into plans to reform the inspection regime.

As an interim step towards more effective, contextualised and collaborative regulation, the government should ask Ofsted to immediately designate all higher education providers as “large and complex providers” so they are subject to the 5-day extended notice period for inspection of higher and degree apprenticeships.

In the long term: Establish an equitable and simplified approach to funding.

Degree apprenticeships are costly to deliver, in part due to several funding bands being set too low. The government should explore using the credit value established through the preliminary work on the Lifelong Learning Entitlement (LLE) to introduce a common approach to funding higher education provision, including degree apprenticeships. 

As a priority: Ensure universal geographical coverage of teacher training opportunities by adding a third phase to the Initial Teacher Training (ITT) market review accreditation process to allow for “near miss” providers to achieve accreditation.

One of the immediate and direct impacts of the ITT market review and resulting accreditation process was the loss of universal coverage of accredited providers. This is now directly compounding the teacher recruitment shortage in specific areas. 

In the longer term: Develop a programme of financial incentive and reward for teacher training.

As the government has acknowledged, there needs to be a considered look at the whole fees, grant and bursaries system around teacher training to truly reward and incentivise applicants. 

In the longer term: Reform and restructure the teaching profession to allow for more flexible working and more professional development opportunities.

Recent research has found that reducing teachers’ working hours and workloads is likely to be the most effective method of stopping teachers leaving the profession. Retention is also closely linked to senior leadership quality.