Universities cannot return to what they looked like in the 2010s, says Kyle

Universities cannot return to what they looked like in the 2010s, the Science and Technology Secretary has said, as he called for increasing specialisation and collaboration in higher education.

Speaking at the Universities UK conference in Exeter, Peter Kyle said universities and the Government need to work on financial sustainability together and will need to recover in a way fit for the 2030s.

“One of the problems is that too many universities are competing for the same pool of students at the expense of playing to their relative strengths or truly specialising to become the go-to authority in their field rather than a bit player in many,” he told the conference.

“This is having a real effect on how resources are being prioritised.”

“The university sector cannot recover to become what it looked like in the 2010s,” he told the PA news agency. “It has to recover in a way that is fit for the 2030s and that is going to be digitally driven.”

Asked if more cuts to university courses and departments are inevitable, Mr Kyle said universities have to change with society, and there had been a rise in students wanting to study science or technology courses to anticipate where the future economy will go.

He added a university cutting some of its arts courses, but compensating that with increased investment into an area in demand like space research, is “not necessarily a bad thing”.

“Providing there is, overall, within the sector the specialisms in other universities which are driving towards art. The move towards specialism is a positive, it’s not a negative,” Mr Kyle said.

In his speech, the technology secretary announced £9.7 million in funding for work by the National Centre for Universities and Business up to 2029, which supports collaboration between universities and businesses.

He told PA: “We’re not touching the sides on what is possible” in commercialising creativity and innovation in universities.”

“And that really frustrates me,” he said.

“We are great as a country at providing through a range of different pathways, the skills that the mainstream economy needs for its workforce, but we are not entrepreneurial enough, and not enough people go to university or to a further education learning centre in order to start a business on the other side.”

Speaking earlier at the conference, science minister Lord Patrick Vallance said there are “substantial challenges” facing the sector.

“We also know that despite the flourishing, start-up spin out seen in the UK, we aren’t doing well enough yet on scaling those companies and getting them to be sustainable large companies in the UK,” he added.

More than two in five higher education institution forecast a deficit for 2024-25 in data released in May. Many universities have announced redundancies and cost-cutting measures.

Last week, the University of Edinburgh launched a voluntary redundancy scheme for staff as the principal warned higher education in the UK is “facing serious and urgent financial challenges”.

The Government is expected to publish a White Paper soon setting out its plans for higher education reform.

Mr Kyle also spoke to vice-chancellors about the opportunities presented by artificial intelligence (AI).

“You are not going to get AI out of the hands of students, but what you can do is find ways to embrace it in a proper academic way and monitor its use,” he told PA.