argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Immigration
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, this amendment has wide support across the House, and I look forward to hearing the comments from others who have joined my noble friend Lord Dubs’s amendment. My noble friend apologises to the House for being unable to be present, but he has been asked to be the guest of honour at a Holocaust memorial service in Reading and felt that he could not stand up that occasion. I am sure the House will be sympathetic Very briefly, because I am sure others will make the point, the amendment deals with people who are in a bit of a lacuna as far as support for loans and maintenance is concerned. Currently, people with refugee status in the UK are classified as having home fee status for purposes of higher education as well as being able to access student finance. However, other potential university students who have either been given a different form of protection or who, after claiming asylum, have been granted a type of leave other than refugee status encounter restrictions and delays in accessing home fee status and student finance. Therefore, they face a barrier to education that is often insurmountable The amendment would rectify this arrangement so that all refugees resettled to the UK, as well as people seeking asylum granted forms of leave other than refugee status, can access student finance and home fees. I beg to move.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Immigration
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): But, my Lords, that is not what the amendment says. I have listened very carefully to the Minister and I will certainly read Hansard when it is published, but the intention behind the amendment—whether he has picked it up correctly or not—is for people who claim asylum and are not recognised as refugees but are granted another form of leave, such as humanitarian protection or leave as unaccompanied children, to be given the fee eligibility of home rather than overseas students if they satisfy the test of being ordinarily resident. That test is if they have lawfully and habitually resided in the UK out of choice since being granted leave, and being eligible for student finance if they are also ordinarily resident on the first day of their course. We are not talking about people who are temporarily here and who might suddenly be removed without notice, making them unable to take their course; we are talking about people with a right to be in the United Kingdom All the Minister’s points about this not being in accordance with Home Office policy are therefore not correct, in my respectful view. We have picked up that there are people with an ordinarily resident status who do not technically qualify for refugee status, and that it is only for refugee status that the three-year ordinarily resident requirement is given. If that is where the Minister is coming from, surely what my noble friends Lord Judd and Lady Lister and the right reverend Prelate said were on point: imposing a three-year residency requirement for somebody who wishes to exercise their ability to remain in the UK in order to use that time to study is a ridiculously aggressive attitude for a caring Government to take. The Minister talked about a warm, welcoming, integrated and supportive environment but the facts are that an enormous barrier is being put in the way of people’s ability to benefit from being given the ability to stay in the United Kingdom. That cannot be right. I understand that this is an emotional and difficult area and it may be better if we could meet outside to talk about it. Perhaps we could also bring in representatives from the Home Office who obviously hold the whip hand. If the Minister is able to do that it would be a great deal better. This is not something we can give up on but in the interim I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Immigration
Janet Royall (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I too have added my name to the amendment. Everything has already been said. I would merely say that Nick Pearce is now a professor at the University of Bath—so that is good, isn’t it Like the noble Lord, Lord Patten, and all other noble Lords, I find it particularly bizarre that in this brave new world, where we want to be outward-facing, persuade the world to trade with us and attract people to study at our universities, we still persist in including students in the immigration figures, which, as the noble Baroness has just said, sends out bad feelings. It is perception that is important. The noble Lord may be right that we are welcoming everyone but, even if that were true—and I am not sure it is—the perception is that we are not, and that is a big problem In an earlier debate on an amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, which unfortunately I missed although I supported his amendment, he said he was searching for ways in which, "the university sector could organise and present itself so that the nation would be on its side and it would be equipped with the data".—[Official Report, 11/1/17; col. 1999.] Of course I agree with that, but I would add, as the noble Lord, Lord Patten, said, that the public are already onside, with 57% of them saying that foreign students should not be in the immigration figures compared with 32% who thought that they should be. So as the Government are so determined to pursue a hard Brexit because a mere 52% of the population voted in favour of leaving the EU while 48% were against, why can they not now act on the 57% who say that they would be content with taking students out of the immigration figures? We are all against bogus institutions, and we are glad that the Government have acted on that. We are all against those who overstay, but the figures on overstaying cited in the past by the Government are, at best, merely estimated and, at worst, being used for political ends. When will better data be available, and when will the consultation on the study immigration route be concluded I well understand the political importance of immigration and immigration figures, as well as the concerns expressed by the citizens of our country. However, bona fide students studying at bona fide institutions are not economic migrants but visitors, and that is the view of the people of this country. I hope that the Government will act accordingly.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, again, my noble friend Lord Dubs is not able to be present because he is attending another event, which I mentioned earlier. I am also aware that neither the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, nor the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, can be here today, but I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Garden of Frognal, will make some remarks that will at least encompass those of the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald The amendment would disapply the statutory Prevent duty set in the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015 in so far as it applies to higher education institutions. The reason for that is that we place a strong accent on—and we will discuss in a later group of amendments —the question of how and in what circumstances we can make higher education institutions, and in particular universities, centres in which the practice of freedom of speech and the prevention of unlawful speech are routine and built into their very fabric and operations When Parliament discussed the then Counter-Terrorism and Security Act Bill in 2015, there was considerable doubt about whether it should extend to universities because it imposed a duty on universities to have due regard to the need to prevent people being drawn into terrorism. It created a structure involving monitoring and enforcement of the Prevent duty and further mandated the co-operation of academic staff in the Channel referral process Accompanying government guidance has exacerbated concerns. While universities are not the only institutions affected by the statutory Prevent duty, the regulation of lawful speech and assembly in these institutions carries particular concern. Our higher education institutions, as I have said, should provide a space for the free and frank exchange of ideas. These ideas should be challenged through robust argument and not suppressed. The Joint Committee on Human Rights concluded, as part of its legislative scrutiny of the 2015 Act, that, because of the importance of freedom of speech and academic freedom in the context of university education, the entire framework that rests on the new Prevent duty is simply not appropriate for application to universities Having said that, university staff are bound by the law, including the requirement to disclose information to the police when they know or believe it could assist in the prevention of acts of terrorism. The removal of the statutory Prevent duty in universities would not remove the responsibility of staff and institutions to co-operate with police to tackle suspected criminality. The amendment would remove a heavy-handed structure designed to restrict lawful speech. Suppressing unpleasant or offensive views is not only illiberal, it is often counterproductive and risks pushing ideas into the shadows where they are less likely to be effectively challenged. I beg to move.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Margot Aline (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I support the amendment. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, asked me to pass on her apologies, because she had another engagement and could not stay for the debate. During Committee on the then Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill, I moved a number of amendments on behalf of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, two of which would have excluded higher education institutions from the statutory Prevent duty. I thought it worth reminding noble Lords of the debates that we had then. I was a member of the JCHR at the time. The amendment stemmed from the JCHR’s conclusion—my noble friend Lord Stevenson has already quoted it, but it bears repetition—that, "because of the importance of freedom of speech and academic freedom in the context of university education, the entire legal framework which rests on the new ‘prevent’ duty is not appropriate for application to universities" The JCHR warned that terms such as "non-violent extremism" or views "conducive to terrorism" are not capable of being defined with sufficient precision to enable universities to know with sufficient certainty whether they risk being found in breach of the new duty, and feared that this would have a seriously inhibiting effect on bona fide academic debate in universities. We have heard some of the problems with trying to define that in the guidance On Report, I summed up the mood in Committee, saying: "In Committee, the consensus in favour of amending this part of the Bill was striking. Noble Lords did not consider that the Government had made a persuasive case for putting a statutory duty on higher education institutions—moving ‘from co-operation to co-option’, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, put it"— and we miss her wise counsel. I continued: "Where was the evidence base? Until the evidence for the necessity of such a statutory duty is marshalled, to use the Minister’s phrase, it is not possible to assess it. Concerns were raised on grounds of both practice and principle. Warnings were given on unintended consequences and counterproductive effects, including the erosion of trust between staff and students, which could undermine any attempts to engage with students who might be tempted down the road towards terrorism. I do not think that anyone was reassured by ministerial assertions that academic freedom and freedom of speech would not be endangered. Indeed, I think that it is fair to say that the majority of those who spoke were in favour of the total exclusion of the HE sector".—[Official Report, 4/2/15; cols. 679-80.] I did not pursue that amendment on exclusion of the sector and focused instead on ensuring that there was a proper duty to protect freedom of speech and academic freedom, but it is clear that, despite what has just been said, the application of the Prevent duty to universities continued to cause real concern.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Mixed Topics
Frank Ashcroft Judd (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, the suggestion of an independent review bears very serious consideration. A very difficult issue confronts us on the matter raised in this amendment. In the considerable amount of time that the House has spent in recent years on issues of security, one thing that has always concerned me deeply is the dividing point between essential action and what in fact begins to be counterproductive We have to approach the issue of how universities play their part in the security of the nation by considering the danger of fostering extremism and unacceptable views by heavy-handedness or the appearance, however far from reality it is, that universities are acting as agents of the security services. If that perception gains ground, it will certainly provide more potential recruits for extremism and unreasonableness in the student community. I do not dissent, with the evidence of anti-Semitism and hostility to Islamic people, from the view that urgent action by the state is necessary. Security is the responsibility of the state and universities must play their part within the law and vigorously ensure that they uphold it—of course, that is right—but when we start using words such as "prevent", I think myself into the position of young students discussing issues and saying, "What the hell is going on? Is this university really a place where we can test ideas?". We must have self-confidence in the middle of all this; we must not lose our self-confidence. The whole point of a university is that we encourage people to think and develop their minds. Therefore, it is a very good place to bring into the open the most appalling ideas that some people have, so that they can be dealt with in argument, and the rationality and decency of most people can prevail. They are places where what is advocated may be argued against effectively and where those arguments may be demonstrated. If there is any move towards preventing such opportunities to take head on in the mind the issues which threaten us, we will be in great danger of undermining our security still further I said in an earlier debate, and I mean it profoundly, that the battle for security in the world must be won in hearts and minds. It will not ultimately be won by controls; it will be won by winning the arguments. If the opportunity to win the argument is not there in universities or begins to be eroded, what the dickens are we doing in terms of undermining our own security?
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): I thank all speakers in this debate. It is a difficult area and we certainly went into several of its most difficult parts. Surely my noble friend Lord Judd is right that there is a tension in attempting to address the worries expressed by the Minister in her concluding remarks by preventing the debates and discussions that might win hearts and minds and protect us, and which need to be protected against the changes the Government are seeking to impose The analysis is relatively straightforward. There is no room for illegal acts in any institution. I am sure the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, will accept that in proposing this amendment we do not wish to change that very obvious and important guideline. But the tension between free speech, which should exist in universities, and actions taken to inoculate against unpleasant and difficult ideas taking root does not seem well expressed in the legislation. This is a probing amendment which attempts to take that forward. In that sense, I felt that the Minister struck an odd note by suggesting that even discussing these issues in this Chamber was dangerous. If I am mistaken, I will withdraw that remark.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): Unhelpful is certainly not the same as dangerous but I think the word "dangerous" was used—we will check the record for it. I do not regard it as dangerous to discuss these issues because they raise very important matters about freedom of speech and the ability to discuss and debate issues across a range of topics, not necessarily all concerned with terrorism. Therefore, in that sense, I resist that—but obviously not to the point that I would resile from the fact that this is really a tricky area and it is very hard to approach it without raising emotional and other issues that get in the way of the debate Maybe a review is required—maybe that would be the way forward. Maybe the Joint Committee on Human Rights will be able to take its work further. It was helpful to know that this work is still being considered, and maybe that is a way forward. The main achievement of this amendment was to get us into this whole debate and ensure that we understood and recognised the opportunities but also the threats that there are in trying to debate that. Maybe we can return to a more detailed discussion of this when we get to the group of amendments which raises the two particular issues about freedom of speech and preventing unlawful speech that are at the heart of the debate. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Mixed Topics
Michael Goodall Watson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I will say a few words in support of the noble Lord, Lord Storey. I commend him on the amount of preparation he has done for this amendment. I am very surprised at the extent of what he has revealed. I think we all know that, to a greater or lesser extent, cheating goes on—it is important to use that word—and in some cases fraud, but the extent of it is such that action needs to be taken. I am disturbed by the QAA more or less dismissing it, as the noble Lord, Lord Storey, said. And yet, as he pointed out, 17,000 students had been caught, and if that number were caught how many were getting away with it It is an issue that has to be addressed. Although there are means of catching cheats these days—software can be, and is, employed by universities that can spot and pick up patterns of writing—there are other ways that cannot be tracked easily. It would be helpful to have a recognition that this is a problem and for something at least to be said, if not done, by the Minister to indicate that the matter will be taken forward in a way that it has not been, effectively, up until now.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Civil Rights
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, this amendment deals with the question of how we put into statute a definition that will adequately cover some of the debates we had on the group of amendments before last, relating to freedom of speech. It is interesting that alongside that is Amendment 469 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, and the noble Lord, Lord Polak, which deals with the same issue but from completely the opposite direction. Amendment 468 in my name tries to stress the need for the definition and practice of freedom of speech in premises, forums and events, affecting staff, students and invited guests. The alternative version of this, which I think aims to come to the same place, is written in terms of completely the reverse option—that is, to avoid unlawful speech by the same people in the same areas. There is a very interesting question about which of these two approaches would be better if one had to choose between them In some senses, that picks up the theme of the last debate, which I have been reflecting on during the interregnum of the very important discussion on the advertising of cheating services, about what we are trying to do here. Without wishing to pre-empt the discussion, I will say that I still think there are probably two issues here: first, whether we believe that our higher education providers, particularly our universities, have to have regard to the issues raised in these two amendments; and, secondly, whether there are external constraints or opportunities to use other statutes and practices to bolster that. There is absolutely no point in having the most well-worked and beautifully phrased approach to this issue if it is not implemented in practice. The problem we all have is that we may well aspire to good words, good intentions and good practice but, if there is not an effective, efficient and speedy determination of where these things are not being practised well, we will all fail. I beg to move.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-25
Topic: Other
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): I thank the noble Viscount for his considered response. This is a matter on which we should all reflect. I am sure that we are all trying to achieve much the same ends. However, I still think it is important to keep discussing the matter and hope that we will do so. If there is an opportunity to hold a meeting to discuss possible wordings or stronger wordings, we would be very happy to take it up. In the interim, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.
Higher Education and Research Bill — House of Lords, 2017-01-09
Topic: Other
Robert Maurice Lipson Winston (Labour, Centre-left): I take a bit of issue with the noble Lord on this occasion. Does he not think that this definition will pervade the whole of our discussion throughout the Bill, which is why pushing this in Committee may be completely justified, even though it is not usual practice in this House?