Student engagement should be in the culture and structure of the new Office for Students (OfS).  The Government introduced an amendment to the Bill to further strengthen this, requiring a dedicated Board member of the OfS who has experience of representing or promoting the interests of students.

The Bill's proposal to introduce rigorous tests for providers who want to enter the system will mean poor quality or financially unsustainable providers will be prohibited, protecting students from the longer-term risk of their institution failing, and also allows the OfS to require providers to have student protection plans.  Transparency is important: a Government amendment means the OfS can also require providers to publish these and bring them to the attention of student.

Young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are going to university at a record rate-up from 13.6 per cent in 2009 to 18.5 per cent in 2015. The Bill aims to continue this trend: monitoring social mobility is at its core. It will introduce a new transparency duty to shine a spotlight on where institutions need to go further. Students will also be provided with 'outcomes data' so they can make informed course choices based on the employment rates of past graduates. 

Finally, the Bill does not raise tuition fees or change the current scrutiny procedure for setting the maximum fee cap.  The Teaching Excellence Framework will enable institutions that demonstrate high-quality teaching to access an upper fee limit that rises with inflation. This will ensure that our world-class higher education sector remains financially sustainable and able to invest in the excellent teaching students expect.