What steps his Department is taking to ensure fair access to higher education for all.

Last week, we published our higher education framework. There has been a narrowing in the gap between the least advantaged and the most advantaged in terms of higher education participation in recent years, but we want to go further, for example by supporting many of the recommendations in the recent report by the panel on fair access to the professions chaired by my right hon. Friend Mr. Milburn.

I thank the Minister for that answer. Increasing additional student numbers is incredibly important to constituencies such as mine in Milton Keynes where there is a relatively low participation rate in higher education. Can the Minister give me any good news about the expansion of the new university centre in Milton Keynes and perhaps about having additional student numbers for those who are studying HE in further education colleges?

I congratulate my hon. Friend on her doughty championing of extending universities' reach across Milton Keynes. Milton Keynes is offering higher education to more students through the Open university than any other university in the country. My hon. Friend was lucky and successful in her bid to extend that reach to mature students and part-time students in Milton Keynes. Additional student numbers are of course an issue for the funding council, but I know that the business plan, as it comes forward, will make that case even stronger.

It is probably common ground between those on all three Front Benches that there is a problem of fair access to some of our research-intensive universities and to particular courses. Does the Minister not accept that the brave new world for which he is preparing the ground, with the connivance of those on the Conservative Front Bench, with fully variable market fees after the next general election will make those barriers even harder for people from poorer backgrounds to leap?

I am going to take every opportunity to expose the conceit of the Liberal Democrats over the next few months. Dr. Cable said that they would turn their backs on the 50 per cent. participation rate and their leader said that they would downgrade their position on tuition fees because they could not cost it after the election. That is the Liberal Democrats' position-conceit and taking our students for granted.

My understanding is that Cambridge and Oxford still refuse to let full-time students work during term time. The access regulator, as I understand it, has never imposed any sanctions against any university. Will my right hon. Friend look into this?

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing that point to my attention. He knows that universities are autonomous, but I had not heard that before. I will look into the matter and discuss it with the funding council.

In a written answer, the Minister confessed that only 6 per cent. of state school pupils aged 15 progressed to Russell group universities. Of those few, just one in 10 are from the bottom two socio-economic groups. It is clear that very few such students get to our longest established universities. Vitally, many from more disadvantaged backgrounds study HE in FE, but we know from an answer just this morning that this figure is falling too. So is the Government's expensive Aimhigher programme a failure, or are the answers to the parliamentary questions inadvertently incorrect? It must be one or the other: is it failure or fallacy?

Universities, parents and students up and down the country will be very nervous that a Conservative Government would cut Aimhigher. The socio-economic gap between those in the highest and lowest groups is down by 7 per cent., while participation from the poorest neighbourhoods in the country and from state schools is up. All that is against the backdrop of the Conservatives slashing funding for universities. We have seen an increase of 25 per cent. in the participation rate, so will the hon. Gentleman commit to a 50 per cent.-

Order. I gently say to the Minister of State that the purpose of Question Time is for questions to be put to Ministers, rather than to members of the Opposition.

My right hon. Friend knows that I have been campaigning for fair access for many years, but can we ensure that fair access means that students are suitably qualified and that they can speak and write English properly? In addition, do they not need to work a bit harder, as at present the average student in our universities does not work hard enough?

My hon. Friend has been a campaigner for the use of contextual data in the past, and I hope that he will welcome that in the higher education framework. I think it best that I leave his words of advice to students to him, as that is a point that only he could make.