Education: UHI 2

Are we happy?

George Gunn

Now that North Highland College in Thurso is to be part of Scotland's newest university, a rare opportunity for real and meaningful change has presented itself, to Caithness in particular and the Highlands and Islands in general.
     The UHI Millennium Institute has finally become the University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI) following last December's advice to the Scottish Government from the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education that the UHI had met the requirements for university status. To complete the process, 'royal' approval arrived from the Privy Council, the ancient but democratically dubious body of senior – read 'retired' – politicians who advise the monarch on matters of 'royal prerogative'. The granting of university title is one of them.
     The new university, which covers an area twice the size of Wales or Belgium, depending on what press release you read, is made up of 13 colleges and research centres, geographically ranging from Shetland to Argyll, Stornoway to Elgin. In truth it has been a long time coming, but now that the final hurdle has been cleared, everyone is happy.
     The principal of North Highland College is very happy as he sees it as an endorsement of 'our standing as a high-quality provider of higher education'. UHI chairman Professor Matthew MacIver is similarly happy – he has described the confirmation as 'a defining moment in the history of the Highlands and Islands'. The principal of the UHI and vice-chancellor, James Fraser, shares the joy, adding that: 'Granting university status is an irrevocable act and therefore not done lightly and hastily'. It has only taken two decades, but we do things slowly up here.
     John Thurso, our dapper MP, is also happy; as are Jamie Stone and Rob Gibson, our MSPs. Even the convenor of Highland Council, Sandy Park, is happy and he has little to smile about these days. Likewise is Trudy Morris, the chief executive of Caithness Chamber of Commerce; and Eann Sinclair of Caithness and North Sutherland Regeneration Partnership – both happy, using words like 'fantastic' and 'momentous'. So everybody is happy. But about what, exactly?
     Professor MacIver is in no doubt. Last week he told the press: 'The new University of the Highlands and Islands will be a powerhouse for the economic, social and cultural development of the region'. So who am I to quibble, especially when I share that aspiration for my own people and place? But there is a definite tension within the new university, running like a seismic crack in and around the institution.
     From 1991, when the then Highland Regional Council set up a steering group to look into the case for the UHI, it was clear that the institution would be a child of the Thatcher era. No matter his unusual largesse and vitality in helping to establish Sabhal Mòr Ostaig in Skye, Sir Iain Noble insisted that it was to be a business college before it was a Gaelic college. The geographical area represented by the UHI is that covered by Highlands and Islands Enterprise – Thatcher's unloved changeling for the Highlands and Islands Development Board.
     When the UHI Millennium Project was launched in 1992 it was hailed as 'revolutionary' with a federation of 13 further education colleges all working in partnership towards a common end. The theory was, and still is, good but the reality was, and still is, less than fulfilled. With 13 different principals, 13 different boards and 13 different budgets, competition rather than co-operation was, and is, more often than not the annual reality. It seemed to many who worked in the various colleges that the UHI was an idea which was being generated from the top downwards and a as a result the collective consciousness of the educational foot soldiers as to just what the UHI was, exactly, sometimes was a bit hazy. Communication of intent is, I would suggest, still not transparent.
     Also unclear, despite the college federalism, was whether the new university should have a central campus and whether this should be, if not in Inverness – then where? The Western Isles Council thought channelling even more resources into the new 'city' of Inverness was a waste of money, as they claimed Inverness was already 'booming' and that the peripheral areas were 'fragile'. Leader Angus Campbell said giving so much to the campus was 'embarrassing'.
     Finally it was settled that the campus was to be built at Beechwood, just outside Inverness, and Highlands and Islands Enterprise committed £25 million towards the construction. This plan hit a serious snag when last year the contractor ROK went into receivership. HIE had contracts worth £32 million with the company, and although ROK had no direct deals in relation to the Beechwood campus, HIE has made public that it will re-examine its procurement policy and as a result it will not be until the spring of this year when there will be an announcement of a construction start date or the identity of a contractor.
     On the academic front it was also a bumpy ride. Although higher education institution status was granted in 2001, in 2006 UHI was told that it would not achieve university status in 2007 as they had planned, in the 'Year of Highland Culture'. The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education said 'more time was needed'. So a major PR moment passed. Things got better in 2008 when degree-awarding powers were granted. In May 2010 the UHI made a fresh application for university status and the result was the recent positive announcement.
     So, after 20 years, here we are. What now? Well, as I pointed out above, in the establishment, it's smiles all round. I fear the smiling will stop very soon. What, I wonder, will be the purpose of the Beechwood campus other than to give the UHI an HQ? Does this not run against the much vaunted claim of 'federalism'? What, exactly, is the status of the 13 partner colleges? Will they remain autonomous and if so how, and if they do, why?
     Can the new university – let alone Scotland – afford the salaries of 14 principals and their various vice-principals? This is definitely not a reason for centralism but in this post-2008 financial melt-down, with the Highland Council proposing school closures by the dozen and deleting their 300 or so classroom assistants (42 in Caithness alone), North Highland College itself cutting its meagre arts courses and every institution ditching what they deem to be non-essential, where is the revenue for the UHI to come from?
     The financial ramifications of the new Scotland Bill are far from clear but what is certain is that Barnet formulae will, despite all the argy bargy, still be in place: Westminster grants to Edinburgh, Edinburgh to Inverness, and Inverness – well, in the far north we know that there indeed is many a slip between the cup and the lip. In the rough-house bar room, which is the structure of dominance we call tax revenue dispersal, those at the bottom often do not get a drink.
     If the UHI, as it claims and as I hope, is to be a significant player in the regeneration of the Highlands and Islands – and in post-Dounreay Caithness we are more acutely aware of the need for regeneration than most – then I believe it has got to begin to re-examine both its structure and its courses – ie its objectivity and its subjectivity. It has to be in the business of changing the Highlands by finding a new educational, economic and cultural paradigm. If it does not do so it will be just yet another institution crucified on the cross of profit, which seems to be the agenda of the authoritarian government we have in Westminster. A university, especially a brand new one, should not be part of the service industry of authoritarianism and wealth. If ever there was a case for the state funding of further education then the UHI is it.
     The men in suits would like us all to forget the Thatcherite, monetarist, 'industry-led' origins of the UHI project. We have now, in opposition to that, a real opportunity to have a university which can be of and from its community, a genuine 'service industry' that facilitates the intellectual fulfilment which is the potential of all our people. That means we must find a new way of joining up the dots, educationally, between culture and economy. At the moment 'economy' is all and 'culture' is expendable. These two things are only words but their meanings seem to me to be far too fixed, tyrannical even.
     We do not want to be caught up in what the great English revolutionary Tom Paine called the 'Bastille of the word'. Neither should we accept a vision of the future which is a slightly re-jigged version of the past. No-one in Caithness, the rest of the Highlands and Islands, or Scotland as a nation, should be 'happy' with that.

George Gunn is a playwright and founder of the Grey Coast Theatre Company