Financial Statements 2017/18
Public benefit and corporate social responsibility
Every year we build support for our mission through corporate, policy and community engagement. We continue to engage beyond the University, with the communities around us and with decision-makers in business, the public services and government, to shape external agendas and not just be shaped by them.
Influencing policy
The members of Board of Governors serve as trustees, and in setting our mission and strategy have due regard to the Charity Commission’s public benefit guidance. The two general principles of the guidance are:
— There must be an identifiable benefit or benefits. — Benefit must be to the public, or a section of the public.
Our public benefit is related to our strategy as highlighted in the University Strategic Report and Overview on pages 8 to 37. Through this we bring a presence and positive impact to the local community, regionally, nationally and internationally.
We respond to governmental initiatives in formally requested consultations and lobby for the government and its representatives to enhance the higher education sector and our own educational values. We are regionally active in response to education and skills needs for London and have a range of local activities which directly contribute to the community and, through them, to a wider audience. We actively make representations to commerce and industry (CBI) and other national bodies, encouraging our staff to sit on national and local bodies that are relevant to our mission to provide service and gain in influence.
The external environment we work in is challenging, with intense competition and uncertainty surrounding the Brexit negotiations. We have a new regulator, the Office for Students, and the higher education sector is under increasing scrutiny. As such, the policy landscape has been extremely busy and in the past year we submitted nine government consultation responses including accelerated degrees, the implementation of T levels, the Industrial Strategy and the Post-18 Education and Funding Review. Our work around Brexit included two consultation responses, participation in roundtables with the government’s Migration Advisory Committee and lobbying work via regional MPs and Universities UK. We have given oral evidence to Parliament’s Higher Education Commission on transnational education and submitted four written responses to parliamentary inquiries. In June, we hosted a visit from The Right Honourable Robert Halfon, MP, Chair of the Education Select Committee, to see our work on apprenticeships resulting in an invitation to give oral evidence to Parliament on the fourth industrial revolution.
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We have worked closely with decision makers to highlight the role of universities in the apprenticeship agenda and reduce barrier to setting up apprenticeships calling for the appointment of a higher education representative on the Board of the Institute for Apprenticeships. It is especially important that we are seen by politicians, businesses and opinion formers as part of the solution to the challenges we face to improve social mobility and productivity because
this is where our students’ diversity and skills have so much to contribute. Our work to position Middlesex as a key player in London’s skills ecosystem is a significant part of our policy agenda and we are actively engaged with the Mayor of London’s Skills Strategy, working with the Greater London Authority skills policy team.
Our work on education pathways has continued with our Make Your Mark campaign which enables us to encourage learners as young as 11 in schools and colleges to develop their aspirations and think about their career goals. The Chair of the Education Select Committee championed the Make Your Mark campaign to Anne Milton, Minister for Skills and Apprenticeships, as a potential blueprint for a national level website on post-18 careers options. We support flexibility in learning opportunities and recognise that there are different pathways into higher education and have reflected this in our public affairs work. We took part in a Department for Education roundtable on T Levels and Higher Education, submitted a consultation response and worked with MillionPlus to take forward this important agenda. We were pleased to see that the government response to the T level consultation reflected our key points on the need for bridging progression to higher education and the allocation of UCAS points to T levels.
Middlesex University
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