Match-funding for Welsh higher education - AM seeks answers

3.57.04pm GMT Mon 19th Feb 2007

Welsh Liberal Democrat Education spokesperson Peter Black AM is to seek answers form Labour's Jane Davidson over whether the Labour Assembly Government intends to follow England and match-fund donations to universities here.

Under the scheme, details of which were announced last week, the UK government will give £1 for every £2 that English universities raise from private donors and former students up to £5 million per institution.

"Clearly, anything that will encourage private giving to UK universities is to be welcomed, although we have a long way to go before getting to the levels of funds that are generated in this way in the USA, " said Mr. Black. "However, this initiative is for English Universities only, and I shall therefore be writing to the Minister to ask if the Labour assembly Government will launch a similar scheme here in Wales, and if so, when and at what level of match-funding."

"Our universities also need to be reassured that such a scheme will not be at the expense of public funding that they would otherwise have had. This match-funding idea has been imported form the USA. As Sally Hunt, joint general secretary of the UCU has pointed out if Labour wants to pinch ideas from across the Atlantic, they could do worse than look at the proportion of national income that the US Government spends on higher education."