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In a constrained financial envelope of devolved spending, the Government has not only provided free tuition but supported our institutions through some pretty turbulent times—the pandemic, Brexit and, prior to that, austerity. I know that you are looking at pre-budget scrutiny for the financial year ahead, but there is a story here. Indeed, as I mentioned in my opening statement, there is a hugely successful story of delivery from our colleges and universities through those periods. For example, in the last budget, the colleges received a revenue increase, so the Government has—

There was a 2.6 per cent increase in revenue spending for the colleges sector in the last financial year, but I am trying to not have that debate, because it is important that we think ahead.

In that context, there is an area that the Scottish Government can control, which is consideration in the period ahead of what additional support, from our limited envelope, could potentially be provided to support both sectors.

We are in very good dialogue with Universities Scotland about the future—the member’s colleague Willie Rennie and Stephen Kerr raised the matter in Parliament yesterday—and I am sure that we will have more discussions. There is a really good conversation happening with universities about the future and about how we can work together in this challenged environment, and I want to have that conversation with the colleges as well.

Overall, we are operating in an environment where inflationary pressures have caused significant challenge. There are situations with energy costs, the geopolitical scenario, immigration rule changes, and the fact that national insurance contributions are going up. The Scottish Government is having to contend with a situation where a lot of external factors have put pressure on those autonomous institutions, which are having to contend with it as well.

The question for us as a Parliament, for the executive and the legislature, is how we work together to ensure that those key sectors and institutions are there to provide for our economy and our learners in the here and now, and that we evolve and adapt for the very challenging future ahead of us with regard to technological change and the way in which the economy will evolve.

But, in that—

I cannot change the past, if that is what you are asking. What we can do together is, first, recognise what our colleges have delivered, in terms of the tens of thousands of people who have successfully gone through our colleges in that period and gone on to have successful careers, without tuition fees.

We can think collectively about how we work with the college sector—I am very determined to do that. I greatly value our college sector—I, and the Government, think that it is extremely important to meet our future economic needs and fulfil the needs of industry. I was pleased to be able to talk about that a bit in the stage 1 debate on the Tertiary Education and Training (Funding and Governance) (Scotland) Bill last week.

How we ensure that we have the provision that is required, both in local communities and over a geographical spread, is very important to me and to the Scottish Government. It is important for us to work together with our college sector and with industry to ensure that the colleges and the economy are working together in the most optimal way, for the benefit of colleges and—crucially—for the benefit of the people whom we want to go through those institutions, work in our economy and our growing and emerging sectors and become very successful in their careers.

As I said to Parliament last week during the stage 1 debate on the tertiary education bill, and as I was very clear in saying my opening statement, I am not waiting for primary legislation to work with the universities to seek to enhance the graduate apprenticeship offer. That is all I am going to say just now. I will update the committee on that in due course, but I have to have further dialogue with Universities Scotland.

I will update the committee on that when I am ready to.

I would have to take that away and look at it in more detail. We know that the financial transaction budget for the Scottish Government has been massively slashed in previous financial years, and that has had consequences not just in this portfolio but elsewhere. I will take that issue away and write to the committee.

The issue of international students is, of course, important for all universities across the UK, not just those in Scotland. First, I think it important to state the benefit of international students, and not just in a monetary sense through the fee income that they bring into universities. Something that we need to consider collectively, as we work with universities on sustainable funding, is how to be not overly reliant on international student income. That income is very important; indeed, it is a public benefit not just to universities, but to the whole of the UK, and it is, of course, of particular interest to our Government in Scotland.

However, this is not just about bringing people here so that they can pay fees and can study; it is also about what they do when they are here and their participation in our economy and society. I can give you an example from a visit that I made to a care home in my constituency not so long ago. The international students studying care who do not go home in the summer, because, financially, it makes no sense for them, stay in Scotland and provide extra cover in that care home, allowing the other carers who work there to take their annual leave over the summer. I just use that as an example of the multi-benefits of having international students.

Furthermore, when many of these international students were able to stay here before Brexit, before these immigration changes and, indeed, before the further restrictions that we are going to see on immigration, they started businesses and worked in our public services and our economy. There is a multiplier effect to the benefits of international students, not just in terms of the fees and income that they provide to universities, and I implore the UK Government to rethink its position on putting restrictions on them. My strong view is that that is not a solution to some immigration challenge that it believes exists; instead, it is a damaging change of economic policy from the UK Government. Quite frankly, it is illogical.

Yes, of course, because it means that what individuals here have to consider is just their cost of living—although I should say that there is a good support package for that, too—rather than the accumulation of the cost of living, fees and so on.

We know how difficult things are, particularly for our young people at the moment. At a UK level, millennials, and younger, are finding the affordability of housing more of a challenge than it has been for decades. Finding ways in which we can support our young people and ensure that they are not overly burdened by debt and can move into their careers with confidence, having had a first-class education, is rightly a priority for this Government.

I do not want to be definitive on how that will be expressed, but I am not close-minded to the idea of engaging with the Parliament in that way.