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UK universities must do more to exploit their ¡°natural advantages¡± on the global stage and the country must renew its efforts to ¡°explode any myths there might be about visas¡±, Boris Johnson has said.

In a rare return to a brief he held as a shadow minister from 2005 to 2007, the mayor of London told the Global University Summit 2013 that the capital had the ¡°critical mass¡± to remain pre-eminent as a world centre for higher education.

¡°I want to take my text from the world of nuclear physics, expert as I am in that subject, and ask you to envisage London as a cyclotron of human beings,¡± he said. ¡°That is what we have in London: the critical mass of talent, because we have more universities than almost any other city on Earth¡­more foreign students than I think any other city on Earth, and certainly more Chinese students, I am delighted to say, than any other city in the world - outside China, of course.¡±

He said that in his tenure as mayor he had seen London grow as an international ¡°brand¡±, adding: ¡°The foreign student population¡­is a huge part of London¡¯s brand. And since the Olympics we have seen serious economic benefits from the brand - big investments coming into our city¡­and of course, investments by other universities around the world here in London, in a symmetrical way to London university partnerships [overseas]¡±.

The academy was also crucial in terms of producing the future workforce and entrepreneurial drive, Mr Johnson argued. But he said that there were still ¡°some things we need to get right¡±, including helping London¡¯s schoolchildren to go to ¡°top¡± universities and being ¡°clear that this city is open to foreign talent¡±. He also called for universities to be ¡°even bolder in selling their brands overseas¡±.

¡°We need to get on with all these things, because other countries are obviously running to catch up,¡± he said. ¡°But I am confident. We have lots of natural advantages. We have the right time zone - no way of changing that; we have more museums than Paris; we have twice as many bookshops as New York.¡±

However, the mayor wryly sounded a word of caution.

¡°We no longer have a monopoly on one of our most important assets, because they now speak it in Australia, Canada and, after a fashion, in America, and I now see - shock horreur - I now see in my copy of ³¢¾±²ú¨¦°ù²¹³Ù¾±´Ç²Ô that the French themselves are going to be teaching their university courses en anglais, mes amis¡­We need to get going before the French have mastered our language.¡±

Listen to our podcast from the Global University Summit 2013.

chris.parr@tsleducation.com