Bill Rammell might have been expected to shy away from sector policy after swapping life as a Labour MP and higher education minister for the vice-chancellor¡¯s job at the University of Bedfordshire.

But whether he is criticising the government¡¯s AAB and ¡°margin¡± policies as ¡°a leap in the dark¡± or repudiating the ¡°nonsense¡± written about Bedfordshire by newspapers that ¡°don¡¯t believe in widening participation¡±, the sector¡¯s bigger picture clearly still engages him.

Mr Rammell, who took over from Les Ebdon at Bedfordshire in August, wants the university to ¡°remain focused on (the) broadening access agenda¡±. However, he added: ¡°I don¡¯t believe that (that) is inconsistent with improving our league table position.¡±

With a ¡°strong focus on the student experience and the National Student Survey¡­you can make progress¡±, insisted Mr Rammell, who was minister for higher education from 2005 to 2008.

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As part of that focus, he aims to improve graduate employability. Mr Rammell said that ¡°over time¡± he wanted to consider introducing the US model whereby a university employs students in delivering campus services - giving them greater financial security and employability skills.

Bedfordshire, whose main campus is in Luton, was branded ¡°one of the country¡¯s WORST universities¡± in a Daily Mail headline earlier this year as it savaged Professor Ebdon over his appointment as director of the Office for Fair Access.

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Mr Rammell said that ¡°universities that are at the forefront of widening participation¡­are always going to be attacked by those newspapers that, bluntly, don¡¯t believe in widening participation¡±, noting that such newspapers believe that ¡°if you increase the flow of students to university you devalue the benefit to the minority¡±.

He added that ¡°the facts¡±, such as 90 per cent of Bedfordshire graduates being in work six months after graduation, ¡°utterly rebut some of the nonsense that¡¯s written about the university¡±.

In September 2013, Bedfordshire will open a campus in Milton Keynes in partnership with the town¡¯s council, initially focusing on science and technology and business courses.

Milton Keynes has ¡°really exciting demographics¡±, said Mr Rammell, adding that it was experiencing the ¡°biggest expansion of any town or city in the country¡±.

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He said it had one of the highest numbers of start-up businesses in the UK and scored highly for the number of ¡°knowledge-dense¡± firms. ¡°If you can¡¯t get it right in that environment as a university, you don¡¯t deserve to be in business,¡± he said.

On sector policy, he said of the government¡¯s attempts to open up competition for high-achieving A-level students, and meanwhile redistribute some places to cheaper providers: ¡°It is - and, privately, ministers and civil servants will tell you this - a leap in the dark.¡±

The right approach now, he suggested, should be to say: ¡°Let¡¯s have a pause for a couple of years and see exactly where this goes and what the implications are.¡±

There was ¡°a risk that some policymakers have a view that the only place students with AAB (at A level) should go is a certain type of university¡±, Mr Rammell said.

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He added: ¡°The biggest skills challenge we face is to move from 31 per cent of the adult working population educated to degree level to 40 per cent¡­That¡¯s the big, big challenge and that is not related to the small numbers, relatively, that academically are at the very top of the spectrum.¡±

john.morgan@tsleducation.com.