Peter Kyle’s speech at Universities UK conference 2025
A speech delivered by Secretary of State for Science, Innovation, and Technology, Peter Kyle, at Universities UK conference, Exeter on Thursday 4 September 2025.
Many of you know, that I take higher education very seriously. For me, it has been a very tortuous journey through higher education, through education in general.
Those who were here last year heard me talk a bit more about it.
But I left school with no useable qualifications, at all.
No one in my family mentioned university – it just wasn’t part of our vocabulary, of our family’s vocabulary.
My dad left school at 14, he was in the Navy at 16, a door-to-door salesman in his 20s. A driven, amazing dad. I had an amazing mum.
But the vocabulary of higher education and university education simply wasn’t a part of our family life.
So it wasn’t until later in life, when Dame Anita Roddick, who by that time was my mentor – when I was a teenager and into my early 20s, working in the Body Shop office - that suggested it to me, university.
It was then, that I finally started to consider it as an option.
This was back in the nineties. Now, nobody back then said ‘people from my background don’t go to uni’ – I don’t think anyone thought so explicitly about those things.
But the system itself was remarkably effective at diverting people from certain backgrounds away from Higher Education, and towards other pathways.
And far too often, towards no pathway at all. It was something that I decided to persist through, and to this day I don’t know what it was that sparked it in me, but I decided to get there after being rejected multiple times, going back to secondary school at the age of 25, and then finally, getting into Sussex University.
The fact that I came out with a doctorate is even more extraordinary.
But that persistence paved the way for a career that has led to me having the privilege of speaking to you today, and doing so as a Secretary of State.
Anita was the first person who saw potential in me that I hadn’t recognised myself.
And Sussex University was the first institution that saw potential in me, and then sought to exploit it.
And so I tell this story, because it’s really important for me, in front of an audience like this, to recognise and actually acknowledge that the pathway that led to University education for me was absolutely enabling and fundamental to the path that I’ve experienced in my life.
So, when I talk about being a champion in your corner, it comes from a place that is very deep, and very personal, and very conviction-oriented.
It’s because a university education wasn’t a given for me – because I fought for it – that means that I always valued it so extremely highly.
But before I go on, I need to address the challenges the Higher Education sector is facing.
I don’t want to duck these. I don’t want to avoid them. I want to do it at the beginning of my remarks. You all know the financial pressures that you are working under.
44% of universities in England are forecasting a deficit this year.
There’s no hiding from this.
- You had the cuts in grants, in 2012
- The cap on student number controls, removed in 2015
- The freeze on tuition fees, from 2017
- Rising costs, that are being incurred with inflation
- All of this compounded by the recent drop in international students.
Each of these, alongside the bigger, more structural problem of what a university’s core business model should be, in a fast-changing landscape.
And how to stay financially viable without treating learning – the very pursuit of knowledge like a commodity. A product to be packaged and sold, rather than a public good.
Financial sustainability is something that we are going to need to work on together.
It is taking time, and it will take more time.
One of the problems is that too many universities are competing for the same pool of students at the expense of playing to their relative strengths.
Or truly specialising – becoming the go-to authority in their field, rather than a bit player in many.
This is having a real effect on how resources are prioritised.
In UUK’s recent survey, 19% of respondents said that academic research has been scaled back in the last 3 years.
While 79% say they would consider scaling it back in the next 3.
At precisely the time when our country needs economic growth. Growth comes through innovation. There’s not business, there’s no charity, there’s no public sector body that’s not found itself in a position of failure, without innovating it’s way out of that failure and on through to the other side. The same is true for government, the same is true for our entire economy.
For us to break free of the shackles of the inheritance that we had last year, when we came to office, we’ve got to do so through innovation, through commercialisation of innovation, and celebration of the entrepreneurial zeal that lies behind it.
You’ll notice that we’ve fought hard to get R&D in the Budget, and therefore the budget that’s available to researchers right across the country. In hard economic times, we now have as a government, an 11% uplift in R&D spending.
So as an unapologetic champion of UK research of course, the trend that I’ve just outlined worries me.
It’s bad for discovery, and for scientific endeavour.
But it would also represent a tragic missed opportunity for our economy.
We know that universities are vital to catalysing growth – the single biggest mission of this government.
Not least in their local areas.
Here in Exeter, this university is the city’s second biggest employer, after the NHS.
It makes up one-tenth of Exeter’s economy.
And I know that many of you will have a similar story to tell, where you are sited.
Combined, our Higher Education sector contributes over £260 billion to UK GDP.
And I want this role of universities – as both national assets, and local economic hubs – to grow in the years ahead.
For our part, the government has just committed a record £86 billion pounds to UK research and development.
This is investment that’s growing way above inflation.
The financial pressures on government are very well known.
But there’s no better illustration of the importance of innovation than the fact that we have uplifted R&D [spend] by 11% since coming to office.
No company has ever turned itself around from a position of failure without innovating its way forward, and I know the same is true for the state.
This commitment includes £500 million for the Local Innovation Partnerships Fund.
Which will fuel critical discoveries, that could change our lives and also position UK research bodies – including our universities – front-and-centre of local economic plans.
Now, today I’m also announcing £9.7 million in funding for the next phase of work by the National Centre for Universities and Business (NCUB), up to 2029.
The NCUB is an organisation that links universities with entrepreneurs, and industry leaders to help make the UK a more attractive destination for investment, and crucially commercialisation.
Of course, some of you will be economic trailblazers already – but not everyone.
And to those who are already leading – my challenge to you is to make this role a bigger part of your public profile as a university, and a university leader.
I think a lot of people don’t aspire to go to university because they see it as some kind of citadel that might be removed from society.
Somewhere you go for a few years, and then return back to the real world.
But that’s not the full story, as well you know.
I once asked some students at Stanford why they chose to go to university in the first place.
Every one of them said: because they want to start a business.
How many kids in the UK go to university because they want to start a business?
Every Vice Chancellor I’ve ever spoken to since being appointed says they see their institution as an economic engine.
But why, then, don’t students see their career at that university as a pathway to personal success – to starting a business, to commercialising innovation, to becoming the founders that our country needs?
These are the questions we need to ask ourselves.
So let me set out my ambition. Something that I expect many of you already share.
I want to mention 3 things.
First: we have to build strong partnerships.
And I realise before I go on, that many of you will say ‘yeah, we are doing it now’, and I acknowledge that and respect the work that is going on.
But these are the things that I think as a sector, and as a government in partnership with the sector, that we need to be doubling down on.
Universities UK has just done some outstanding work in this area.
With their Transformation and Efficiency Taskforce report.
It shows just how much collaboration – both between universities, and with others can alleviate funding pressures, and drive growth.
This could be something as mundane as sharing back-office services, like a joint IT helpdesk.
It might be a consortium for joint research bids, or shared skills programmes.
And these don’t have to be big, international partnerships.
So many of you are brilliant, global players. And that is great.
But be local, too.
Look at Exeter and Falmouth, who share the Penryn campus.
Look at Glasgow – the university is a large part of the reason why the city is leading Europe in the space sector.
Or, in this part of the world, we have a fantastic model in the business incubator, SETsquared.
It’s led by 6 universities:
- Bath Bristol
- Exeter
- Southampton
- Surrey
- Cardiff
Together, they pool lab space, research, and so on to help local entrepreneurs, looking for academic backing.
The scheme has supported more than 5,000 businesses so far, and added £16 billion to the UK economy.
I want every region in the UK to know who their economic champions are.
Leaders who have the ideas and the networks to take their local economy forwards.
And that’s a mantle I hope many of you in this room will take up.
I don’t know of a single area or region where the spark of economic potential has been turned into success, without a leader with a clear vision, and the ability to inspire organisations from all sectors – and deep down into communities, to achieve things they didn’t previously know or believe was possible.
If this is not how you see yourself - and how others see you - then my challenge to you is: ‘why not?’
As Secretary of State, I can’t – and I won’t – come to your institution and tell you how to become your regional champion. These aren’t things that you can force on people.
What I can say is that if your area lacks ambition, clarity of economic vision and leadership, then please ask yourself what’s stopping you from using the colossal resource of your university, combined with your initiative and skills, to inspire the change that your region or area might need?
Second: look for areas and ways to specialise, based on your unique strengths.
Whether that’s in a particular research field, in teaching, or something else altogether.
Students don’t travel around the country – or move to a new one – because a university is the same as their local one.
But precisely because they are distinctive, with a depth of expertise.
Again, here in Devon, we see a great example with Plymouth’s defence and marine cluster.
It has a first-class proving area – called ‘Smart Sound’ where researchers are using a stretch of water, off the coast of Plymouth, to trial cutting-edge marine tech.
There’s a Cyber-SHIP lab.
Where they test things like how ports might respond in the event of a cyber attack.
There’s Turnchapel Wharf, a 14-acre site on the waterfront.
It was once used by the Royal Navy, and served as an embarkation point for troops during the D-Day landings.
Now it is home to companies working on everything from ocean robots to underwater surveys, to map the sea floor.
And the University of Plymouth is the anchor around which the whole system is moored.
A brilliant, local ecosystem – with national and global strengths.
This specialism doesn’t take anything away from neighbouring universities.
The University of Exeter can’t replicate what Plymouth is uniquely placed to bring to maritime research, and Plymouth can’t replicate what Exeter is doing – with the Met Office on its doorstep – on weather and climate science.
This is the power of a university that has found its unique role within the community it serves.
Finally, I would not be doing my job if I didn’t come here and talk to you about digital services, and AI.
Anyone that reads the papers knows I can’t stop talking about it.
Because I really believe better tech can transform the way we govern and in higher education, it can transform the way we learn.
My department is spearheading work on how we create a modern, digital government.
I can tell you, it’s not easy.
A lot of the challenges we’ve had in government will be shared by the Higher Education sector.
Some of you will have old, deeply-embedded legacy systems.
And almost all of you will have resourcing constraints.
But if you face the same challenges, that means you face similar benefits from tackling those challenges.
Our analysis found that – if we get it right – public sector digitisation could save the Treasury £45 billion a year, from lower costs and higher productivity.
That is a lot of money for the taxpayer.
If we can roll up our sleeves and tackle this at a national level, I have no doubt you can do it at an organisational level too.
And, of course, then there’s AI.
AI is transforming all the core functions of a university, including the way that teaching and research is being done.
There are challenges here, absolutely there are. I know a lot of teachers are worried about how students use AI, and whether it’s a hinderance to proper, in-depth study.
But that doesn’t negate the potential benefits that sit alongside it.
In medicine. In science. In climate science. In space exploration.
The government’s upcoming ‘AI for Science’ Strategy will set out how we’ll cement our position as a global leader in these AI-enabled breakthroughs to come.
What we do know for sure is that AI will change the nature of what it is to be a university.
Each person in this room will need to consider what this means for your university – and how it will find its place in this new world.
Now, I can’t do this to you, or for you.
You have to have a vision based on the world that’s coming.
I know some of you are already thinking deeply and thinking hard about this.
Queen’s University Belfast is one of the places developing a great strategy.
One of the biggest things, for them, is encouraging a culture of open-mindedness, and experimentation. Not being afraid of change, by default.
Their mantra: “go try, fail fast, fail well and come back again.”
I think the next few years – thinking these issues through, solving the challenges – it can be really exciting.
If there are people here that don’t feel excited by this, then you really shouldn’t be doing this job.
So those are my 3 ideas for you today.
Strong partnerships. Opportunities to specialise. And embracing digital.
Change is never easy. And if I take you back to a year ago when I discovered the full extent of the financial mismanagement, that had gone before, policies that were counter to the interests of what I believe was best for this country, and frankly, funding constraints that meant it was impossible to do everything that I had inherited and been committed to by the previous administration. Before we even started on the agenda that I and the government am hoping to deliver.
This will be a very familiar story to all of you in this room, as well.
Although sometimes government feels different to other organisations, like universities, we have shared challenges.
Like you, I spent the last year trying not to be overwhelmed by those challenges. But to create as many opportunities as my imagination would allow.
That is the approach I’ve brought forward elsewhere in the economy, and even though we are not there yet, I want to be a steadfast partner to those organisations who share that approach to delivering for our country.
As I have said, for me this is very, very personal.
So in the coming weeks, we plan to set out a more detailed vision for the sector.
This cannot be a top-down transformation imposed by government – I want you all to keep working with each other and my department, including our fantastic Science Minister that you’ve already heard from, Patrick Vallance.
And we want to come together to ensure universities are on a sure footing.
And I know you will all agree: that is a vision that is worth fighting for and working together for.
Thank you.