This pamphlet is the transcription of a series of seminars held jointly with the Higher Education Policy Institute between March and July 2003. The series was designed to provide participants with an opportunity to discuss the longer-term implications of the government’s strategy for higher education, including its overall purpose, focus, funding and the relationship that higher education should have with other areas of economic endeavour in England. The four seminar topics were:

• What are our universities for?
• Widening participation and fair access
• The contribution of universities to economic and societal development
• Higher education funding.

The document includes as an appendix a paper entitled ‘Widening Participation & Fair Access: An Overview of the Evidence’, which was circulated by way of background material for the second seminar.