THERE are disturbing trends in the latest college and university statistics that ought to be setting off alarm bells in the corridors of St Andrew's House.

Since we began collating figures on the number of college students just over a decade ago the numbers have fallen dramatically by more than 147,000. No amount of waffle about full-time equivalent numbers can disguise that. The number of college lecturers has also fallen by more than 1400.

The Scottish Government openly admits it has prioritised the university sector over the colleges, but there is bad news in Higher Education too, with signs of a fall in numbers of students from China, India and Nigeria who help underpin the finances of our universities in the absence of tuition fees from domestic students.

The news from the college sector is not an unalloyed failure. The point about full-time numbers is that this has helped target younger students who needed help to get into employment, which we acknowledge. New Education Secretary Angela Constance insists that prioritising getting young people into work and boosting the economy was the right thing to do. Young people going into college without qualifications and emerging with course passes which get them a job has to be a good thing.

But one of the strengths of our colleges was that through part-time courses they helped wean some people back into education.

As the National Union of Students puts it: "With the economic downturn we've been through, it's important not just to focus on young people, but also those who are returning to education to re-train or upskill and ensuring flexibility for those with additional responsibilities, such as childcare, through part-time places. Such a dramatic drop in the overall headcount could mean that those students are the ones missing out."

Our college sector was a ramshackle mosaic which did cry out for rationalisation, but the aim was to improve it, not slash it, so a 38 per cent fall in student numbers and matching drop in the number of college lecturers is a real cause for concern. It may be that a decade from now we will look back at the creation of super colleges as the right road to go down, but for now the jury is out and we need to get some much-needed flexibility back into the system to help those who do not have simple, conventional needs.

On overseas admissions to our universities it is too soon to say a crisis is looming, but a two per cent fall in enrolment from China, nine per cent decline in Nigerians and 12 per cent fall in those from India does suggest a pattern.

Universities Scotland call this drop "worrying" and point the finger at the UK Government for cutting post-study work visas, an area on which the Smith Commission called for action. Scotland's universities are a success story on the international stage and the last thing we need is anything to which undermines that. A Holyrood-Westminster spat is something we could do without.

Meanwhile, in the college sector Labour has been able to call Holyrood Ministers elitists, helping middle-class students at the expense of working class college kids. Higher and Further Education bothy need maximum support. They should be complementary, not the focus of a futile argument about class war.