You see in the late 70’s there were a good number of Universities, Polytechnics, and Colleges of Education ( Teacher training) all over Britain. Filling staff positions with suitably qualified applicants wasn’t always easy. What’s more the, ( in those days) non-University sector was quality controlled by a number of bodies, including the Universities themselves. So what the Universities did, they expected the colleges in which they played a validation role to do the same. The non-university accrediting body of the day -CNAA- was a fledgling, and the universities were, especially in teacher training, predominant.