The 2003 White Paper on higher education brought back into public debate the meaning of the term 'university'. In accordance with its statements that 'excellent teaching is, in itself, a core mission for a university' (DfES 2003a: 54) and 'not every teacher needs to be engaged in 'research' as a narrowly defined activity but might be expected to engage in scholarship to inform their work as teachers' (DfES 2003a: 54-55), the Government proposed to remove the need for institutions to hold research degree-awarding powers in order to use the University title. The first part of this paper will investigate the case for the establishment of teaching universities and the practicability of their introduction in the UK. The second part of the paper will focus on how Liverpool Hope University College, an institution with little mainstream research funding, has maintained a scholarly culture.