Tuition fees: more student protests despite free year offer
Teenagers from poor backgrounds could have their first year at university paid for by the government, but as Keme Nzerem reports the plans won’t stop the protests.
Ministers have calculated that 18,000 students a year could benefit from the scheme, saving up to £18,000 from the cost of their education.
The coalition believes this would significantly increase the numbers of children going to university from poorer families.
Universities Minister David Willetts told Channel 4 News the “concession” had always been written into the plans.
He said: “This particular proposal from the deputy prime minister is very imoprtant – that we should be able to say to students whose families have meant they’ve been on free school meals that thwy would get their first year’s fees waived.
“There are about 10,000 students every year whose families have been on free school meals. What we’re looking for is to help students ourselves through this package of £150m and then in addition look for universities to put insome match-funding on top.”
Institutions which choose to charge more than £6,000 a year in fees – expected to include Oxford and Cambridge – would be required to fund a further year’s tuition for these students.
More Channel 4 News coverage of student protests
The state’s share of funding for the scheme would be covered by a £150 million National Scholarship Programme announced by Business Secretary Vince Cable when he set out the government’s proposals for an increase in the fees cap from £3,375 to £9,000 from 2013.
Ministers are due to consult with representatives of students and universities before deciding how the scholarship programme money will be spent.
But the proposal for a year’s free tuition has emerged as the preferred option over alternatives such as an increase in the maintenance grant for poorer students.
It has strong backing from Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who believes the government needs to shift the debate away from the voting intentions of Liberal Democrat MPs.
Mr Clegg told the Independent on Sunday: “I believe in this policy. I really think we will look back in 10 or 15 years’ time and think, actually that was quite a brave and bold and socially progressive thing to do.
“It’s now time for the NUS and Ed Miliband and others to just come clean about what their proposals are, and then in an open contest compare it to what we are doing.”
Ed Miliband has accused the coalition of “cultural vandalism”.
Around 80,000 schoolchildren in each year group receive free school meals, available to families receiving Income Support, Jobseekers Allowance, disability benefits, asylum seekers’ support and Child Tax Credit.