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Education Secretary hints at 'unpalatable' tuition fee rise amid 'concern' for financial health of universities
22 September 2024, 11:34 | Updated: 22 September 2024, 15:11
The Education Secretary has hinted at a possible rise in university tuition fees, while admitting it would be an "unpalatable" decision.
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Bridget Phillipson told LBC's Sunday with Lewis Goodall ahead of the start of the Labour party conference that the government would "look at all the options" in order to help universities.
Pressed on whether, as a last resort, she would consider raising tuition fees, which have been set at a maximum for domestic students of £9,250 for seven years, Ms Phillipson said: "It’s not something I would want to go to.
"But I do recognise all the time that the value of the fee has eroded - it hasn’t gone up in a very long time."
Read more: 'A bad deal for everyone': It's time to rethink tuition fees
Education Secretary speaks to Lewis Goodall | Watch again
Universities and teaching unions have warned that the sector faces a major funding crisis. Some university vice-chancellors have called for an increase in tuition fees of between of between £2,000 and £3,500 a year.
Labour peer and former ally of Tony Blair Peter Mandelson has also warned that tuition fees may have to rise.
Tuition fee rises have been politically unpopular ever since the widespread protests that followed the increase of maximum fee to £9,000 under the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition over a decade ago.
And University and College Union (UCU) leader Jo Grady said on Sunday that Labour should hike taxes on businesses to increase public funding for universities, rather than increasing the financial burden on students.
Ms Grady said in a statement: "Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves should realise there will be no decade of national renewal if the decline of our great universities goes unchecked. After the state the Tories left us in there is a material risk of a university going under unless the Government acts.
"But university employers now want students to bear the cost by taking on yet more debt. Graduates already face up to 40 years of repayments and staggeringly high effective marginal tax rates. Rocketing fees would mean one hundred thousand more per cohort would never pay their debt off.
"The tuition fee model has become unworkable, it leads to yearly cycles of job cuts, hurting staff and damaging student provision, and, by accelerating the decline of our universities, it ultimately harms us all.
"Education is a public good that enriches communities and strengthens society. It should be publicly funded. Big business reaps private profits from the graduates it employs, which is why we are calling for an increase in corporation tax of 4.3 percentage points."
Ms Phillipson told Lewis: "I am concerned about the health of our university sector, and that's why the action that I've taken since becoming education secretary has been to refocus the role of the Office for Students on financial sustainability. The last government spent a lot of time picking fights with universities and didn't pay enough attention to the challenges that we're seeing.
"My message to university since taking on this role has always been that it's as independent institutions, it is on them to manage their budgets, to make sure that they're living within their means.
"I do recognise that there are wider challenges there that we will, over time, seek to address, but they are independent institutions that have responsibilities in terms of how they manage their budgets".
Ms Phillipson was also asked about the ongoing row over donations to Starmer and other senior ministers, which she called "frustrating".
She told Lewis: "We just want to draw a line under this and move on. Of course, it's a distraction.
"It's frustrating that we're talking about these kinds of stories rather than talking about the change that we're delivering on, and we just want to get on with that."
Ms Phillipson herself received a £14,000 donation to fund a 40th birthday event and another reception, but said they were held "in a work context".
