20 September 2017 
Matt Sisson, Projects and Membership Manager
It’s not the news that anyone involved in HE finance or planning wants to hear, but further significant changes to the HE funding system seem increasingly likely. Newspapers/sites have been littered this week with stories of potential upheaval, and with all that smoke something has to be on fire. The standard narrative seems to be that, despite the universities minister defending the new system as recently as last month, Labour has made university funding and student fees a toxic area for the Conservative administration, who now see winning back support among the young as vital to avoiding electoral defeat.
After that it’s a mug’s game. The Sunday Times’ exclusive on the weekend suggested that fees could be chopped to £7,500, excluding certain STEM subjects or other government priorities – a story fleshed out a little more (and without a paywall) by the Independent. The Times Higher covered the exclusive, also pointing out that raising the loan-repayment threshold to £25,000 is also “under consideration by the chancellor”. The Telegraph picks up on another report by researchers at UCL calling for a new ‘all age graduate tax’ – this is firmly not UCL policy! It’s all covered by Wonkhe, which is happy to hang its hat on the idea that £9,250 is as high as fees will ever get. With party conference season soon upon us, and the Budget in November (no Autumn Statement anymore…), we should have a lot more certainty by December.
