The Telegraph ran an article on Monday which disclosed that the government was planning to postpone its Higher Education bill indefinitely, saying it is now "unlikely to be published before 2015". All the changes to Higher Education under this government have so far been forced through without any additions to primary legislation, but the HE bill would have allowed more substantial changes including the extending of full student loans to those attending for-profit universities, putting them on an equal funding footing with the existing publicly-funded non-profits, and potentially opening up the possiblity of for-profit providers - perhaps from the US - taking over struggling UK HEIs.
However it has so far proved more troubling for policy-makers than simply raising the tuition cap or changing the funding formula, after it became apparent there would be serious challenges in putting existing HEIs and new for-profits on a level regulatory playing field. There have also been concerns that UK charity law would make university failure and takeover - a key part of the planned 'market' reforms - a difficult proposition. It appears that these concerns have now made their way to the upper echelons of the government, as the Telegraph reports that a 'Whitehall Insider' has shared that "The Liberal Democrats were increasingly opposed to further reforms to universities after the recent decision to increase fees... but David Cameron was also unimpressed by the recommendations so the whole thing is now off the table". The Guardian believes that the matter is not yet settled, and reports Universities Minister David Willetts as saying "There's going to be a further discussion in cabinet in the next couple of weeks. There's no final decision either way yet".
Both the UCU and NUS have welcomed the news, after sharing their concerns that all taxpayer university funding should go to the best possible provision for students, rather than as profits to shareholders. They were also worried about the record of for-profits in the US in mis-selling qualifications to vulnerable students. However they both also stressed that the sector should remain vigilant in case the postponing of the bill simply meant that "many of the most damaging proposals contained in the government's white paper can now happen under the radar, without scrutiny from either the Commons or the Lords".
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