31 May 2017 
Matt Sisson, Projects and Membership Manager
With Labour recently closing the gap to the Conservatives in the election polls, commentators are starting to consider the possibility that the Conservatives could fail to win an outright majority, as suggested in the latest YouGov polling this week. This has already had economic implications, with the pound weakening and volatile this morning, but it also has potentially significant consequences for HE, with clear daylight between the main parties’ policies for the first time in decades, a HEPI blog suggests. The Education Policy Institute, an “independent, impartial, and evidence-based” research institute chaired by former Lib Dem minister David Laws, has produced a detailed analysis of each of the three main parties’ education (including HE) manifestos.
Regardless of your political persuasion, the uncertainty around an election result that just a few weeks ago was seen as a ‘done deal’, has added a big and real risk to university’s registers. While few were looking forward to the implemented HE Bill, the possibility of an imminent end to fee income would be a massive challenge. Throw Brexit into the mix, along with the first TEF results (where ‘upsets’ are expected)… who’d work in university finance?!
