Student Tuition-Fee Hike Will Have Far-Reaching Consequences

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-11677862

The decision to raise university student tuition fees will have enormous repercussions.

Students face a huge rise in annual tuition costs, with the fees increasing from the current level of £3290, to anything from £6-9000.

Labour's universities spokesman, Gareth Thomas, described the move as a tragedy, with the poorer students in the UK being forced to pick courses on the basis of cost, rather than the course that they actually want.

What is most worrying is that because of the cuts to spending on the arts announced in last month's Spending Review, the funding of many degree courses in the arts, humanities and other related subjects will now be almost completely reliant on student fees alone.

This will mean that a wider choice of degree subjects will be available to those students able to afford them, with many colleges being forced to charge the maximum fee of £9000 to ensure adequate funding of the courses on offer. 

Despite Coalition reassurances that those universities charging closest to the maximum fee will have to give financial assistance to those students who need it, the prospect of a two-tier system is clearly looming large.

The memory of all those Liberal Democrat MPs pledging during the election to oppose any rise in tuition fees is now a very distant one.