15th July 2015 1:00
By Blue Tutors
Universities UK has issued a statement calling for the cap on university tuition fees to be lifted so that fees can rise with inflation. The current cap on tuition fees is £9,000 a year, a fee which the majority of universities in England currently charge. Universities have said that the cap, which was set in 2012, has been declining in real terms as it has not risen with inflation. University heads have said that the least that they require is for the value of fees to be maintained in real terms, adjusting according to inflation.
Universities have also raised concerns about the rising costs of living for students and the support available to them. The vice-president of universities UK said that the government urgently needed to consider increasing the maintenance support available to students to help them complete their courses. She said that financial support for maintenance was severely lacking, and constituted one of the biggest concerns for students. Universities UK concluded that the value of tuition fees should be maintained in real terms in order to allow universities to deliver the highest quality education possible.
Universities Minister Jo Johnson has said that universities need to improve levels of teaching, before the issue of fees can be addressed. Speaking to a meeting of Universities UK, Mr Johnson said that universities need to raise the status of teaching in universities such that it matches that of research. Due to the demands of the Research Excellent Framework (REF) and its links to funding, universities tend to priorities research over teaching, a trend which Mr Johnson said needed to change. He announced plans to introduce a “teaching excellence framework” to go alongside the REF, which would measure the quality of teaching and link this to funding. However, when asked whether he would rule out a rise in university tuition fees, Mr Johnson said that he would do whatever was necessary to keep universities financially viable.