Tuition fees at universities in England will rise for the first time in eight years

Tuition fees at universities in England will rise for the first time in eight years, the Education Secretary has announced.

Fees have been frozen at the annual rate of £9,250 since the 2017/18 academic year.

Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said the cap will now rise in line with inflation from April 2025.

This will increase next year’s tuition fees to £9,535, an increase of £285.

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Ms Phillipson also announced an increase in the maximum value of maintenance loans so they will now increase in line with inflation, giving an increase of £414 a year to help students with living costs.

Sir Keir Starmer promised to scrap tuition fees when he set out to become leader of the Labor Party in 2020.

However, early last year the Prime Minister abandoned that pledge, saying it was no longer available due to the “different financial situation” the country was in, and he decided to prioritize the NHS.

However, he said at the time that Labor would offer a “fairer solution” for students if they won the election.

The change comes at a time when universities are facing a funding crisis, largely caused by a huge decline in the number of international students.

Rules introduced by Rishi Sunak’s government have made it harder for international students, who pay higher fees than British students, to bring their families to the UK with them.

Universities are calling for more investment, but Ms Phillipson recently said institutions should seek to manage their own budgets before relying on taxpayer bailouts.

When she was in opposition, she also promoted the idea reduction in monthly payments “for every graduate” by changing the loan repayment procedure.

In June 2023, she wrote in The Times: “Reworking the current system offers the opportunity to cut taxes for graduates every month, putting money back into people’s pockets when they need it most.”

However, the idea was not included in Labour’s 2024 manifesto, which states only that “the current higher education funding deal is not working for taxpayers, universities, staff or students.”

It adds: “Labour will act to create a secure future for higher education and the opportunities it creates across the UK.”

Independent MP Zara Sultana, who lost the Labor whip after rebelling against the two-child benefit cap, called the latest development “wrong”.

“It’s time to eliminate tuition and cancel student debt because education is a public good, not a commodity,” she wrote on X.

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However, money saving expert Martin Lewis said higher fees would not necessarily result in students facing higher annual repayments as it “depends solely on how much you earn, not how much you borrow “

In a thread on X, he said the more damaging policy was the Tories’ decision last year to lower the salary threshold at which payments must be made – from £27,000 to £25,000 – and to increase the time it takes to repay a loan before it is issued. from 30 to 40 years.

He said: “Increasing tuition fees will mean that only those who repay their loans in full within 40 years will pay more. This typically only affects middle-to-high-income university graduates, so the cost of increasing it tends to fall on wealthier people. “

Lewis added that the bigger problem for students is the fact that maintenance loans are “not big enough” and “have not kept up with inflation”.

University tuition fees of £1,000 per annum were first introduced by the Labor government in 1998, rising to £3,000 in 2006.

The coalition government then tripled the amount to £9,000 in 2012, causing a huge backlash, particularly against the Lib Dems, who had vowed to abolish the levy during the 2010 general election campaign.

Since then there have been further changes to student funding, such as the removal of maintenance grants and NHS bursaries, increasingly moving student support away from non-repayable grants and towards loans.