Student fees could be cut and grants restored in Theresa May's final Tory U-turn

Students could see university tuition fees slashed to £7,500 a year under a major shake up of post-18 education unveiled today.

Prime Minister Theresa May will back an independent panel’s recommendations to cut tuition fees from a maximum of £9,250 per year in one of her last major policy statements from Downing Street.

And she will call for the reintroduction of maintenance grants – scrapped by the Tories – to save students from low income families £9,000.

Mrs May’s backing looks set to be one of her final U-turns on long-standing Tory policy while in office.

Tuition fees were tripled in 2012 under then-Chancellor George Osborne, when she was in the Cabinet. And maintenance grants were scrapped in 2016, just before she became Prime Minister.

Yet Mrs May will back tuition fee reforms today and explicitly back bringing back maintenance grants. She will say: “My view is very clear.

“Removing maintenance grants from the least well-off students has not worked, and I believe it is time to bring them back.”

There is a catch, however. The move will only come into effect if it is backed by the next Prime Minister at a spending review in the autumn.

Mrs May will say: “It will be up to the Government to decide, at the upcoming Spending Review, whether to follow this recommendation.”

The expert panel led by Dr Philip Augar, a City financier, has made 53 recommendations to improve opportunity and skills for those who go into higher education and the half who don’t.

The review was ordered by the prime minister after the 2017 general election, to counter Labour ’s promise to young voters that it would completely scrap tuition fees.

The panel found “some students are charged too much for their degrees and the substantial taxpayer subsidy could be better directed” and proposes increasing the government contribution to teaching costs.

The panel welcomed the increase in the number of students entering higher education from low-income families in recent years, but notes that much more still needs to be done.

The Prime Minister is expected to echo the view, saying that “progress is too slow” in getting students from disadvantaged backgrounds to go to university.

Last year, some universities failed to improve their intake of students from disadvantaged backgrounds for the first time in more than a decade.

Dr Augar, Chair of the Post-18 Education Review Panel, said:“Our work revealed that post-18 education in England is a story of both care and neglect, depending on whether students are amongst the 50 per cent of young people who participate in higher education or the rest.

“The panel believes that this disparity simply has to be addressed. Doing so is a matter of fairness and equity and is likely to bring considerable social and economic benefits to individuals, employers and the country at large. It is our core message.

“Our proposals are designed to build on the considerable achievements of our universities – one of the UK’s world class industries – with a particular focus on the economy’s needs and improving value for money for students and taxpayers.

“We also seek to rebuild further education, for too long the Cinderella sector, and see technical and vocational education as a means of addressing the country’s skills gap.

“We are firmly of the view that post-18 education should be a lifelong experience available to all, irrespective of age, situation or income. Our proposals are intended to create such a system.”

In a keynote speech, Mrs May is expected to say:” “I was not surprised to see the panel argue for the reintroduction of means-tested maintenance grants both for university students and those studying for higher technical qualifications.

“ Such a move would ensure students are supported whichever route they choose, and save those from the poorest backgrounds over £9,000.

“It will be up to the Government to decide, at the upcoming Spending Review, whether to follow this recommendation.

“But my view is very clear: removing maintenance grants from the least well-off students has not worked, and I believe it is time to bring them back.”

The Prime Minister will also say more must be done for the 50% of young people who do not go to university. In Germany, 20% of 25-year-olds hold a higher technical qualification – yet the figure in the UK is just 4%.

She will warn that failing to equip more of our young people with the technical skills they will need to compete in the jobs of the future, “we have hampered our national ability to compete on the world stage.”