Top unis could charge you more than £9,000 under new rules

Bad news if you’re at Oxbridge


Universities with “high teaching quality” will be allowed to charge more than £9000, it was announced yesterday. 

Top unis will be allowed to increase the cap in line with inflation – meaning that you’ll pay more to go to a better uni – starting in 2017, Chancellor George Osborne said yesterday.

It is unclear what qualifies as “high teaching quality”, but it’s expected that Oxbridge and some London unis will be included.

The rule could extend to the rest of the Russell Group as well, depending on government definitions.

Chancellor Osborne also slashed maintenance grants

 

If this policy had been put in place with the £9k increase in 2012, top unis could now be charging around £500 more a year.

The move comes after years of Oxford and Cambridge asking to be allowed to charge more, with Oxford’s vice-chancellor Andrew Hamilton saying in 2013: “The real cost of an Oxford education is at least £16,000 per undergraduate every year.”

It’s another increase in costs for students – joining the already announced scrapping of maintenance grants for poorer students, which will be replaced by loans.

Speaking about maintenance grants, NUS vice president Megan Dunn told The Tab: “This is yet another unreasonable barrier to accessing higher education.”