Fairer higher education system for students and taxpayers

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The higher education system in England will be made fairer for students and taxpayers thanks to major reforms announced by the government today.

Student finance will be put on a more sustainable footing by ensuring more students are paying back their loan in full, and there will be a clampdown on poor-quality university courses that don’t benefit graduates in the long-term.

Under the current system, more people than ever are going to university but too often, students are racking up debt for low-quality courses that do not lead to a graduate job with a good wage. This means that some students never even start paying off their student loan. And currently, only a quarter of students who started full-time undergraduate degrees in 2020/21 are forecast to repay their loans in full.

The cost of student loans is increasing quickly. The value of outstanding loans at the end of March 2021 reached