Why I won't be a fees rebel

THE PRICE of university for countless thousands of future Hampshire students is to be decided today in a crunch House of Commons vote on top-up fees.

And Prime Minister Tony Blair received a welcome boost for his plans from one of their former leading opponents - city MP Alan Whitehead, who has now thrown his weight behind the scheme.

The Southampton Test MP successfully dragged concessions out of education Secretary Charles Clarke over plans to allow universities to charge students up to £3,000-a-year.

Now the Prime Minister looks set to avoid defeat in today's crunch Higher Education Bill vote - the toughest test of his ten-year leadership.

In an e-mail to potential Labour rebels, ex-minister Mr Whitehead admitted "concerns" about variable fees - letting different universities set their own rates for degree courses.

But he said: "We believe the adverse impact variable fees could have had has now been contained."

He added: "The significant benefits for students, and particularly poorer students, and universities, including modern universities ... cannot flow unless the Bill succeeds."

He urged MPs to back the Bill during its Second Reading today and "debate, scrutinise and improve it further" during its Commons committee stage. Mr Whitehead helped secure concessions making it easier for students from poorer families to attend universities.

The most deprived one-third of students will receive a £3,000 financial package worth, including £2,700 in cash-in-hand grants, ensuring they didn't struggle to buy food, pay rent and fork out for vital equipment and books.

Graduates must earn at least £15,000-a-year before repaying the debt, which would be scrapped after 25 years. Tuition fees would also be capped at £3,000-a-year until at least 2011. Students currently pay £1,200-a-year tuition fees before they start university.

The government claims universities need to fund an £11m black hole in funding.

However, universities will not receive any money until students graduate and get well-paid jobs - meaning taxpayers would fund them until at least 2010. Opponents of top-up fees fear students will leave university with thousands of pounds of debts, preventing them from buying homes and starting families.

They claim top-up fees would widen the gap between elite universities, which can command higher fees, and other institutions, which would struggle to attract students paying £3,000-a-year.

Both Southampton's higher education institutions are anxiously awaiting the result of today's vote.

Dr Roger Brown, principal of Southampton Institute, says top-up fees are only a short-term solution to the university funding crisis.

"Southampton is fortunate to have, in the university and the institute, two large, successful and complementary institutions. While top-up fees should, if charged, assist both institutions in the short run, in the medium to longer term neither institution will be able to benefit because of the years of under funding to which top-up fees are only a partial response."

Southampton University vice chancellor professor Bill Wakeham reckons the proposals have got the balance about right.

"The three political parties in their policies on higher education now offer different balances between public and private contributions, with the government's proposals in favour of shifting the balance towards contributions from individuals who have had the benefit of university education.

"I believe that the government's proposals for variable tuition fees paid after graduation and according to income represent the fairest way to implement the change."

Mr Blair has predicted ministers will win the vote but admits there is "still a hill to climb."

Labour whips undertook a massive arm-twisting operation over the weekend to persuade rebels to back the Bill.

The government would lose the vote if 81 Labour MPs and all opposition MPs voted against the plan. But about a dozen Tory MPs are expected to back top-up fees. And a similar number of potential Labour rebels will not be in Westminster for the vote.

Today, Hampshire MPs were pledging to vote along Party lines.

Southampton Itchen MP John Denham, a former Labour minister, admitted at first he had "grave concerns" about variable fees.

He said: "I feared students from poorer backgrounds would not be able to afford to go to the best universities no matter what they achieved at school."

But he has changed his mind. "Now there is significant financial help for young people from modest backgrounds. They get as much help whether they go to prestigious universities or new universities."

Tory MP Julian Lewis, who represents New Forest East, said he would be "reluctant" to charge students any fees at all.

Mr Lewis, who will vote against the Bill, said he received a full student grant when attending Oxford University.

He opposed variable fees because students would ask themselves, "Can I afford a place at that university?", he said.

Mr Lewis said he would cut the number of university places: "I would rather have a finite number of people going to university who are properly funded than a huge number of people who are saddled with debt because there are so many people with qualifications they can't find a job."

Liberal Democrat frontbencher Mark Oaten planned to vote against top-up fees but believed the government would scrape to victory. He said: "It seems to me to be a tax on education and it breaks the long-held principle of encouraging people to go to further education."

The Winchester MP said many of his constituents were concerned about tuition fees, especially as the town's King Alfred's College is set to attain university status.

Desmond Swayne, Tory MP for New Forest West, said he could not vote for a "disastrous Bill". He said: "Students will get a huge amount of additional debt in a bid to make the universities better off, but they are not going to be."

Mr Swayne said the huge expansion in university places - "some people do surfing studies", he complained - had a detrimental effect on higher education.

Conservatives Mark Hoban (Fareham), Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) and Peter Viggers (Gosport) are expected to oppose the Bill. So will Lib Dems Sandra Gidley (Romsey) and David Chidgey (Eastleigh).