Dunkirk spirit

Gareth Roberts, chairman of the CVCP, had a handy budget hint for Kenneth Clarke during the launch of the committee's evidence to the Dearing committee last week. Government funding per student, he said, has fallen from almost Pounds 7,000 in 1990 to a forecast Pounds 4,400 in 1999. At this rate, said Roberts, it will drop to zero when he is 70. Incidentally, his birth coincided with the British evacuation of Dunkirk.