Postgrad bottleneck warning

students who want to progress to postgraduate level could encounter significant financial barriers if the Dearing committee's funding proposals go ahead, a member of the inquiry team has warned, writes Julia Hinde.

Ewan Gillon, the Queen Margaret College PhD student who was on the inquiry's research working group, says plans to recommend charging undergraduate tuition fees and not to extend loans to postgraduates could put many graduates off research.

"If you are coming out of first degrees with huge amounts of debt, those who have not got money behind them are not going to want to go further.

"It is becoming almost standard that you need a postgraduate qualification to get a job in some fields. But a lot of these are not funded. It appears to me that this has not been addressed," he said.