Tensions in fees alliance

Vice chancellors and the National Union of Students made clear the strength of the alliance forged in the campaign to defend higher education, as the Committee of Vice Chancellors and Principals met last week in Sheffield.

But the tensions acting on the entente were also evident as vice chancellors discussed the key issue of funding. Talks between CVCP chairman Gareth Roberts and NUS president Douglas Trainer during the conference were instrumental in persuading vice chancellors to drop the estimated repayment figures from the income-contingent repayment scheme outlined in their draft funding submission to the Dearing review.

Mr Trainer said: "We were keen to ensure that the CVCP did not give up the battle for extra funding from business and Government and land the whole burden on students."

In his closing conference speech, Professor Roberts said that a new system of funding should "if necessary" include individual contributions to fees, retreating slightly from the previous CVCP view that they were undoubtedly necessary.

Commending the "new realism" of NUS in accepting the need for contributions to maintenance cost, he announced that the union would join the CVCP in a working party to look at the size of the funding gap and the possible ways of closing it.

The two groups were united in concern that some universities may introduce top-up fees in 1997 after a poor Budget settlement. Professor Roberts estimated that around half a dozen institutions might do so, with up to a further 20 following suit in 1998: "This would create a new binary divide, which is the last thing either the CVCP or students want." Mr Trainer promised that NUS would campaign against institutions which introduced fees, but stopped short of advocating boycotts.

He said he recognised that the London School of Economics, the only institution so far to be planning for top-up fees in detail, would be a difficult target in view of its largely international intake.

Other institutions known to have discussed the issue are Birmingham and the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology. UMIST council has passed a resolution accepting top-up fees as one of a number of revenue-raising options which might be considered, but ruled out acting alone.

Huddersfield University has avoided a potential clash with students over tuition fees by deferring any decision to introduce them until after the Dearing inquiry's report on higher education funding. A university spokesman said that the council has no plans to introduce entry fees for students.