The Liz Truss government must not allow planned lifelong loans to “wither on the vine”, according to post-18 education review chair Sir Philip Augar, but a former minister suggested the new regime may aim to restrict student numbers.
The comments came at a Conservative Party conference fringe meeting on “the case for expanding higher education”, hosted by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change’s Future of Britain project, at a time when the balance of Tory opinion has shifted towards economic and cultural concern over higher education in its expanded form.
A Tony Blair Institute report recently called for a 70 per cent higher education participation target, building on the former Labour prime minister’s 50 per cent target, pinpointing the sector as one of the UK’s few sources of economic growth.
