University Tuition Fee Cap — Raise Upper Limit to £9,000 Per Year — 9 Dec 2010 at 17:12

The majority of MPs voted to raise the UK's undergraduate tuition fee cap to £9,000 per year.

The motion approved read:

• That, for the purpose of section 24 of the Higher Education Act 2004^[1], the higher amount should be increased to £9,000, and to £4,500 in the cases described in regulation 5 of the draft regulations in Command Paper Cm 7986^[2], and that the increase should take effect from 1 September 2012

Command paper Cm 7986 is a draft document which became The Higher Education (Higher Amount) (England) Regulations 2010.

The £9,000 "Higher Amount" is the maximum fee an institution can charge if it has a plan in place under section 33 of the 2004 Higher Education Act^[3]. Such plans require institutions to set out how they are to promote awareness of financial and access arrangements for the course. Regulations may be introduced to require governing bodies to monitor their institutions' compliance with their plans.

Sections 30-38 of the 2004 Higher Education Act deal with plans, and their enforcement. The plans are approved and enforced in accordance with Section 34 of the Act, by the "Office for Fair Access" which calls the plans "access agreements"^[4]. Access agreements can be viewed on the OfFA website^[5].

Ministerial guidance as to the content of the plans has been issued.^[6]

In the absence of such a plan institutions are only permitted to charge the "Basic Amount". This division was followed by another vote which set the "Basic Amount" at £6,000 per year.^[7]

The £4,500 cap applies to final years and sandwich course years where there is a shorter than usual amount of attendance required at the institution.

• [1] Section 24 of the 2004 Higher Education Act
• [2] Command Paper Cm 7986
• [3] Section 33 of the 2004 Higher Education Act - The legislation which defines the plans required to charge the higher rate of fees.
• [4] Tweet by Nick Hillman, Special Adviser to Universities Minister David Willetts. 11th December 2010
• [5] The Office for Fair Access Website
• [6] Ministerial Guidance to the Director of Fair Access, The head of the Office of Fair Access - Issued December 7th 2010
• [7] Tuition Fee Cap - Raise Basic Cap to £6,000 - House of Commons Division, 9th December 2010.

Debate in Parliament | Source |