Should UK students be charged university fees?

Charging students has removed the cap on places

Question: Should UK students be charged university fees?
Position‹2 of 2: Yes, the UK should charge for access to its higher education institutions.
Argument‹3 of 4›: Charging students has removed the cap on places

It is actually increasing places not decreasing fees that reduces inequality.

The argument

Proponents of this argument believe that students from poorer backgrounds have been hampered not by their finances, but by competition for too few university places, which were mainly given to those who had higher grades, often as a result of private education. The introduction of fees has meant that the cap on student numbers can be removed, as each university is in charge of its own intake, and the government is no longer paying for every place. If the lack of student places is the root of inequality, then paying for tuition has reduced this problem.

Context

Young people from disadvantaged backgrounds are almost twice as likely to go to university than they were in 2009, and this change has been credited to the removal of the cap on student places. For this reason, the argument equally stands that charging for tuition increases equality.

Premises

[P1]Students from poorer backgrounds were hampered less by finances than by competition for too few university places, which favoured the privately educated with higher grades. [P2] Introducing fees let universities control their own intake and removed the cap on student numbers, since the government no longer funds every place. [C] Therefore, because charging students has removed the cap on places and the inequality it caused, the UK should charge university fees.

Counter-arguments

There is some question about the reliability of these statistics, with evidence showing whilst the number of young people at university increased, the number of students in all types of higher education (such as vocational courses and apprenticeships) actually decreased.

Rejecting the premises

Rejecting P3. It may be that those who were previously more likely to study for an apprenticeship or vocational course are pushed into university courses which have now become the norm for higher education.