The UK government is raising tuition fees in England for the first time in 8 years

Britain’s new Labor government announced on Monday that tuition fees at universities in England would be raised for the first time in eight years as higher education institutions struggle with financial deficits.

The 3.1% increase comes as university leaders blame a crackdown on immigration for reducing the number of international students who have already been hit by Britain’s exit from the European Union.

Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said the tuition cap for domestic undergraduate students studying at English universities would increase by £285 in August 2025 to £9,535 ($12,350).

From 2017, the limit is £9,250.

The amount available in the so-called Maintenance loans that help students with general living costs.

Phillipson said the new government, elected in July, was making “difficult decisions to restore the sustainability of higher education”.

Labor blames the Conservative Tory party for leaving it a terrible legacy across sectors including the economy, health care and prisons.

Last week, the center-left party announced tax increases that will raise £40 billion in its first budget in almost 15 years.

Tuition fees were first introduced in the UK by former Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Labor government in the late 1990s.

In 2012, the Conservatives tripled the maximum amount universities could charge to £9,000. It then kept the limit at £9,250 for seven years, despite soaring inflation.

New Labor Prime Minister Keir Starmer has pledged to abolish tuition fees as he stands for the party leadership in 2020.

The devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have the power to make education policy and set their own tuition rates.

Fear of shortages

Universities UK (UUK), which represents 141 of the UK’s higher education institutions, welcomed the increase as “the right thing to do”.

“Thriving universities are essential to a thriving UK,” UUK chief executive Vivienne Stern said in a statement.

She called the nearly decade-long fee freeze “completely unsustainable for both students and universities.”

The UK has warned that all its members are “feeling a crisis” due to visa restrictions on international students.

They typically pay more in tuition than their domestic counterparts and have become a lucrative source of income for many institutions.

But former Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak imposed restrictions on overseas student visas, banning many people from bringing their families as part of a crackdown on record levels of immigration.

According to official statistics, 30,000 fewer applications were received from abroad in the first four months of 2024 than in the same period of 2023.

Universities have warned for months about the impact on their finances, fearing the shortages could force them to cancel courses or close some altogether.

Sally Mapstone, chief executive of UUK, told the group’s September conference that the current deficit in the sector was £1.7 billion for teaching and £5 billion for research.

The National Union of Students has welcomed the increase in maintenance loans, which it has advocated for for years.

However, vice-president for higher education Alex Stanley demanded an “urgent review” of higher education funding, saying the sector was “in crisis”.

“Universities cannot continue to be funded on the basis of ever-increasing student debt,” he said.