Call for fairer student bursaries

Students now pay £3,145 a year on tuition fees

Students from poorer homes are losing out under the current system of university bursaries, a report claims.

The Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) says students with similar needs receive differing amounts of financial help from institutions.

Hepi says a national bursary scheme for England is the only way to ensure awards are fairly allocated.

The idea was rejected by universities and the government, but welcomed by the National Union of Students.

In its report, Hepi says there is a "highly variegated market" in bursaries which makes it very difficult for students to compare the various financial packages on offer at different institutions.

The different criteria used by different universities to determine eligibility for financial support adds to the complexity, Hepi says.

The current system is complex and confusing Wes Streeting National Union of Students president

It also points to the uneven distribution of poorer students across the higher education sector, saying this distorts the current market in bursaries.

"Universities with the most demanding entry requirements are likely to have smaller proportions of students from low-income households and are therefore able to provide more generous means-tested bursaries" the report says.

"The result of this is that students with the same level of need may receive very different levels of means-tested bursaries."

The report says students from poorer backgrounds at a university with many other students from poor homes will be more reliant on term-time work to help finance basic living costs, compounding inequality.

The Hepi report calls for a national bursary scheme which would offer a standard level of support to students on a means-tested basis.

This would be funded from pooled income from universities, with institutions passing their contributions directly to the government.

'No evidence'

England's Minister for Higher Education Bill Rammell said it was for institutions themselves, subject to approval from Offa (the Office for Fair Access), to decide how to support their students.

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The Russell Group, which represents large research-led universities, said there was no evidence that a national bursary system would widen participation.

Director general Dr Wendy Piatt said: "A national bursary system would create many losers and few winners as there would be relatively small increases to a standard bursary but many high-achieving, low-income students would lose out on substantial support currently available."

The 1994 Group, which represents smaller research-intensive universities, also rejected the national bursary proposal, saying a forced pooling of tuition fee income amounted to a tax.

Chair of the group Professor Steve Smith of Exeter said: "A national bursary scheme would be an extremely restrictive tool, stopping institutions from offering bursaries that are specific to identified access problems."

But the NUS said the report backed up what it had been saying for years.

NUS president Wes Streeting said: "The current system is complex and confusing.

"We need a single national bursary scheme, so that financial support is based on what students need, not where they study."

The vice-chancellors' umbrella group, Universities UK, said the proposal raised issues which would need to be explored further.