There exists a large untapped potential among the less advantaged members of society. There is a moral responsibility towards these citizens and a social and economic reward for society as a whole if they could be provided with opportunities similar to those more fortunate by the circumstances of their birth. The surest way to address this problem is to tackle it as early as possible. The 1944 Education Act (passed by a Tory Secretary of State) had as its stated principle that ‘The nature of a child’s education should be based on (their) capacity and promise and not by the circumstances of (the) parent.’ Recent attacks on early years’ provision and the Sure Start programme, the emphasis on rote learning and testing in schools and the marginalisation of the humanities and creative arts, especially in state schools have been a backward step as has the loss of status of teachers in the mind of government. The first priority must be to address this failure, but that lies beyond the scope of this book. However, it is a good part of the reason that we have imposed the discipline upon ourselves to propose policies that do not involve any further public expenditure on higher education. The funds are simply needed more in the primary and secondary levels of education.

It is an important part of stated government policy to widen participation in universities, and in particular throughout the entire sector including the most elite universities. Government policy, incorporated in and developing upon the Browne Report, laid emphasis on the enhanced earning potential of graduates who should therefore bear some of the costs, ameliorated by policies around actual earnings of graduates. This reflected thinking that the prime purpose of education is personal financial gain and where this did not transpire, either by career choice or lack of graduate jobs, some help would be available through non-payback of loan. The fact that a significant amount of the loans would not be paid back was regarded as an acceptable recognition that society benefits as well as the graduate.

Research by London Economics for the Sutton Trust has revealed rich data on participation rates. The pattern for the decade up to 2016 showed that while participation increased over the whole range of household incomes, the special benefit to those from low income backgrounds was modest.