Introduction

The expansion and growing importance of higher education (HE) in England since the 1980s have prompted numerous reforms aimed at reshaping and restructuring HE and its funding, reflecting the changing ideological, economic and social functions of HE. The proposed reforms to be introduced in 2012/13 in England are by far the most radical and those concerning HE funding and student finances the most farreaching. This chapter aims to unpack the drivers for these reforms, locating them in a broader historical and policy context. It describes the proposed 2012/13 HE changes and analyses their potential impact against their stated aims.

It is argued that the reforms herald a fundamental change in the role of the state in HE provision and in the balance of public and private contributions towards its costs, in line with broader shifts in responsibility and risk for welfare from the state to the individual. In turn, they reflect changes in beliefs about HE, its purpose and role in society, and who should have access to it and pay for it. The reforms are both driven and shaped by ideological, political and economic factors that together are leading to deleterious policy change. The new policies are untested. They represent a big experiment with unknown consequences and unforeseen unintended consequences. It is unclear, therefore, whether the reforms will meet their stated aims, or whether they will stand the test of time. We will not know for sure, for several years to come. However, they are likely to have a destabilising effect on the HE sector in the short term, and to polarise HE in the longer term, exacerbating existing social divisions and inequalities within and across the sector.

The chapter starts by examining the changing nature of undergraduate student finances in England, as the legacy of earlier policies are key to understanding the proposed 2012/13 reforms. Next, it explores the lead-up to the 2012/13 reforms and the recommendations of the 2010 Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance – chaired by Lord Browne of Madingley – which informed the Coalition's proposals. Then, the government's response to Browne, encapsulated in their November 2010 announcement and their subsequent 2011 White Paper Higher education: students at the heart of the system, will be discussed.