25 years ago the Dearing Report suggested a series of fundamental reforms to higher education in the U.K. Among its 93 recommendations the most controversial was that students should pay a contribution towards their undergraduate degrees with the use of a loan in which repayments take the form of a percentage of the borrower’s subsequent earnings, ideally collected each week or month as a payroll deduction alongside income tax and social security contributions. This recommendation was underpinned by a set of economic principles, with claims that it would lead to greater efficiency and equity. Income contingent tuition loans were eventually implemented in England by the Blair Labour government in 2006 and subsequently reworked by the Coalition (Conservative/Liberal Democrat) government in 2012. The four nations of the U.K diverged: Scotland decided not to charge students, and Wales and Northern Ireland established modified parallels to the English system.

Certainly the reform facilitated a major increase in access to higher education, as was Dearing’s intent. However, the economic and political realities of implementing and sustaining the reform have proved challenging. Given that other countries use a variety of higher education fee and loan systems, this is an opportune time to look back on this social policy and ask both what have been the benefits and why not all that was promised came to pass. With speakers who include some who advised Dearing, we discuss: the underpinning economic theory behind the reforms; how the reforms unfolded in practice; their positive and negative impacts; and what the implications are for future policy development.

View the programme here: www.researchcghe.org/events/public-event/the-dearing-report-25-years-on-student-loan-reform-in-uk-did-it-work

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