Brown and Clarke clash over top-up fees
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Your support makes all the difference.Cabinet ministers clashed yesterday over controversial plans to allow universities to charge top-up fees of up to £3,000 a year that are expected to be announced next week.
Gordon Brown is believed to have issued a blunt warning that proposals by Charles Clarke, the Education Secretary, could deter people from poor families from going to university. The Chancellor made an attempt to keep open the option of a graduate tax, arguing that it would be fairer than Mr Clarke's plans for "deferred fees" to be paid after graduates' earnings hit a certain level.
The row between the two ministers came at a heated meeting yesterday of the Cabinet's domestic affairs committee, chaired by the Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott.
Allies of Mr Clarke expressed confidence that his blueprint would be included in a long-awaited White Paper on higher education due to be published next Wednesday. But Brownites denied claims that the graduate tax plan was "dead", insisting that no agreement was reached yesterday.
Although Tony Blair is backing the Clarke scheme, Whitehall sources said several ministers had expressed reservations. In an attempt to limit the controversy over top-up fees, the Government is expected to scrap the current "up front" tuition fees of £1,100 a year, which would also be deferred until graduates were in work. Another sweetener will be a limited restoration of maintenance grants for the poorest students, which were abolished in 1997.
Will Straw, president of the Oxford Students Union and son of the Foreign Secretary, warned that the Government's plans could result in a two-tier system of higher education.
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