UCU laments failed widening participation agenda as thousands miss out on university place

Earlier this year the government announced it would be capping the number of student places at universities, despite a record number of applications this year, following years of spending on encouraging people to apply to university. As students across the country receive their A-level results, the union says thousands will miss out on a place because the government was not bold enough to make the case for higher education or provide the necessary funds.
 
UCU general secretary, Sally Hunt, said: 'The government's widening participation agenda should have been celebrated and allowed to flourish. The government should have been honest about the power of higher education to change people's lives, made the case that a better-educated society is a better society, and then put its money where its mouth was.
 
'The government's decision to cap the numbers of student places at university this year, and most likely permanently cap the ambition of thousands of potential students, marks the nadir of a policy which has become, in essence, the rationing of hope. The late addition of some extra places that are not funded or resourced is little more than a sticking tape policy that won't help students or universities.
 
'Although the government has invested considerable sums in higher education, it fell into the trap of trying to sell university as a passport to greater riches in life in order to justify the costs to hard working families. It should have been bold enough to go the whole hog and fund it properly. Failure to do that has left us with the number of NEETS* on the rise, a benefits system which will inevitably be further burdened by people who could benefit from being at university, rather than on the scrapheap, and a system of funding higher education which has little or no support among the British public.
 
'Everyone knows there is a clear economic case to be made for investing in our graduates. Aside from the obvious benefits of more teachers, nurses, doctors, engineers etc, graduates are less likely to commit crimes, they are less likely to be a burden on the NHS and less likely to stretch the creaking benefits system.'
 
Professor Danny Blanchflower, the former member of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee who forecast the recession, recently called on the government to provide more investment to get young people into education, rather than become unemployed. Professor Blanchflower said that one million young people could become unemployed in the next 12 months and that it would be far better for the government to provide places for them to study at university.

*Not in education, employment or training (NEET)