The head of University College London claimed that the government should cut student places at “pile it high, sell it cheap” universities with the purpose of protecting research institutions that are known all over the world. Vince Cable, the business secretary, wrote in his essay that he is going to outline plans of the government to cut costs in higher education. According to UCL’s Malcolm Grant, “world class” universities are expecting with fear the government’ cutting research funding. Grant says that such a decision could “decimate Britain’s global competitiveness in research” and too many research universities that are conducting researches in cancer and other diseases will be closed.
Nowadays the increase in applications for university places has a great impact on the government that is suppressed to introduce further cuts on students. If cuts are imposed, all universities will be influenced. These cuts will likely result in a protest from the parents whose smart children will be rejected in university places. It will also influence the elite universities, as Grant said, “The politics of reducing total student numbers is very difficult, it then leads to the conclusion that there should be fewer universities. There will be political pressure to keep open universities at the teaching-only end of the spectrum by taking resources away from the world-class research universities”.
David Willetts, the universities secretary, said that students are likely to pay higher tuition fees while universities will be forced to improve the quality of their teaching so the graduates will have all necessary “employability skills”. Grant induced the government to consider the reducing in student numbers to be the price of closing Britain’s research institutions. “I think it’s an avoidable consequence if politicians are prepared to revisit the question of student numbers,” he said. Grant thinks that people do not realize that “human benefit” comes from research centers. The same tuition fees do not show the differences between universities. Students who study at elite universities should pay more. He says that due to the taxpayer subsidy fees for domestic students will always be lower than for foreign students.