Research-led universities such as Oxford will be "taxed" to subsidise attempts to increase working-class applications, if changes to the way the government funds higher education go ahead. Oxford could stand to lose millions of pounds under the plans.
David Eastwood, head of the Higher Education Funding Council for England (Hefce), said that funding which is spent on promoting cutting-edge research will in future be given to universities which attract poorer students. Hefce currently spends £1.7billion on research and £332million on raising the number of working-class students attending university. The changes mean that universities will have a financial incentive to accept poor students for the first time.
Almost a third of all research funding currently goes to Oxford and four other institutions: Cambridge, Manchester, Imperial and University College London. These universities have among the lowest rate of working-class applications in the country, and so are expected to lose out significantly under the changes. Malcolm Grant, who chairs the Russell Group of leading research-led universities, said: "While we applaud widening participation, it would seem sensible for Hefce to look at ways to allow our world-class universities to compete at an international level and not to tax research funding to cross-subsidise widening participation across the sector."
Speaking to The Times newspaper, Eastwood said that it was impossible for all higher education institutions to compete on a level playing field for research funding, and that universities without a research focus should concentrate on other qualities, such as their teaching provisions. He said that as students pay higher fees under the new top-up fee system, universities have a responsibility to improve their contribution to society.
How Oxford is funded