Further and Higher Education Students: Cost of Living

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 19th September 2023 Westminster Hall

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir George, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield). He said almost exactly what I would have said, but I would not have put it so well. Colleagues of different parties have made similar points, so I will try not to repeat them.

I find myself returning to the point made by the Institute for Fiscal Studies that the value of maintenance loans for students from the poorest families is at its lowest in real terms since 2016-17, and the poorest students in England are more than £1,000 worse off than in 2021-22. Like the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), I respect the Minister, but he has to explain how the Government have allowed this situation to develop, because there has been a paltry rise in the maintenance loan. I am sure he is embarrassed about it. He ought to be embarrassed about it on behalf of the Government, and they need to do something about it.

I will make a few quick points about the city of Cambridge, which I represent. Cambridge is a genuine education city, with fine universities, an excellent further education college and brilliant sixth-form colleges. But as the Cambridge University Students Union points out, although the University of Cambridge is a very wealthy university—perhaps the wealthiest in Europe—sadly Cambridge is also the UK’s most unequal city on some measures. In CUSU’s words:

“Students must pay extortionate rents, College bills and other hidden costs, while maintenance loans and University and College bursaries have been largely stagnant. Disparity across the collegiate University means that students’ experiences of both applying for and receiving necessary funding differ vastly.”

There are many different experiences, but the fact that one of the Cambridge colleges has had to set up a food hub speaks volumes about the situation in which we find ourselves.

I am grateful to Harvey Brown, the CUSU welfare and community officer, for pointing out the pressure on postgraduate students in particular. He said that some had been in touch to say that there is simply nowhere they can afford to live in Cambridge, with some suggesting that living in a tent was the only means of staying in the city to finish their studies. He also talked about postgrad and international students, who are reliant on scholarships and often depend on extortionate visas, and the visa criteria for international students being harsh, with some having to prove progression to maintain their visa.

There is a range of complicated issues here, but clearly something needs to be done to improve the situation. I also echo the points about further education students. I was told this morning that some are paying £2,000 a year in rail fares just to come to and from Ely for their education.

I will conclude by observing that there is quite a furore in the papers about the triple lock. Is it not extraordinary that there is not a furore about this generation, which is actually suffering here and now? Would it not be wonderful to see that on the front pages of the newspapers tomorrow?