Higher Education Act 2004
|
|
| Long title | An Act to make provision about research in the arts and humanities and about complaints by students against institutions providing higher education; to make provision about fees payable by students in higher education; to provide for the appointment of a Director of Fair Access to Higher Education; to make provision about grants and loans to students in higher or further education; to limit the jurisdiction of visitors of institutions providing higher education; and for connected purposes. |
|---|---|
| Citation | 2004 c 8 |
| Territorial extent | England and Wales, except that sections 42(1) and (2) and (5) also extend to Northern Ireland, that Part 1 and sections 45 and 47 and 48 and 51 to 54 also extend to that country and to Scotland, and that any amendment or repeal made by this Act has the same extent within the United Kingdom as the enactment to which it relates. |
| Dates | |
| Royal assent | 1 July 2004 |
| Text of statute as originally enacted | |
| Revised text of statute as amended | |
The Higher Education Act 2004 (c 8) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that introduced several changes to the higher education system in the United Kingdom, the most important and controversial being a major change to the funding of universities, and the operation of tuition fees, which affects England and Wales. University funding is a devolved matter for Northern Ireland and Scotland. After complex and controversial debates, the Higher Education Bill received Royal Assent on 1 July 2004.
Until 1998, all education in the United Kingdom was free up to and including university courses. However, shortly after coming to power, the Labour Party under Prime Minister Tony Blair abolished the student maintenance grant system and introduced an up-front fee fixed at just over £1,000 per year for all university students. Up to a quarter of this fee was waived for the poorest students, but many maintained that education should remain a free public service, and that the system would place students in unnecessary levels of debt. The government, however, insisted that fees were the best means of providing university funding. At the same time, they stated that their aim was to increase the proportion of students going on to Higher Education to 50% by 2010.
In the years that followed, it became clear that the original fixed fees of around £1,000 per year were still not providing enough funding, leading to proposals of what are often referred to as top-up fees. The idea was that universities would be able to "top up" the fees to a level that more accurately reflected the funding they needed. However, widespread protests led the Labour Party to make a manifesto pledge at the 2001 general election not to introduce such a system.
...
Wikipedia