Students attack £9,000 fees move

The university is the latest to confirm it plans to introduce top-level tuition fees from 2012 when the cap is trebled and state funding for degree teaching is hit by massive cuts.

Sheffield Students’ Union president Josh Forstenzer said: “The university was founded by donations from the local community to ensure the finest education was within the reach of the children of working people in our area.

“With this decision, we fear that many local families will be put off sending their children to university by heavy burdens of debt.”

Any university planning to charge more than £6,000 a year has to get a package of support for poorer students approved by the Office for Fair Access. Sheffield plans to “significantly expand its financial support and outreach activities” to £12m by 2015, from the £6.7m it currently spends.

The university’s vice chancellor Prof Keith Burnett said: “We now face a real challenge not of our choosing, but one which we owe it to future students to accept. At a time when many sectors of society are feeling the impact of cuts and young people are increasingly concerned about employment and debt, we must effectively deliver and communicate the positive worth of the university.”

MPs have used Sheffield’s decision to attack Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg over the pledge he signed in opposition to oppose any increase in tuition fees.

Shadow Business Secretary John Denham said. “When a university in Nick Clegg’s own city charges the maximum £9,000 in tuition fees, it’s clearer than ever that his promise to student voters in Sheffield and around the country wasn’t worth the paper it was written on.”