Cambridge has expressed concern about a recent Labour pledge to reduce tuition fees, should it be elected to government in 2015.

A spokesman for the University of Cambridge said: “It is important to debate how best to address the long-term financial sustainability of undergraduate education. For this University, the fundamental point is that any revised scheme should continue to enable us to deliver needs blind admission on academic merit alone.”

Speaking to the Sunday Times, Douglas Alexander, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, confirmed that a cut in tuition fees would form part of the Labour Party’s manifesto in 2015. He did not give details on the policy, but the Independent has suggested that a reduction to £6,000 is likely, as proposed by Ed Miliband in 2011.

The cap on university tuition fees was raised from £3,000 to £9,000 per year in 2012, despite a Lib Dem pledge and widespread student protest.
Universities UK also expressed concerns about a fee cut of this nature, citing an estimated funding shortfall of £1.7 billion.

The pledge from Labour was delivered in the wake of news that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills expects up to 45 per cent of tuition fee debt to go unpaid. Meanwhile, the Institute for Fiscal Studies recently delivered a report suggesting that almost three quarters of students would fail to clear the debt.

Labour’s prospective parliamentary candidate for Cambridge, Daniel Zeichner, implied that a graduate tax might be a way of responding to the shortfall, but stressed that Labour’s final policy platform was yet to be agreed: “It is clear that the tripling of tuition fees by Vince Cable hasn’t worked and looks likely to bring in less money than the previous system, as so many students are earning too little to repay their loans,” said Zeichner.

“It is staggering that of the £6.7 billion spent by the taxpayer on universities, just £0.7 billion is spent on teaching, while £4.2 billion goes on writing off unpaid loans.

“It is quite understandable that universities are concerned about future funding - we share that concern, which is why our proposal is fully-costed.”

The former Universities Minister John Denham, currently serving as parliamentary private secretary to Ed Miliband, has been credited with an alternative plan reportedly gaining ground among Labour’s policy reviewers.

The scheme would involve a £15,000 government voucher granted for any degree, with additional top-up fees to a maximum of £4,000.

Tuition fees are likely to be a major issue in the general election next year, especially in university-centric areas like Cambridge. Julian Huppert, the Liberal Democrat MP for Cambridge, said: “Labour’s latest comments are vague, probably deliberately so. They have not guaranteed that universities would get the replacement money, and it is certainly not helpful for students to cut the money available for their teaching; they would then get a worse education.”