School’s out! Sixth formers join protest against tuition fees

Pupils walked out of lessons as part of nationwide campaign by the National Union of Students against the coalition Government’s plans to increase tuition fees to up to £9,000 a year, almost three times the current rate.

Pupils from Trinity School protested outside Warwick and Leamington MP Chris White’s office.

Lower sixth-former Rosy Mack, 16, said her year would be the first affected.

She added: “My parents will probably be able to put me through university but people all over the country will be discouraged by the idea of paying £9,000 a year. Who wants to be in that much debt when they are only 23?”

Toby Dove, 17, attacked the “hypocrisy” of Liberal Democrats who had previously pledged to phase out the fees. He said: “Students and people in education haven’t done anything to get us into this economic situation.”

Luke Johnson, 17, said increases might prevent people from less well-off backgrounds going to some universities.

Julia Claxton, 16, said she had hoped to study in London but was not longer sure she would be able to.

Pupils at North Leamington School and Southam College also held protests. Southam sixth-former Lizzie Warham, who hopes to be a social worker, said: “It’s making me question whether it’s worth going to university.”

The 18-year-old said she was “disgusted” that some universities would be able to charge more than others. North Leamington pupil Harry Sinclair-Waugh compared the £20 billion it would cost to pay for higher education for ten years with the cost of the war in Afghanistan.

Students at Warwick University held a sit-in over government plans to withdraw teaching grants for arts and humanities subjects.

Despite the protests, Mr White said he would support the bill. He stressed students would not start paying back loans until they earned £21,000 and those earning £25,000 would only pay around £30 a month, with payments stopping if their salary dropped.

Mr White added bursaries would be targeted to help those who needed it most, but said the world had changed since universal grants, and there had to be new ways of funding universities to provide a good quality education.

He said: “We’re trying to get to a place where nobody who has the ability to go to university can’t go.”