Fees? Yes, please!

I love paying top-up fees. It’s the only way I can justify studying my completely useless degree. I’m doing History, you see. I spend my days reading about stuff that happened years ago and people who are very, very dead. Why am I doing this?

Simple. I enjoy it, and it will help me get a better job when I’m older. That’s it. I have no desire to help others in society. My motives to study this degree are completely selfish. Why, then, should others in society be forced to subsidise it?

Granted, many degrees do benefit everyone. Without the clever people who study them society would fall apart in a quite spectacular fashion. People like doctors, architects, engineers and chemists all play an important role.

History graduates do not. Nor do graduates of English, Philosophy, Politics, Sociology, Linguistics or Journalism. Sorry.

Politicians missed this point when arguing for top-up fees. Back in 2002, Margaret Hodge asked: "Should the dustman continue to subsidise the doctor or should the doctor contribute towards the cost of their own education?"

This logic fails to note that one day the said dustman may require said doctor’s skills, which he or she picked up at university. The chances of the dustman requiring anything I have learnt on my degree (outside of a pub quiz) are pretty slim. Why should the dustman have to cough up anything so a bunch of middle-class kids can spend three years discussing Nietzsche?

The £3,070 I pay in fees each year seems to be a fair amount. I pay a fraction of what students in North American universities pay. For the £3,070 I get brand-spanking new facilities, taught by world renowned faculty and get a superb student union thrown into the bargain.

Admittedly, students on the continent pay a lot less, but they get less. English fees are the highest in Europe. Germany, after massive arguments, introduced fees of up to £400 a semester last year. England has seventeen universities in the THES Top 100; Germany has the grand total of three. The French, meanwhile, pay up £550 a year and have just two universities in the Top 100.

But, then, I’m one of the lucky ones. I come from a middle-class background. Both my parents went to university, as did my brother and sister. To be frank, I can afford to pay top-up fees – but not everyone else can.

According to the Sutton Trust, top-up fees put off poorer students from attending university. The thought of nearly £10,000 tuition fees, on top of normal student debt, is simply too much for some. This is unacceptable and needs to change.

Top-up fees do need to be modified, but they should not be removed. The choice is simple: campaign to abolish all fees and drag down university standards, or apply fees sensibly and maintain the standards of the UK universities.

An introduction of a sliding scale for fees would be a start. Those with a household income less than £30,000 per year could go free. Less than £40,000 and you pay £1,000. Less than £50,000, pay £2,000 and so on. A knock down rate for poorer families would remove the disincentive that top-up fees can pose. Likewise, subjects crying out for students – such as chemistry and maths – could provide the incentive of lower fees than more popular courses.

Tinkering with the system in this way would cost far less than abolishing student fees outright. And this is the crux of the issue. No political party will ever be elected on a policy of giving university students even more money – especially at the public’s expense. Whether you like it or not, tuition fees are here to stay.