Change announced in 2015 comes into effect on Monday and will condemn poorer students to a ‘lifetime of debt’, says NUS

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

The National Union of Students (NUS) has attacked the government’s decision to replace maintenance grants for the poorest students, saying it will leave them “with a lifetime of debt”.

From Monday, the grants, worth about £3,500, will be replaced with additional loans that will have to be paid back at the end of an undergraduate course, once graduates earn more than £21,000.

Sorana Vieru, NUS vice president, told BBC Breakfast: “It’s a disgraceful change that basically punishes poorer students simply for being poor, so they have to take a bigger loan than those students from privileged backgrounds.

“It could put off students from underprivileged backgrounds from applying, who might not understand how the loan system works, or are very debt-averse. We also know that mature students are way more debt-averse than younger students and BME (black and minority ethnic) students perceive student debt on a par with commercial debt.”

The change, announced by the then chancellor, George Osborne, in 2015, was opposed by Labour, which said it would hit those from low-income homes the hardest.

Nick Hillman, director of the Higher Education Policy Institute, told the BBC that students would end up with more money in their pocket overall, despite the withdrawal of the grants.

Students condemn the scrapping of maintenance grants Read more

He said: “In the past they had about £7,500, in future they will have £8,200. But it will all have to be paid back if they get a well-paid job, whereas in the past around £3,000 or so did not have to be paid back.”

The change comes the day after a new study was released that claimed student debt payments wipe out the benefit of higher earnings for most graduates.

The report by the Intergenerational Foundation, looking at the £9,000 annual tuition fees in England, suggested that apart from Oxbridge, medical and dentistry graduates, there is no guaranteed graduate earnings premium – estimated to be £100,000 over a lifetime – for the many young people entering higher education.

Speaking in January, Jo Johnson, the universities and science minister, said the maintenance grant change “helps balance the need to ensure that affordability is not a barrier to higher education, while ensuring that higher education is funded in a fair and sustainable way”.

The Department for Education declined to comment further on Monday.