Funded places for Scottish universities to be cut

Finance Secretary Shona Robison says the government is providing £2bn for higher and further education

At least 1,200 funded university places will be cut in Scotland, the finance secretary has confirmed.

Shona Robison said the government could not afford to continue financing additional places created during the pandemic.

She told MSPs that no decision has yet been made on further reductions after the government announced a £28.5m reduction in university funding.

The Conservatives said it was a "hammer blow" to universities and students.

• Higher earners to pay more income tax in Scotland

• Yousaf 'committed' to free uni tuition for Scots

• Colleges and unis to lose £46m in pledged money

During her budget statement in December, Ms Robison told MSPs she was "protecting free tuition and driving forward our commitment to widening access".

Ministers have also frequently pointed to free tuition in Scotland as a justification for higher taxes on higher earners when compared to other parts of the UK.

However, documents published alongside the draft Scottish Budget in December included a 6% funding cut for higher education "to support delivery of core teaching activities".

It said additional savings are "to be made in the [higher education] sector including from reducing first year university places".

Ms Robison told Holyrood's finance committee that it was no longer "sustainable" to fund an additional 1,200 first-year university places that were created during the pandemic due to a "big spike" in the number of pupils meeting admission thresholds after exams were disrupted.

She said ministers had used UK government Covid funding to finance those places and kept them open for two years.

The government will spend £2bn on higher and further education under its 2024-25 budget plans, she added.

Labour MSP Michael Marra told MSPs cutting 1,200 places would save between £4m and £5m. He said that more places would need to be cut to make up £28.5m in savings, citing a figure of 3,800.

MS Robison said she did not recognise that figure. "There isn't a number as such", she told MSPs, because the Scottish Funding Council is still in negotiations with universities about cuts with the aim of "landing in a place that is affordable and sustainable".

Labour MSP Michael Marra sought answers over the government cuts

Ms Robison acknowledged that the budget "could pose a risk to those from less well-off backgrounds". She said the government was working to ensure that does not happen, for instance by supporting "non-traditional" routes to university.

She said efforts by the UK government to cut the number of foreign students coming to UK down would "put pressure on our university sector".

The Scottish government has said it has overseen record numbers of full-time first degree entrants from Scotland's most deprived communities going to university.

"That's something that we want to see continue and we want to see that trend continuing and that attainment gap and opportunity gap continuing to be addressed," Ms Robison added.

• Scottish budget 2024-25: At a glance

• How will Scotland plug its £1.5bn budget shortfall?

There is an annual cap on the number of Scottish students who can access university places funded by the Scottish government.

Students who get free tuition in Scotland should have lived in the UK for three years and have their "ordinary residence" in Scotland before starting their course.

SQA figures showed 30,050 Scottish students were accepted to university last year, compared to 30,490 in 2022 and up from 28,750 in 2019.

Overall, there was a lower number of Scottish applicants compared to 2022 - dropping from 48,000 to 44,490.

'Rock and hard place'

Alastair Sim, director of Universities Scotland, said institutions needed to find £28.5m of savings from teaching grants in one year as a result of the budget.

"That forces rock-and-hard place choices for the Scottish government; either reduce the number of places at university or further deplete how much public funding is spent on the education of every Scottish student.

"The availability of places for Scots is at a historic high but any change to numbers is immediately visible.

"The other option sits below-the-surface but exacerbates an already chronic set of pressures facing students, staff and the sustainability of institutions."

Scottish Conservative education spokesperson Liam Kerr said: "Scotland's university sector is already facing huge challenges thanks to the failures of SNP ministers to support them and this would be another hammer blow for them.

"It would also be deeply damaging for many young people - who are already facing barriers to university entry due to the SNP's arbitrary cap on student places - if even fewer places were available."

Labour MSP Pam Duncan-Glancy said: "We cannot have Scottish students excluded from universities due to SNP-Green cuts."

Scottish ministers like to regularly remind us of their policy on free university tuition.

It's often used as justification for why some Scots pay more in income tax than those in other parts of the UK - yes, a bit more comes out of your pay packet, but free tuition is just one bonus you get in return.

The big picture is slightly more complicated.

Only a certain number of funded places for Scots are made available each year. Once they're all filled, they're gone.

And, going forward, there's going to be fewer of them. It's thought around 1,200 places could go.

Ministers argue that this is just a return to normality. There was a post-Covid "spike" in places after exams were cancelled.

The Scottish government stresses they will still be supporting tens of thousands of students every year. And, even with these cuts, it does look like numbers will still be higher than they were a few years ago.

But these reductions - tucked away in spreadsheet documents - went unnoticed for almost a month after the budget was delivered. And that suggests ministers weren't keen to publicise this too widely.