Figures show that Scotland’s university access attainment gap has widened, with SNP ministers accused of “betraying” the poorest students.
An end-of-cycle report from Ucas, the admissions service, disclosed that the difference between the most and least deprived pupils being accepted into university had increased by 50 per cent since 2018 — from 6.1 percentage points to 9.2 last year.
While the number of applicants from the most deprived backgrounds in Scotland increased by 0.1 points from 69 per cent in 2018, more students from the most affluent areas were accepted.
About 78.3 per cent of students from the SIMD 5 quintile — the least deprived — were accepted into university last year, up from 75.1 per cent five years ago. The number of accepted applicants from the SIMD 1 quintile — or most deprived — increased each year to 5,785 in 2022.
Stephen Kerr, the Scottish Conservative education spokesman, has accused Nicola Sturgeon of failing on her pledge to close the attainment gap. He said: “Nothing sums up the SNP’s abysmal education record more than their failure to eradicate the attainment gap.”
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He said that since the first minister’s pledge to eliminate the attainment gap, progress had regressed.
“We’ve witnessed the SNP’s repeated failure to close it in schools across Scotland and now we are seeing it in our universities too,” he said. “A good education can be a passport out of poverty. It’s unforgivable that this is being denied to so many talented youngsters.”
A Scottish government representative said: “The number of students attending university from the most deprived backgrounds is at a record high.
“The fair access commissioner’s latest report recognises that Scotland is continuing to ‘set the pace’ when it comes to widening access to university and described the Scottish government’s approach as an ‘unambiguous success’. We are determined to accelerate the progress that has been made and we are investing a record £1 billion in the Scottish Attainment Challenge during this parliamentary term.”
Sturgeon last month denied breaking the promise to reduce the poverty-related attainment gap after figures showed that on average, the gap increased from 12.2 per cent in 2018/19 to 14.7 per cent among S3 pupils.
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Labour has pledged to fund more university places in Scotland despite warnings from Sir Keir Starmer that free tuition may be unaffordable in England. The Labour leader yesterday rolled back on his pledge to scrap tuition fees in England. Instead he said it would have to be reappraised to take account of “the damage that has been done to our economy” and refused to commit to putting it in the next election manifesto.
Scottish Labour said Starmer’s warning had no impact on its manifesto pledge to go further with free tuition.
Anas Sarwar said he intended to raise the cap on the number of students permitted to attend university each year, which has been imposed by the SNP to prevent the cost of government-funded tuition spiralling out of control. Scottish Labour said it would “increase the cap” which would “enable more students, especially those from the most disadvantaged backgrounds, to have the opportunity to go to university”.
Ross Greer, the Scottish Green education spokesman whose party is in government with the SNP at Holyrood, criticised Labour’s position. “England already has some of the highest tuition fees in the world,” he said.
“Starmer seems content to become the Nick Clegg for a whole new generation of students who expected better from the Labour Party. There is nothing inevitable about tuition fees. They are a political choice.
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“This would once again put Scottish Labour in the incoherent position of claiming to oppose tuition fees while standing candidates at the next general election who, if elected, will loyally troop through the voting lobbies behind Keir Starmer to keep English tuition fees in place.”
Bob Doris, who was among the SNP MSPs who scrapped tuition fees in 2007, said Starmer’s prevarication had “shown that the public he can’t be trusted”. He said: “Keir Starmer is throwing his own commitments on the scrapheap at the earliest available opportunity and adopting Tory policies.”