The UK has ¡°gone backwards¡± when it comes to its record on helping students from disadvantaged backgrounds, a former Conservative education secretary has claimed.

Speaking at?Times Higher Education¡¯s World Academic Summit at the University of Manchester, Justine Greening said she was disappointed by the record of the former Tory administration.

¡°We have gone backwards ¨C we have deprioritised widening access,¡± said Ms Greening, who left Parliament in 2019. ¡°We have failed to find the solutions that are out there and problems have got bigger because of Covid.¡±

In a conversation with former Ucas chief executive Mary Curnock Cook and THE editor John Gill, the former Tory MP for Putney also questioned whether some of the Conservatives¡¯ flagship policies on higher education ¨C in particular, degree apprenticeships ¨C were likely to help poorer students.

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¡°I would not have known what apprenticeship to do at 17 ¨C I didn¡¯t have that kind of advice, but I did know what degree I wanted to do,¡± said Ms Greening, who studied business economics and accounting at the University of Southampton.

¡°We need information if you want to have true choice,¡± continued the former Cabinet minister on the lack of advice and support for first-in-family students like herself.

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The former Cabinet minister, who founded the?campaign to encourage businesses to work with students from less privileged backgrounds, said she also favoured ¡°significant reform¡± of the apprenticeship levy.

¡°I would increase it and widen it out to give employers more choice on if they want to support the graduate route or the apprentice route,¡± said Ms Greening.

Ms Greening¡¯s comments come despite?, with 29.2 per cent of children on free school meals progressing into higher education in 2021-22 ¨C the highest ever level.

However, Ms Greening said she was concerned over a deterioration of outcomes for students from poorer backgrounds ¨C a point echoed by Ms Curnock Cook, who worried that the abolition of student grants and the failure to uprate maintenance loans in line with inflation had impacted hugely on students.

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¡°You can find some statistics to make it look it hasn¡¯t made a difference, but the degradation of student finance has done so much damage,¡± said Ms Curnock Cook.

¡°Young people can barely afford housing in what I call the ¡®cost of learning crisis¡¯,¡± she argued, adding: ¡°They cannot afford rent, they cannot afford to eat and they are working so many hours.¡±

Given that more than 50 per cent of students are now working ¨C with many on ¡°full-time hours¡± ¨C students ¡°do not benefit from the whole university experience¡±, she said, adding that the educational environment becomes ¡°very transactional¡± in such circumstances.

jack.grove@timeshighereducation.com