Most Vice-Chancellors believe that student fees should be increased, so there is unlikely to be a conflict of interest in this case if the Chancellor agrees with the Vice-Chancellor. Chancellors do play an important role in fund-raising, and an increase in fees would provide him with plenty of work to do in persuading donors to establish endowments to help less well off students to pay the costs that the taxpayer apparently won't pay any longer. It's the government that has a conflict of interest.

Cassandra – indeed.

Anthony, I fear the apparent ambiguity of the phrase conflict of interest has obscured the point I’m trying to make with the above. You’re right, the majority of Vice-Chancellors do indeed agree that student fees should be increased, and yes, it’s therefore more than likely that the majority of Chancellors agree also – united fronts etc. What I believe represents a major conflict of interests, though, is the fact that an organisation headed by Richard Lambert – one such Chancellor – was made responsible for drawing up what should, surely, have been an entirely INDEPENDENT report on how higher education is to survive government cuts. To put it another way, was it ethical for Lambert to accept – on behalf of the CBI – responsibility for compiling proposals that, if implemented by politicians, will arguably make life a lot easier for universities such as the one he represents (and, as you identify, plays an important role in fund-raising for) – and a lot harder for students and their parents.

Were, say, the National Union of Students to produce a similar report, it would inevitably come to the (yes, likely biased) conclusion that making students pay any more for their university education is wrong, absurd – and met with universal cynicism. So why, then, was authority over the actual report placed in the hands of an organisation headed up by a figure in the university establishment – and why has it not aroused similar cynicism?

“Chancellors do play an important role in fund-raising, and an increase in fees would provide him with plenty of work to do in persuading donors to establish endowments to help less well off students” – if only.

I believe that a Graduate Tax is the only fair system - say an extra penny in the pound of taxable income, so that those on higher salaries pay the most. But why should it be only new graduates? There are many, like myself, who benefited from a free higher education but are apparently refusing to pay the tax necessary to fund the current generation of students. We should be paying now for the benefits we recieved, and profited from over the intervening years. It would be interesting to see how many graduates in Westminster, or the CBI, would be willing put their money where their mouths are and vote for such a tax.

Today’s Guardian report (http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/sep/23/cbi-forecast-recession-over) on the CBI’s prediction that the recession, like WW2, will be over by Christmas, features a slightly – but perhaps tellingly – different vocabulary to Monday’s piece about student funding.

The CBI, referred to then rather ambiguously as ‘business leaders’, is today referred to more than once as a ‘lobby-group’. To my mind, the word(s) ‘lobby-group’ describe an organisation that aims to influence government policy in order to advantage its members.

Richard Lambert is the CBI’s highest ranking member. Higher student fees will benefit universities such as the one he represents (and is responsible for making money for). The CBI is an organisation that exists to carve out advantages for its members. You do the maths.

Who thought it’d be a good idea to get a LOBBY-GROUP headed up by a MEMBER OF THE UNIVERSITY ESTABLISHMENT – a figure on ONE SIDE of the top-up fee debate, then – to draw up a report on the future of student funding that, if the papers are to be believed, will be at the centre of governmental debate on the subject expected to begin in the autumn? Does anybody know?