Higher Education Fees

I have given way to several of the hon. Gentleman's colleagues and several of my own, and I now wish to summarise where we are. As I was saying, there have been difficult choices to make. We could have made a decision drastically to cut the number of university students; we could have cut student maintenance; we could have cut the funding to universities, without replacing it. Instead, we have opted for a set of policies that provides a strong base for university funding and makes a major contribution to introducing the deficit, while introducing a significantly more progressive system of graduate payments than we inherited. I am proud to put forward that measure to this House. [Interruption.]