Higher Education Fees

My hon. Friend is, as ever, way ahead of me and exactly right. The reverse of what one might have expected is true. In Germany, 63% of the student population—[Interruption.] Please listen to this, because it is important. In Germany, 63% of students have fathers who also went to university. That means that only 37% of the students in Germany are the first in their family to go to university—the figure in the UK is 51%. Only 29% of students in Australia have fathers who went to university. The figure is only 31% in Canada and 39% in the United States. The countries in which universities make the biggest contribution to social mobility are therefore those with the highest fees. How can that be? I agree that it is counter-intuitive. I will not deny to Opposition Members that that is not how one would expect people to behave. However, it is explainable. First, such universities have an incentive to expand the number of places, because they receive additional money for each place—enough money to pay for the costs of that place. They therefore massively expand the number of places. That makes it easier for people who have not had huge advantages in life, who have not been able to go to the best schools and who do not have the highest grades, but who are nevertheless huge potential reservoirs of talent, to get places.