Trainee teachers to lose fee exemption when colleges start to charge £3,000

The Government is to waive fee concessions for thousands of trainee teachers when top-up fees of up to £3,000 a year are introduced by universities next year. The move has prompted a warning from the Conservatives that it will worsen teacher shortages in the classroom.

At present, students on one-year Postgraduate Certificate of Education courses for trainee teachers are exempt from the now £1,150-a-year tuition fee. However, Kim Howells, the minister for Higher Education, told MPs yesterday that universities would be free to charge the full £3,000 a year for students on these courses from 2006.

He added that ministers were planning to offer them all the concession of a non-means-tested grant of £1,200 a year to help cover the cost.

"We are working on the basis that the first £1,200 of the £2,700 maintenance grant (which is available to all students from the poorest homes on three-year degree courses) will be non-means-tested for PGCE students," he said.

He insisted that the level of grant that will be on offer to the students would be the same as at present.

Dr Howells' decision was immediately attacked by Chris Grayling, the Conservatives' higher education spokesman. "This is very bad news for student teachers," he said. "Being forced to pay for a fourth year of teacher training, having already racked up three years of debt at university, will deter many young committed men and women from joining the profession. This will only create additional teacher shortages in schools that are already suffering from severe gaps in classroom staffing. "It is a thoroughly retrograde step that we pledge to reverse."

He warned that the decision could be extended to "doctors, nurses and radiographers" in the future.

David Rendel, the Liberal Democrats' higher education spokesman, added: "It is going to introduce a very difficult anomaly between those on the PGCE who are charged variable fees even if part of it is remitted and those on the graduate training programme who won't have to pay."

A review of the impact of the new top-up fees was promised to MPs last year as a concession to persuade waverers to back the top-up fees legislation. Dr Howells said this might result in changes to the student support arrangements. He accused Mr Grayling of "speaking with a forked tongue with a vengeance", adding: "This lot [the Conservatives] want to cut the number of teachers."

Record numbers of trainees have applied for courses this autumn but there are still vacancies for maths, science and languages teachers in particular.