Abtisam Mohamed has led a Westminster Hall debate on higher-education funding, warning that universities are being forced into repeated cuts under a model that no longer meets the cost of teaching and research.
The Sheffield Central MP said Sheffield Hallam University had lost more than 1,200 posts in just over two years. She argued that universities were expected to support regional growth, public services and research while operating with insufficient stable funding.
Mohamed criticised the proposed international-student levy as a way of financing maintenance grants, saying support for domestic students should not further destabilise institutions already reliant on overseas fee income.
Education Minister Georgia Gould told MPs that tuition-fee caps had been indexed for 2025-26, 2026-27 and 2027-28, and that the Government intended to legislate for automatic inflation-linked increases.
Gould said indexed fee income would safeguard around £6 billion over the coming year. She also pointed to £86 billion of research-and-development investment between 2026 and 2030, including £38.6 billion through UK Research and Innovation.
The debate did not produce a new funding settlement. Mohamed's central demand was for a long-term model that treats universities as national and regional assets while separating support for disadvantaged home students from volatile international recruitment.
