British universities are increasingly becoming hostile environments – even for students who have always lived in the UK

The best of Voices delivered to your inbox every week - from controversial columns to expert analysis Sign up for our free weekly Voices newsletter for expert opinion and columns Sign up to our free weekly Voices newsletter SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. A new University League published by People and Planet, which ranks UK universities according to ethical and environmental criteria, reveals that over 85 per cent of the sector fails to provide financial support to long-term UK residents with irregular immigration status. The government has cancelled legal aid for almost all immigration cases since 2013, increased NHS surcharges, and expanded the category of “no recourse to public funds’” such that more and more people cannot access fundamental government benefits. Different fee statuses and refusing public financial support for students with irregular status operates at the intersection of anti-immigration policies and the marketisation of higher education to chart racialised limits around the claimants on public resources. Our vision, however, entails the abolition of tuition fees and the hostile environment, and a publicly well-funded higher education sector that is a site of critical learning, not a proxy for the Home Office.