Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department will consider introducing discretionary provisions within home tuition fee eligibility criteria for British nationals living abroad who can demonstrate genuine and ongoing connections to the UK but were unable to relocate prior to their children commencing university.

To qualify for automatic home fee status and higher education student support, students must normally be settled in the UK and have been ordinarily resident in the UK and Islands for at least three years before their course begins. However, if a student has spent time overseas due to their own or a specified family member’s temporary employment abroad, this does not interrupt their ordinary residence in the UK, providing flexibility for those who have not made a long-term decision to live outside the UK. Decisions on whether a student meets the criteria for home fee status rest with higher education providers, which are independent and autonomous bodies. Student Finance England makes decisions about eligibility for student finance.