EDUCATION

 

      Alan Milburn – the coalition's child poverty adviser –has criticised the alternative to the EMA, saying the bursary scheme is flawed. Photograph: Dan Chung for the Guardian.

 

      The coalition made "a very bad mistake" when it abolished the education maintenance allowance (EMA) in England aimed at helping poorer 16- to 17-year-olds stay on at school, Alan Milburn, the government's adviser on child poverty and social mobility, tells the Guardian today.

      Before publication of his controversial report into improving access to higher education, Milburn also warns that there is no evidence that money being spent on tuition fee waivers designed to help low-income students at university is "in any way" effective.

      Universities run various waiver schemes but students might have their first year of university paid for by the state if they had been eligible for free school meals. Milburn instead calls for much of the fee waivers money – the budget is due to rise from £94m this year to £261m in 2015/16 – to be transferred to restoring a revised form of the EMA, scrapped in 2010.

      The suggestion is part of a wider assessment of how the government and universities spend nearly £600m to help children from poorer backgrounds attend higher education. Universities are estimated to spend as much as £81m on outreach.

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