This is a masterly piece of analysis that exposes the malignant heart of the government's attack on Univerity education. It shows it for what it - like the rest of this government's policies - really is, an ideologically-driven attack on public services that will not actually save money. On the basis of Collini's article, in terms of governmental financial loss or gain, the government might just as well given every university a 10% rise in funding. Please get a coffee, take half an hour and read - and then relay to all the ill-informed folk spouting things about how the country can't afford education etc.
The real tragedy, though, is that universities - especially university management - have been entirely complicit in this disgusting process. See previous posts - less in-depth and less well-written than Collini's - here under the search labels 'the state we're in', 'AHRC', and 'The Big Society'.