Tories coy over rethink on fees.

The article informs that u-turn by the Conservative Party in Great Britain on tuition fees and the expansion of higher education looks likely despite the wrangling over the leadership that overshadowed policy discussion at this week's party conference. In an interview with the journal "The Times Higher," Stephen O'Brien, the party's Higher Education Spokesman, hinted that it was "difficult to envisage" the Tories advocating anything other than a "co-payment" system in future--with students and the state contributing to the cost of a degree. The Tories currently oppose tuition fees. As "The Times Higher" has reported in recent months, party insiders admit privately that the policy of commercial-rate loans rather than tuition fees "hit a brick wall" with voters at general election.