But if the comparatively few people from working-class backgrounds who want to go to university can't afford do so, things will never get any better.

That said, I do sometimes resent some of the 18-year-olds on my course who are getting their degree for free while I pay through the nose. Not because I don't think tuition should be free, nor because I don't think it's fair enough to charge people for a second degree, but because a lot of them take it for granted and piss around instead of doing work. We accelerated students often say to each other "Pah, you can tell who's getting their degree for free..." Using taxpayers' money to skip lectures and sit mute and unprepated in tutorials is not OK in my book.