Fresh concerns have been raised over the sustainability of part-time higher education in the UK after it emerged that the Open University is forecasting a ?30 million deficit this year, and another major provider started losing money.

In its latest?, the OU posted a deficit after taxation of ?17.9 million in 2017-18 compared?with a ?9.8 million surplus in the previous academic year.

When one-off costs ¨C including ?27.7 million for ¡°restructuring and strategic change¡±, of which ?13.3 million related to voluntary staff severance payments ¨C are excluded, the university¡¯s deficit stood at ?5.2 million compared?with??2.4 million in 2016-17.

However, the Open University, which had 174,898 part-time students last year, told?Times Higher Education?that it had ¡°a projected operating deficit of around ?30 million¡± for the current academic year.

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The figures emerged after a difficult period for the OU, marked by the resignation of vice-chancellor Peter Horrocks amid staff opposition to plans to cut courses and jobs as part of a ?100 million savings drive.

A ?30 million savings programme was subsequently approved, and an OU spokeswoman said that the institution aimed to ¡°return to a surplus in 2019-20 and¡­achieve our target 2 per cent operating surplus in 2020-21¡±.

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The university ¡°remains in a strong financial position with substantial reserves which were deliberately built up prior to the 2012 funding changes in England [which] were designed to give the university some protection ahead of uncertain fluctuations in student numbers and to help us invest in change to increase efficiency and support student success¡±, she added.

Meanwhile, Birkbeck, University of London ¨C which specialises in evening courses and where a third of new undergraduate enrolments in 2017-18 were classed as part-time ¨C also returned an underlying deficit of ?518,000. This was the first time it has failed to return a surplus in a decade.

Birkbeck expects to be in deficit again in 2018-19, but intends to achieve a 5 per cent surplus by 2022-23, its accounts?.

The weakened finances of the UK¡¯s leading part-time education providers are likely to strengthen calls for England¡¯s post-18 education?review to recommend policies to protect this area when it reports in early 2019.

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Claire Callender, professor of higher education policy at Birkbeck and the UCL Institute of Education, said that the review should recommend government subsidies to lower the cost of part-time courses.

¡°If you want to see a continuation of part-time education, you probably need to bring down the overall level of tuition fees and that will involve reintroducing subsidies ¨C I just don¡¯t see how else this can be done,¡± Professor Callender said.

Universities also require financial incentives to teach part-time students who are ¡°more expensive to teach than full-time ones¡±, she added.

¡°We also need to rethink how the apprenticeship levy is used so employers can encourage staff to undertake part-time study,¡± Professor Callender suggested.

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Birkbeck said that it had a ¡°strong balance sheet based on a decade of recurrent structural surpluses, [which] given the decline in part-time and mature students¡­is testimony to our institutional agility and resilience¡±.

It also highlighted the ¡°impact of Brexit¡± regarding its deficit, stating that the number of non-UK European Union?nationals, who have ¡°historically been a significant part of the college¡¯s student population¡±, has halved since the EU referendum in June 2016.

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jack.grove@timeshighereducation.com