Employers have been warned to expect an increase in the number candidates coming to interview with fake degrees on their CVs if students are saddled with rising tuition fees.

The warning from Eyal Ben Cohen, managing director of CV verification and background screening expert Verifile, comes ahead of today’s House of Commons vote on tuition fees.

According to a report from Verifile, the number of confirmed bogus institutions claiming to operate from the UK, has risen by a 24%, taking the number of degree mills to 337 in the UK alone, while a further 219 institutions are suspected mills and are currently under investigation.

Cohen says: “It’s clear that fake institutions are on the rise in the UK and the government is not doing enough to fight it. In costly education systems like the US, degree mills are everywhere.

“We fear that pushing up the cost of UK education will only increase the demand for fake universities and encourage more people to use their bogus ‘degrees’ as a way to improve chances of employment.”