University research is underfunded against its true costs to the tune of billions of pounds every year, and much of this gap is made up through the fees of international students.
Changes or further freezes to tuition fees for home students in England would mean universities receive less money, creating another large shortfall.
This gap would need to be covered by increases in productivity, a deterioration in the student experience or redirecting the cross-subsidy from international students to home students.
If international student fees are used to fill in a larger gap in the funding of home students, they will no longer be available to cross-subsidise research, making it much harder to hit the ambitious R&D targets.