Baroness Jenny Tonge, a former frontbencher, said Mr Clegg and Mr Cable, along with other ministers should not support the government in its plans to introduce higher tuition fees. She said: "Those Lib Dem ministers who signed the pledge should resign rather than betray their principles."
Following proposals from Lord Browne over the future of university funding Mr Cable admitted on Tuesday that it would not be possible to stick to the promise to scrap tuition fees made by his party in April this year - even though it was one of the central tenets of the party's manifesto. However, he has suggested that charges will be capped at £7,000 per year. Mr Cable explained: "The road to Westminster is covered in the skidmarks of political parties changing direction."
Lord Browne recommended that the current £3,290 cap on fees should be lifted - and raised the prospect that institutions could charge as much as £12,000 a year for some courses. In a statement to MPs, Mr Cable said: "The Government endorses the main thrust of the report but we're open to suggestions from inside and outside the House over the next few weeks before making specific recommendations to Parliament, with a view to implementing the changes for students entering higher education in autumn 2012."
The Coalition could be at risk of a rebellion by Lib Dem MPs unwilling to accept the new plans. Greg Mulholland, MP, said Lord Browne's future for universities was "a compromise that some party people cannot and will not accept". Simon Hughes, the deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, has warned that young people could be "discouraged from going to university because of the risk of significant debt at the beginning of their working lives".
