You've sort of moved the goal posts slightly here as I thought the emphasis was on the opportunity issue rather than the funding issue.
The situation I am thinking of involves a bright girl coming from a home where ambition was nurtured, a single parent home, by the way, but regretfully the breadwinner was retired early through ill-health so income suddenly stopped. The girl, who had not enjoyed the A level process, didn't think she wanted the Uni experience so went to work. Believe me, she couldn't have been "pushed" anywhere! During the year she experienced at work she realised she was not achieving her full potential and decided that, despite her circumstances, Uni it had to be. Wages were squirrelled away and when she moved "oop North" she managed to get a part time job with the same company that had employed her in her home town. She worked part time during the first two years only stopping work in order to concentrate completely during the last difficult year.
The only reason I tell this lengthy story is to illustrate that if the determination to get a Uni education is there, the cost of it will not deter anyone, upper middle or lower class. If it means enough to you, you'll find the money. Yes, she'll have a ruddy great student loan to repay but she'll also have the satisfaction of knowing that if she hadn't gone she would have always regretted it..
And, after the finals, the country will hopefully have gained a forensic biologist par excellence.