"student / university finance – an increase in taxpayer-funded maintenance grants which contradicts the principle of tuition fees;"

Not so. These are an increase in grants targeted at students from the poorest background; a highly progressive move designed to encourage such students into university. Indeed, for all its faults, it was the 'top-up fee' bill (passed through parliament under Blair's stewardship) that brought the return of the maintenance grant. To suggest that grants are autmatically at odds with the principle of tuition fees is disingenuous to say the least.

Finally, let's not forget that Reform is an organisation that argues against the use of increased government spending in Higher Education.  

• The report claims to "review the progress of public service and economic reform" in the Blair decade. Yet the 99 pages only briefly mention Tax Credits twice (repeating an identical critical point). Surely Tax Credits are one of the major reforms in the ten years, so should warrant extensive study in 99 pages.
  
• I was gob-smacked in the intro (page 5) to see the the comment "In crime, the success has been to increase prison places", as if prison was a positive social end in itself. Later on page 21 the rationale is given "the average criminal commits 140 crimes per year, an increase in the prison population of 35,000 would reduced the number of crimes by 4.9 million per year".  Is this a fair analysis? Doesn't seem all that plausible to me. The source given is "Making punishments work; David Green, Civitas" but I can't track that down online. A later Times article  "Prison is a Bargain" by David Green is on a similar line, but different numbers.
  

 When you look more closely at the full Reform report, you see they want to reduce public spending to about 1997 levels, reduce the size of the NHS, and introduce educational vouchers. Essentially Reform is offering classic Tory policy, with "reform" to improve state sector efficiency. Here are a few quotes from the full report:

• reduce public-spending-to-GDP from the current level of 43 per cent of GDP to the levels of Ireland and Australia (around 35 per cent) in two Parliaments (page 7)
• a phased programme of tax reductions to increase incentives, to give individuals room to invest in themselves (page 7)
• The NHS, for example, is probably 25 per cent overmanned ... NHS workforce has increased by 280,100 since 1997, from 1,058,700 to 1,338,800. An increase of over a quarter. (pages 7, 9)
• Understand that higher public spending can frustrate reform. The very big increases in NHS manpower and capital, for example, are huge barriers to change; they absorb resources that could be better spent elsewhere, and they make change expensive and difficult. The mantra “investment tied to reform” is wrong. (page 6)
• successful school reform: School funding would follow parental choice – and allow children to be sent to a state or independent school. (page 38)
• This means that the new direction is based on a new partnership between the State and the individual. ... the basic level of education which is the passport to participation in the global economy.  But it must recognise the new requirement for individuals to invest in themselves and provide for their own and their families’ welfare needs. It must also recognise the penalties that large government sectors impose on incentives. (page 38)