"We don't need no education"? Well we may well if we are a Lib Dem MP preparing to vote on the raising of the ceiling for university tuition fees from £3290 to a wallet screwing £9000 per year. A major part of the Lib Dem manifesto pre-election was to ensure the scrapping of tuition fees altogether, as famously promoted by Lord Snooty's valet and all the other front line fence-straddlers.
Back when Cameron was a student and smashing up restaurants as part of Cambridge Uni's notorious Bullingdon Club, there were no such thing as tuition or any other kind of fee payable by students, in fact they were given non-refundable grants to attend. The population of over 18s who made it to university level education then was proportionally an awful lot smaller, as universities were still places that largely took the brightest 1% of the populace, and not simply a repository for 50% of the same age group as a means of keeping them off jobless statistics as they are today. With the smaller population, the lofty notions of free higher education for all were affordable without impacting on other government department budgets.
This brings us to the nonsensical influence of devolution. If, as is looking likely, despite the whimpering protestations from the Lib Dem and even a few Tory back benchers, and the demonstrations by the students themselves (never thought they had it in them), the Bill to increase the fee ceiling gets through Parliament on Thursday, a rather farcical scenario will develop. Gwyneth from Cardiff, who starts at say, Bristol University next September will pay no more than the original £3290 ceiling, and any extra charged by Bristol will be funded by the Welsh Parliament. Rose from Bristol will pay the full £9000 (assuming Bristol charges top whack), and even if she goes to Cardiff University or anywhere else in the UK will still pay the full amount her Uni charges. For Bonnie from Edinburgh, it's even better. She will not pay a bean in tuition fees as the Scottish Parliament will pay it all for her, regardless of where in the UK she goes to study.
The Scots & Welsh Parliaments will have to find savings from elsewhere in their budgets to pay for this, but it begs a simple question. As there do not appear to have been any noticeable protests from over Hadrian's Wall or Offa's Dyke that as a result of subsidising the further education of their young, their transport, or social services, or any other budget is about to suffer swingeing cuts, does this mean that the UK Parliament's (read England's) grants to the both countries is too much? And why do Scots & Welsh MPs get to vote on what in this instance only really affects English students and their families....ah, that'll be the still unresolved West Lothian question.
One can easily imagine the resentment that will grow from English students towards their Scots & Welsh counterparts in English universities. Although devolution is a good thing, in this example a fairer system needs to be constructed.
Of course the whole thing is a bit of a red herring anyway. Who lends the English, and to a lesser extent, the Welsh students the money to pay the tuition fees? Government run loan companies that's who. With the repayment of these loans being put back until salaries reach a certain level (£21000 is being discussed), it does not take Stephen Hawking to work out that the repayments will take many years, and in a significant minority of cases there will be no repayment at all. The actual saving to our economy will be zero initially and minimal for quite a few years hence. Surely a fairer way of repayment is a graduate tax? At least that way every graduate will pay some of it back.
None of this would have happened if A-levels had not been progressively (a favourite Lib Dem word, that) dumbed down over the years, producing an unsustainable number of higher education students studying for worthless degrees that most employers have no interest in. The amount of resumés I receive as a prospective employer in the late summer each year, where although Johnny may well have a degree in Business Studies, he struggles to spell correctly or to construct a logical sentence is simply staggering! Note to any students reading this - if an employer gets past the first paragraph of your resumé you are in with a chance, so at least put the thing through spellchecker before you print it off.
For us dupes who voted for the Lib Dems as opposed to protest voting for them against Labour, this is the first serious example of them back-tracking on their election pledges, as evidenced by the long overdue politicisation of university students and the subsequent demonstrations. The next serious mass protest will be when Trident comes round for renewal, and Clegg & Co try to persuade us it is a good idea, thereby selling their principals down the river. Again.
However, the way things are going it may well be brushed under the carpet for the duration of this Parliament, but if not expect some marching in Whitehall.
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