The first thing that I find odd is the proposed cost -- £700m. Is that all? It that's correct it rather makes you wonder why the government introduced them in the first place. Can it be correct though? If, as the article says, it will save students and their familes 3,000 pounds a year, then on my calculations that means only 233,000 students will benefit. Surely there are more students than that in the UK who pay tuition fees? There are around 1m students in total, so that would mean 3/4 don't pay the fees, or in other words this is a classic Tory middle-class bribe.
Not that there is anything wrong with middle-class bribes, this after all is why the Tories exist. In fact given the minimal cost for the maximum publicity it's a pretty good policy -- even if only 1/4 of students do pay the tuition fee, I bet most parents expect to pay the tutition fees and they'll be relieved.
Of course the policy doesn't do much for the Conservatives attempt to present a coherent tax and spending cutting outlook. Believing that it will pay for itself is clearly wishful thinking, and taken with other policies such as the plans to scrap any road pricing schemes, if there is any coherence it is that of the Scottish Assembly. Furthermore there must be a question mark over whether they would actually implement it when in government, all political parties have a terrible record of sticking to their promises on student finance.
ps There's clearly a few errors in my above calculation. I was assuming (from the BBC report) that the 3000 pounds per year would be a standard fee by 2005 (compared with 1100 pounds now) when actually it appears that only a few universities will be charging it as 'top up fees'. Or so we thought. Last night the Tories correctly pointed out that Labour's calculation about how many places the Tories will need to 'cut' to keep their promises seems to imply that more than half will charge top up fees (i.e. similar to my calculation), which is quite a revelation. However the Tories shouldn't crow too much -- if it is an uncomfortable truth about the required level of funding that has been revealed it is one the Tories have to come to terms with as well, and ruling out fees makes it much harder.
posted by Matthew @ 5/13/2003 01:27:00 PM
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