Belt and braces
Demands by Labour and the Tories for an independent review of student support and university funding were narrowly defeated.
So those two parties, mostly, then proceeded to oppose the abolition of the endowment charge on the grounds that Scottish Government ministers had failed to establish a stable basis for university funding, overall.
But a majority preferred the option of scrapping the charge. The SNP, the LibDems, the Greens, Margo Macdonald and Labour MSP Elaine Smith voted for abolition.
Alex Salmond drew a history lesson. He said the pre-Union Scots Parliament had been the first in the world to sanction free education. The new Parliament, he said, had restored it.
Tough choices ahead, though, for ministers and for the working party on finance established with university principals.
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The graduate endowment is in a vote this evening. Good news all round? Cheered by all? Mostly - but not entirely.
There remains a longer-term question.
Firstly, though, the main item. The Graduate Endowment, currently 拢2,289, falls liable to be paid in the April after you鈥檝e been tapped on the head by your university鈥檚 chancellor to signal your degree of success.
(At St Andrews, the world鈥檚 finest educational establishment, graduands were lightly dusted on the nut by a species of cap said to contain a fragment of John Knox鈥檚 breeks. Happy days.)
Anyway, this endowment charge is to be no more. It will be scrapped for future graduates - and, importantly, for those who graduated last year. They won鈥檛 have to pay.
Those supporting abolition - the governing SNP and the opposition Liberal Democrats - say it restores fully free education.
Severe doubts
They say further that it didn鈥檛 work efficiently, that it merely added to student debt.
Those who harbour severe doubts - Labour and the Tories - say that ministers are ducking the wider issue of university funding.
Together, they want an independent review of student support and university finance.
Ministers reply that they鈥檝e established a working party with the relevant interests. They say that鈥檚 more likely to produce an early plan for action.
Any views? Ideally substantive rather than merely partisan.
Steely stuff
PS: As you know, I tend to let comment run free on this blog, without reply.
However, I cannot let the slight on my braces (or galluses, as I prefer to call them) pass without rebuttal.
For decades, I have deployed said garment to hold up my breeks. I will not have them traduced.
(For the avoidance of doubt, the foregoing is irony. The steely stuff will follow later.)
I'm 
Comments
I'm graduating this year and thankfully I won't be having to rustle up 拢2,300 next year. Personally the SNP have got my vote.
Surely its time that the government forced businesses provided more investment to universities? After all business (especially big business) benefit greatly from high quality graduates.
Brian,
Your 鈥済alluses鈥 have been your trademark for many a year, likewise you affection for your native heath in Tanadice Street.
But the dust on your head with Knox鈥檚 trousers, ah that has left a bigger mark as it did on many in your years at St Andrews.
Never mind tho鈥 your 鈥淎lma Mater鈥 like the 鈥淎uld Grey Toon鈥 will aye be there to welcome you and all back within it鈥檚 Walls.
It is not unreasonable to ask graduates to contribute something to the cost of their education after they have their obtained their degree.
Far better that than never actually finishing their degree course due to financial pressures during the three or four years they are at university.
While the rhetoric of fully free education, based on the ability to learn, not the ability to pay is laudable, words are easy.
It is not sustainable to have a completely free higher and further education sector when the aim is to have as much as 50% of young people going to university.
And for those who do attend, meaningful support in the form of increased busaries which allows poorer students to cut back on the hours they work in part-time jobs, and therefore levelling the playing field with their better off peers who often enjoy more parental support, while at the same time reducing the debt burden that would exist were all their support to be generated by student loans, is surely more pragmatic and ultimately will allow more to go to university. And make sure that they can stay there.
This is one of those stories that gives us a good insight into the world that politicians live in.
The one where saying that something "doesn't go far enough" is a good enough reason to oppose it entirely.
And the one where the scrapping of a charge is seen as a cost rather than a saving.
拢17m doesn't sound like a huge chunk of money in government budget terms, but 拢2000 is a huge amount for a student leaving university.
I had to pay the endowment when I graduated a few years ago (or rather, it got lumped onto my other 10k student debt), and it seems a bit arbitrary that 5 years later my younger sister won't pay it when she graduates this year.
But I'm not at all convinced that this is part of a coherent policy for higher education rather than another piece of populist nonsense (Berwick-upon-Tweed, anyone?), but then the graduate endowment was a very blunt tool anyway.
What a ramble - it's a complicated issue and I was really hoping Brian would just tell me what to think. Maybe he's in a grump after last night's frustrating draw aty Tannadice?!
Dear Brian
As a fellow Dundonian (and adopted Glaswegian) can I say I fully support your galluses?
Unless I get on my bike and cycle to Govan Law Centre I fear I may need to borrow a set of your very fine and elegant braces?
Mike
Instead of relieving students from paying this fee, surely it would be more useful and practical- especially in the long term- to follow up on the poverty of the students' in general? Freeing them from just one of the many monetary burdens by which they are oppressed would be like giving each student 拢2,289 in the hand, and at the risk of sounding cynical, this money is likely to be spent on something other than furthering their education.
Instead of relieving students from paying this fee, surely it would be more useful and practical- especially in the long term- to follow up on the poverty of the students' in general? Freeing them from just one of the many monetary burdens by which they are oppressed would be like giving each student 拢2,289 in the hand, and at the risk of sounding cynical, this money is likely to be spent on something other than furthering their education.
We were always so proud of our free education with the added benefit of any person from any area able to access our education system. We should not educate people from other countries for free but we should aim to give free education to all from Scotland. If we do not we must do as we do now import the educated from other countries which is not only unfair on these countries but these people have not had the benefit of our system.
Some years back we could even brag of grants to help people who could not afford to live while being educated.
So what happened;- we had "professional students" who stayed in education as long as they could. We had schools who denied entry to people from less salubrious areas no matter how clever. We had people who did not stay in Scotland to build their own country when they had taken advantage of this free education. I say give all the free education and the only time they should pay anything back is if they leave the country as soon as they are educated. Lets get back to a situation where we can again be proud of our system and we educate all the people we need.
It is not unreasonable to ask graduates to contribute something to the cost of their education after they have their obtained their degree.
Far better that than never actually finishing their degree course due to financial pressures during the three or four years they are at university.
While the rhetoric of fully free education, based on the ability to learn, not the ability to pay is laudable, words are easy.
It is not sustainable to have a completely free higher and further education sector when the aim is to have as much as 50% of young people going to university.
And for those who do attend, meaningful support in the form of increased busaries which allows poorer students to cut back on the hours they work in part-time jobs, and therefore levelling the playing field with their better off peers who often enjoy more parental support, while at the same time reducing the debt burden that would exist were all their support to be generated by student loans, is surely more pragmatic and ultimately will allow more to go to university. And make sure that they can stay there.
Well, the SNP have bought my vote for the next few years at least.
Graduating last year meant the horrible idea of paying 拢2k now when I want to enjoy the spoils of my hard-earned education (I was not a media studies graduate).
However, a public-justice part of me feels that I've bitten the hand that has fed me. By removing the fees, well, it attracts even more of those who are not perhaps suited to the University environment.
I always reckon an active scholarship program within the Scottish university system would be a far better use of funds than giving anyone the chance, and more focus on apprenticeships...perhaps moving some 'degree' courses under the apprenticeship umbrella.
It sounds elitist, but a great deal of pressure is put on some individuals to go to Uni at a time where they have little knowledge of themselves. From people I know, it seems to be worse to attempt a Uni degree (wasting 2 or 3 years at times!) and fail than to have focused on a job from the start and gain vital work experience instead.
A student with a failed (or 3rd - don't shout at me) degree has lost 4 years of paid employment and is thus out of pocket and often lacking the skills to get the vaunted 'graduate job' that leads (sometimes) to better pay and conditions than normal.
In an ideal world (or an ideal country), new graduates would follow a career path which would mean them paying higher taxes than non graduates, which in turn would pay for the further education of others.
However, this is not (yet) an ideal country, because this model doesn't work when all taxation is controlled by Westminster, and they decide how much of it we get back, and that determines how much is available for everything in Scotland.
It's not right and needs to be fixed urgently if we are to have an effective economy and further education system.
The simple root of the problem is that there are far too many folk at higher accademic institutions. The madness of "higher education for all" has left us with huge bills and higher education certificates.
It is time to acknowledge the excellent non-accademic oppertunites that colleges used to provide and stop trying to shoe-horn all our youth into an accademic box they neither want nor need to be in.
OK, so I'm fairly biassed on this, what with being a University student. I currently have around 拢12,000 debt. Not including the graduate tax that I won't have to pay now!
I therefore cannot comment fairly on whether or not student debt should be abolished. I can say personally I hope it is, since otherwise I'll be paying mine back till I'm well into my thirties. I hoped the SNP would be able to deliver on their manifesto pledge to scrap the debt. Sadly they cannot.
Why?
Because Labour, the Lib Dems and the Tories refuse to support this. But, like I said, I'll refrain from comment on the morality of this issue in an of itself. Here's my issue;
Why should I have to pay these monies back, when the politicians refusing to back a debt-ending act were themselves recipients of a grant??
Surely if Messrs. Alexander*, Goldie and Stevens are committed to having all students pay for their tuition, even if it means the long-term financial ruin of such students, they themselves will voluntarily pay back the grants they received for their tuition/living costs out of their own pockets, as a gesture of solidarity with the cash-strapped students. Won't they?
No?
Hypocrisy? Surely not.
Surely freeing students from the endowment fee would not tackle the causes of the problem, but only the results? For removing the fee would be the same as simply placing the 拢2,289 back in their hands, and at the risk of sounding cynical, I don't think the majority of students would use this money to further their education. A far greater problem is the lack of money for the students in the first place, a general issue which must be addressed first.
I'm a student and I'm not that impressed by the scrapping of the endowment charge! The Graduate Endowment represents a small fraction of student debt. I will leave university with a debt of just under 15,000 without the graduate endowment. The proportion of individual student debt that the endowment represents is very small. It's not going to make much difference to student debt nor will it have any great impact on the numbers going to university.
As someone who graduated last year I am (will be) delighted at the passing of this bill. It seemed to me to be a backdoor means of charging tuition fees.
I guess time will tell whether the SNP and Lib Dems are ducking the wider issue of university funding. I can't say I'm a fan of 'independent reviews', they seem to be a waste of taxpayers money. If there is an issue to be addressed then it will normally be apparent long before a review has reported its findings.
"...MSPs have voted to scrap the endowment charge currently paid by Scottish students after they graduate.
They voted to abolish the charge by 67 votes to 61..."
I can already hear the squeals from the English media and all the Little Englanders.
Keep a grip on yir breeks.
At least now we know the galluses are holding your breeks up, I thought they were holding you down.
As far as University funding is concerned someone needs to look at the usefullness of some of the courses and some of the meaningless and irrelevant research projects being funded by the Universities. I think Scotland's Colleges and Universities have one object nowadays, to get bums on seats irrespective of whether the owner will ever graduate with a useful education.
Brian
It pleases me that you have to wear galluses some 27 years after we first met but, as yet, I do not!
Wonderful news for those that are due to graduate, or have done in the last year. What about those who graduated before and have still to pay? What a lovely debt we have.
Don't even get me started on the fact the reason I graduated after 3 years and not 4 (meaning I wouldn't have to pay) to complete a post-grad in primary education,(after being inticed by the job opportunities) only to find out there are no jobs. All because the Government statisticians are unable to count! Maybe they need to go back to university.
It's true. He has worn galluses as long as I can remember. And, yes, I am related. My brother and I used to try and guess what the next pair would be like. Never got it right. Thought about a belt one Christmas, my father said he'd pay me if I did. Chickened out....
For decades, I have deployed said garment to hold up my breeks. I will not have them traduced."
Brian-if you were of normal proportions in relation to your height, just think, you wouldn't need galluses at all! A belt would be quite adequate.
Mind you, having sampled these Forfar bridies, (as I would imagine you have) I can understand your reluctance to experiment!
The plans for "free education" are not a "benefit to the taxpayer".
The SNP and Lib Dems would be better being honest about the true cost of education to the taxpayer. Too many unsuitable students go to university.
And don't tell me that no student spends any of their loans on purely educational material. The majority of students spend some of their money on socialising, mobile phones and the like.
I'm all for free education - provided that if students are to receive grants then they account for every penny.
If a student graduates then goes to work outside of Scotland, then where is the direct benefit to the Scottish taxpayer? And what of graduates who end up in jobs that do not require degrees? Is that not also a waste of public funding?
Firstly, I am surprised by the support Prof H has received on this site. His outburst made me angry.
Last nights Reporting Scotland implied that Prof H suggested that Lockerbie should profit from the aftermath of terrorism. If this is accurate then his comments are crass and he should hang his head in shame.
Fashion? He's slagged off Lockerbie for being 'a dump' I assume that means it's a bit tired looking. Maybe there's not a lot of money in the town so what do you expect Professor? Kids running about in Armani gear? Not a lot of logic for a Professor.
I'm all for free speech and loathed the Labour mob all reading from the same hymn sheet whether they agreed with the subject or not but I think he should engage his brain before he opens his oversized gob. Maybe he thinks what he has to say is important but I don鈥檛.
Prof H is an arrogant, self-righteous idiot who could well do with a few lessons in tact. Even his 'unreserved apology' was reserved, he can鈥檛 even apologise properly.
Some have accused us Nats of being quiet on this issue. I have been trying to post my comments for two days but couldn't due to server errors. Nat or not, I do not support his comments. I鈥檇 sack him.
However, I wish him well in his quest for a country full of pretty towns with pretty shops and pretty people who wear pretty clothes but can't help but wonder, WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU GOING TO LIVE PROFESSOR?
Still angry.
Can we hear a bit less about university funding and a bit more about school and college funding which is numerically superior,less class bound and more pertinent to those people who need to be attracted into trades and vocational activity generally?
It would seem more realistic to expect 25% of people to go to university and the rest to colleges or straight into employment in a small country of 5 million people.We will never match funding in England,Europe or America with or without graduate or tuition fees so should stop trying so hard.If all the parties in parliament are so hot on social democracy they should start practising what they preach and make sure that the limited public purse is used to help those in greatest need so they can benefit the country most!
Fantastic news that the endowment has been scrapped. I was very dissapointed that the 大象传媒 news at 10 didn't even mention the story (of course I wasn't surprised!). However, I was outraged that Reporting Scotland (after the news at 10) didn't mention it. I would have thought that a return to free university education would have merited a report. Also, why does Question Time when it's in Scotland never deal with domestic Scottish issues? Is it because the audience don't ask or because they don't get picked? Is someone at the editing desk trying to stop the SNP looking good? Surely not? Ps Brian, thank you for your continuing enlightening blogs, I just wish we could get similar coverage on TV!
hurrah!! Well sort of..
The abolition of the Graduate Endowment charge is very much welcomed, but compared to the debt I already have accumulated from 4 years of Uni (this does not include the course fees i had to pay myself) it is quite small.
Now, i dont think you can call education free when we still have to repay these student loans. As i completed my first degree ten years ago, i have noticed that my current debt is over 10 times what it was then.
I fear i may still be paying this loan off when i retire!!
'Education, education, education' was how Tony Blair set out his priorities for office - as Labour campaigned to put classrooms at the top of the political agenda.
End Of 大象传媒 Cutting.
Holyrood voted by 67 to 61 in favour of scrapping the one-off charge of 拢2,289.
The vote means current students and those who graduated last year will not have to pay the fee.
Labour and the Conservatives voted against abolition, after they failed to force the Scottish Government to set up a review into university funding.
End Of 大象传媒 Cutting.
Does Labour intend to change policy as much as Wendy Alexander changes spin doctors?
Craig
I am pleased the Tax was scrapped.
Imagine being a young married couple who graduate at the same time. Within your first year or working life, as you try and get your foot on the property ladder, start clearing your student debt, contemplate starting a family etc, you also have to come up with a spare 拢5,000 by April.
Good on the SNP for making our lives 拢5k less stressful!
To John Foster who thinks that;
"Freeing them from just one of the many monetary burdens by which they are oppressed would be like giving each student 拢2,289 in the hand"
Eh, let me explain something. If you have to add the fee on to your debt, because you don't have the money, and then the fee is abolished, how exactly is this giving each student 拢2,289?
If I don't have it in the first place, I'm still not going to have it come June when I graduate, it's not going to accompany that light dust on the napper that Brian mentioned in a shiny wee packet, it's just one less burden In will have.
So please, don't confuse this with some kind of SNP student bonanza where the big chap flies out in a hot air balloon pepperring our campuses with (Scottish) 拢20 notes.
Does no-one think its unfair that only students that graduated in 2005, 2006 and 2007 have to pay the endowment? I graduated with a law degree in 2005 and then went on to a post grad diploma(which i also had to pay for!). Its not even all students that graduated in those 3 years that have to pay - there are so many exemptions that it is ridiculous and ultimaetly only about 50% of graduates in each of the 3 years are left to pay for it!!! Surely there is some sort of human rights/equal treatment issues!
The Goverment mentioned in their consultation stages of the Bill that they had no plans to abolish the goverment endowment for students who became liable in 2005, 2006 and 2007.... I think that we should be encouraging the goverment to look at abolishing the endowment for all graduates (no matter when they graduated) and to find a way to return the money to those who have already paid!!!
I can't believe the negative and short sighted comments on this thread. Scrapping of the fees is a great start to sorting out the Farce that is 'Student Debt'.
Education is the answer to all problems. Nobody goes away from University with nothing gained from the expirience and as such, Society benefits in so many ways for years to come. Education is a solution to mass poverty in raising the overall quality of the population and more importantly providing them with hope and aspirations for the future. It is not a 'micro-issue' where people argue on whether an individual should pay or not for their education, because this is simply a short sighted viewpoint. Also, to suggest that some people are 'not suited' to University strikes of a negativity which Scotland should be well above. (Who gives anyone the right to make this judgement on an individual without providing the individual with the chance and opportunity to prove them wrong... particularly those from poorer backgrounds with wich this current 'step in the right direction' is a huge issue.)
I agree that Industry should do more to pay for University education as they are the ultimate beneficiaries. However, graduates leave university with increased confidence and skills which earn them higher wages and subsequently earn the Government increased tax.
Ps. 拢17 mil is absolutely nothing... a drop in the ocean. In Iraq & Afghanistan we have spent 拢7 Bil. according to the Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/11/20/nterr20.xml)
... We could probably have put All students in the UK, Iraq and Afghanistan through a free University Education with that cash, and don't get me started on the cost of replacing Trident.
The bigger picture is always the one to view.
It may seem hard when graduating with debt, but if we are to have 50% participation in higher education we need a change of culture whereby student debt,and/or fees are seen as a worthwhile investment by the student in his or her future. The only alternative would be higher taxes across the board, which would be unfair to those who never studied. I have travelled to the Far East quite a bit and I am amazed at how people in South Korea are prepared to make sacrifices in order to get a first degree in Korea, then travel overseas and get a masters, all at their own expense. They do this as they have not been a wealthy country as long as the UK and know that the alternative 40 years ago would have been working in the paddy fields. The UK needs to drop it's complaceny and our citizens need to see that if we are to compete internationally we need the best education, even if we have to contribute to it ourselves.
I was fortunate that when I was young I benefitted from a free University education, however I went on to earn a good wage and now pay a rather scary tax bill each month, so I feel I have more than paid back the state. One problem for our country now though is that international mobility has increased and more of today's graduates may end up being taxpayers in other countries, and yet the cost of teaching in our universities needs to be met.
Gordon Brown: How your 2p can send 100 million children to school.
Today, in Mozambique, led by Nelson Mandela, a message is being sent to every parent in the world: by 2015 every child must have the right to schooling and a school to go to.
Today, Britain is promising more money than ever before for global education and entering 10-year commitments with poor countries to make education for all a reality. We are promising to spend at least $15bn over the next 10 years on global education - four times larger than our commitment over the past decade. By this act 15 million children who do not go to school today will have the chance in the future.
End of Cutting.
$10 -$15 billion on global education, yet Labour with the exception of Elaine Smith vote against our own children in Scotland.
Craig.
I am rather disappointed that focus is being placed on the graduate endowment being scrapped only, without proper discussion being given to the wider question of university funding.
The University of Edinburgh, my own very fine institution, has an endowment of just over 拢200million. The University of Oxford has an endowment of 拢3.6billion. And the American universities are in an entirely different league altogether. How can our superb and highly regarded universities maintain their world class status without an enormous increase in funding?
It also seems to me that the SNP neglect to mention that student loans are not like other loans. I pay back my loans when I earn enough to do so and the rate of interest is the rate of inflation so my payments increase in line with my ability to pay. If only banks were that generous! This is not to say that student loans are the only solution. This is simply to say that student loans are not as demonic as may at first appear. But I agree with [11] above that a well-funded scholarship programme would probably be a better approach to the problem of those promising students from low-income backgrounds being given the same fantastic opportunity that I had. I wonder if such a scheme would cost about 拢17million?!
brian, i have to wonder at those student's who moan athaving to pay THIER own debt,ever heard of budgeting? this is what we all learn to do,surely getting your fee's paid,is a big help,remember the scot.gov.have a budget TOO. and it would cause a stushie if they ran out of money.
brian your gallouses become you dont think of getting rid,heaven forfend.
Hiya
Sorry Brian but the John Knox's breeks hat is Edinburgh Uni's graduation gimmick! Unless John Knox had more than one pair of trousers and St Andrews have a hat made from his Sunday pair! I was indeed bopped on the head by said trousers/hat at Edinburgh Uni in 1997, having got through with no fee's, loans and a full grant.