Irish passport = fee free Scottish education...

lol I'm Northern Irish but would rather pay fees of astronomical amounts than call myself an irish citizen and have an irish passport. I feel really strongly about my British identity and couldn't give thta up even if it meant no fees!

I think Nationality is much more important than loyalty to phone networks!

I've seen a few of pages on the internet with similar concerns that I would have eg I just found this: http://www.fsicrew.info/forums/snp-discriminates-against-unionist-students-t18440.html

Also, Gregory Campbell's comments on this page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-17900220

Scotland's education policy towards England and Wales is a joke.

Live in England? Pay £9000.
Live in Spain of Greece? Go there for free.



They can get their independence in 2014, good riddance I say.

Northern Irish with an Irish Passport. Parents wanted me to go to Uni in Scotland like my brother. I wanted to go to England so I applied to all English Uni's and have offers. Don't I feel really smart now.

From what I'm aware, it is not as simple as that. Scottish people get university for free because the Scottish government pays for it. EU students get university for free in Scotland because their country, not Scotland, pays for it. England and Wales only subsidizes about half of the money, which is why they have to pay £9000.

Well obviously the Scots aren't going to freely give tuition to Poles while charging the English if there were no legal compunction to do so. However they DO have the option to waive fees for UK students. And frankly, the fact that they can even consider NOT giving fee waivers to the very people whose taxes pay for their universities is despicable.

Why would they when the rest of the UK won't even givè their own students free tuition, I don't get what you're so angry about

I'm angry that UK taxes go towards Scottish-only benefits. The Scottish government isn't providing free tuition. The British taxpayer is providing free tuition, but only to Scottish students.

And as for your solution of 'the rest of the UK giving its students free tuition':

1. It's unaffordable. The only reason the Scots can do so is because they are subsidised by UK taxpayers.

2. The English are unrepresented. There is no English Parliament, only Westminster. And when the tuition fee vote went through, Scottish MPs were quite happy to vote in favour, knowing that their own constituents would never have to pay.

Well obviously the Scots aren't going to freely give tuition to Poles while charging the English if there were no legal compunction to do so. However they DO have the option to waive fees for UK students. And frankly, the fact that they can even consider NOT giving fee waivers to the very people whose taxes pay for their universities is despicable.

The Scottish government's budget comes from the UK budget. So the UK pays for it.

EU students studying anywhere in Europe are paid for the country they are studying in (or by fees, which must be the same as domestic students)

The reason the Scottish government is able to do this is simply that the UK, rather than England, Scotland etc is the EU member state. It's a loophole, which they are exploiting, against the spirit of the law, to discriminate against British students.

So you were/are prepared to pay £9000 per year in England (and repay after £15,000 earning threshold), rather than rougly £3500 per year in NI?

I would be put off applying to England for the reason above.

totally agree

and

'"With such a unique situation, the Scottish executive should take an equally unique approach to Northern Ireland students.

"Rather than only those who are happy to have an Irish passport gaining free university places, the Scottish executive should remove all fees for students from Northern Ireland.

"This would restore fairness in that those who wouldn't be comfortable being an Irish citizen can still avail of free places at Scottish universities.

"Those who do not accept being labelled as Irish should not be disadvantaged to the tune of up to £27,000 over a three year period."'


well said Greggers

unionists need to be more steadfast and consistent instead of waivering to republican ways so quickly. It's making Unionism look feeble and fickle

If you are too pretentious to order an Irish passport then you SHOULD be charged those fees, I know if I was promised lower fees I'd have gotten a British one.

Do you think it's a bit of a loophole that needs reformed? I mean for example pretend there are two people, Person A and Person B. Person A and Person B are both born in Belfast (part of the United Kingdom) and live in the same area all the way up to age 18. Person A identifies themselves as being British and Person B identifies themselves as being Irish so they each get the appropriate passports. Despite both never having lived in the Republic of Ireland, Person B is now eligible to free university education and Person A living a few miles away has to pay £9,000. To me, this is ludacris. Northern Ireland obviously has a very different nationality issue than other countries and I think because of this, the Scottish government should really reform this as soon as possible.

you what??

if anything, it's those that order Irish passports purely for the offer of no fees that are the pretentious ones.

and it's called acting on principles. At least i'm being consistently unionist

I admire you for standing by your principles, however, if you wanted to go to Glasgow university would you not apply for an Irish passport anyway?

I'm at a Scottish uni right now and nope, will not be ordering an Irish passport anytime soon.

Not really. The EU law is pretty clear. It's just its drafters didn't forsee that the Scottish government would be so malicious as to discriminate against its fellow British citizens.

As for 'axing the EU budget', I would remind you that even countries not in the EU pay into the budget. It's part of being able to access the internal market, and even the BNP want access to the internal market.