Jeremy Corbyn plans to scrap tuition fees - is he right?

How old are you?I have recently left school and I tell you they are desperate for kids to go to uni for their league tables. Also uni isn't a piss up if you do it right. To me it sounds like your to old for this site anyway with all your swearing and rudeness I think a lot of people would rather remain poor & socially happy than be rich and rude. This is a matter that effects young ppl its our burden of debt which predicted forecast shows will end up worse of for the whole economy anyway.

No one would want to be poor.

I agree with you second point, I would also view English as valid because that's still a traditional subject and still productive(in my opinion), but honestly I don't understand how you could feel the same for cop out subjects, with the sorts of people that take them that just simply have never worked hard.

Scrapping them is unsustainable

Some people don't know what they want to do at 16. Anecdotally, I finished school and loved music so took music and music technology A-Levels and am now doing a PhD in maths.

If I was put on the heap at 18 for doing a 'pointless' subject I'd not be in the position I am now. But equally I wouldn't ever begrudge someone doing a music degree to try for a career in music. I think my point is don't be arrogant in thinking STEM subjects are the only important ones because they're not at all.

Of course he's right. Most progressive countries in the world have realised the importance of higher education to society, it's a shame that the UK is still stuck in the "Education is a commodity" age.



Yet countries like Germany and the Netherlands have free or extremely cheap higher education. What's different about those countries that means they can afford it yet for some reason the UK will languish if we scrap fees? It has nothing to do with the economy, those countries prove it. It has absolutely everything to do with attitude and politics.

mmm even so I think you're an exception as an individual. But out of interest you must have done maths at A level as well ?

They should not be scrapped, tuition fees aid social mobility, although I suppose it is better for Labour if we don;t have social mobility because if we did all those Labour voters would start turning blue...

How on earth do you justify the statement "tuition fees aid social mobility"? Students who don't come from wealthy backgrounds are going to leave university with over £50k debt in many cases, having to continue repayments for the rest of their working lives (in the case of 75% of students). Wealthy students may not even have to take out loans in the first place. Tuition fees do not aid social mobility, they do the literal opposite.

How old are you?I have recently left school and I tell you they are desperate for kids to go to uni for their league tables. Also uni isn't a piss up if you do it right. To me it sounds like your to old for this site anyway with all your swearing and rudeness I think a lot of people would rather remain poor & socially happy than be rich and rude. This is a matter that effects young ppl its our burden of debt which predicted forecast shows will end up worse of for the whole economy anyway.

Because the nature of that debt is a rather generous repayment system and write off. What fees allow is greater funding for the universities and thus larger grants for more people. I know of people at my university with grants combined from the university and SFE large enough that they do not need the loan (although I think that you should not be allowed to refuse the loan unless you are also receiving no grant money from SFE). All you have to do is compare England and Scotland. Yes, the education system is pretty crap in Scotland and massively favours the wealthy, but if you compare the percentages of disadvantaged students from Scotland at university and England at university, a much greater percentage go in England, despite the fees; then look at as a percentage of the student population, WAY bigger in England. Then look at independent school students going to Scottish universities, 12% vs a national attendance of 5% (admittedly, I don't have the figures on hand for England). Scottish universities rely on English studnets and international students for much of tehir funding, they have less to help the disadvantaged, in England this is not the case, the support is more widely there.

Pretty much this. I don't like how it's possible to get into university courses with A Level grades that are average or less than average (which is roughly a C). To me university should be reserved for the academic elite. It's supposed to be challenging and getting a degree is supposed to demonstrate that you are more academically able than most people. Under our current system a degree is becoming less valuable, especially as I believe I read earlier this year that more than 50% of 18 year olds intend to go to university. It completely destroys the notion that it's an elite institution when even people of average academic performance are going to university.

Scrapping them is unsustainable

But surely that also has something to do with the lack of decent alternatives? You can't just reserve university education for the "academic elite" without addressing the fact that the average person's options when it comes to finding a decent paying job are severely limited without a degree.

I'm 29. I know it's not a piss up if you do it right - I have no problem with students that do sensible degrees and work hard; my main gripe is at people that go to uni as a piss up on the tax payer and come out of it 3 years later with a dreadful degree that qualifies them to do nothing, so the country never sees the benefit of its investment and the student never pays off their debt. The government should cut funding for courses that statistically don't demonstrate value for money to the country.

I graduated 4 years ago and you forget that I also have a student debt to pay. I'm not rude, I'm direct. Young people need to get some ****ing perspective.

Scrapping them is unsustainable