Can Labour pay for university fee cut?

Of course they can. Plenty of countries in Europe don't have any fees at all and do extremely well. I don't know if Labour would carry through with that promise (I don't think they can afford not to, given how the Lib Dem's broken promise practically destroyed them) but regardless, it's not enough. It's still going to leave most people in a huge amount of debt.

I agree it will still mean people leaving with a large amount of debt, but if they tweaked the repayment rates a bit as well, it would mean more people would be able to repay their debt in full, making the system more sustainable. I mean, I went to uni under the old system, and I have very roughly £30,000 of debt- so how much debt do you think it's acceptable for students to end up with?

I don't really think it should be acceptable for students to have any debt simply because they want to become educated. We're living in the 21st Century - having an educated and intelligent population is in society's best interest, it's not some commodity for economists to play around with.

I do agree with this, and it would be nice to have a free university education for everyone who wanted or could benefit from one. However, I do think you have to balance this with all the other things society also wants, such as an NHS, a welfare system and good schools.

I do think it's really important to communicate to everyone how important graduates actually are for society, and I don't think we should make going to uni punitive at all. The thing is, at the moment, it's not really punitive, because most graduates will not pay back their debt- so funding university is still the government's problem, it's just that a lot of people aren't aware of this.

It's not one or the other though. There are many highly successful European countries that have public healthcare and better welfare and education systems than us yet they also have free (or heavily, heavily subsidised) higher education. There are so many sources of money for these project, like stopping this pointless austerity, stopping fossil fuel subsidies, raising taxes for the ultra rich, cracking down on corporate exploitation and the banking sector etc.

I'm trying to phrase this in a non-agressive way, but which countries do you mean? The only one I can really think of is Sweden, and I would say their universities aren't really competitive with UK universities in terms of quality.

Yes, there are lots of things we could do, but you have to bear in mind that ultimately increasing the size of the state would mean increasing taxes for everyone, which most people (in the UK) are ultimately against.

I would prefer a mixed system where there was still some investment from the student, but some government subsidy for all courses, with more subsidy for courses deemed important/useful to society. I would also be in favour of much larger grants for university students, possibly partly funded by a graduate tax.

both of which are very harmful to society, despite the fact that the degree would probably be regarded as useful by many.

If oil/gas production stopped it'd be even more harmful to society...

I don't understand why people always say this. Obviously if you suddenly stop an industry society is addicted to, you've got a problem. That doesn't mean we need more people going into the industry. People joining O&G are not contributing constructively to society, they are contributing to an industry that is actively opposing the kind of change we need to have a hope of keeping the planet comfortably habitable. I'm not and never have suggested that we suddenly obliterate the O&G industry, I'm saying we make it socially unacceptable to join it so people start contributing to industries that genuinely operate for the good of mankind and the environment.

Which industries genuinely operate for the good of mankind and the environment? Any organisations in particular?

The public sector in particular (obviously excluding publicly owned industries like Gazprom), but generally any organisation whose actions are sustainable and are not resulting in environmental or humanitarian harm.

Sweden is a good example. Germany and Finland also both have very good healthcare and better education systems than the UK. Their universities aren't as competitive as those in the UK, but that's largely because of historical reasons rather than poor courses or facilities. I still doubt it costs significantly more for a university to carry out an undergraduate course in the UK than, say, Sweden. If they are able to afford free university education then so should we.

And no, it doesn't mean increasing taxes for everyone. It means increasing taxes for the wealthy and corporations which they are, of course, going to be against but contrary to some people, I think we should actually be designing policies for the good of society rather than the good of the wealthy and powerful.

I strongly disagree with subsidies for courses "deemed important/useful to society" because it is completely impossible to define what those courses are. A lot of people would say STEM courses are in that category. Looking at the STEM courses I have offers for, a huge number of people go into IB and the Oil & Gas, both of which are very harmful to society, despite the fact that the degree would probably be regarded as useful by many.

Considering the current system is less profitable for the government and the old system made more money as people could actually pay it, cutting uni fees will pay for itself plus some.

The public sector isn't sustainable under any definition, least of all one about the environment. The NHS carbon footprint is MASSIVE and the armed forced routinely cause humanitarian harm...

Or was there a subsection of the public sector you were thinking of?

No, of course it isn't sustainable at the moment. It's completely impossible for any large organisation to be sustainable at the moment. Which is precisely why we need as much investment as possible going into allowing them to be sustainable, rather than persuading people to continue to go into O&G.

Also, I should have probably excluded the Armed Forces from my definition.

I typed out a long reply to this which TSR lost

At the end of the day, this is a thread about election policy, and the first hurdle is persuading people that university education is worth subsidising at all.

As an Environmentalist, I don't think courses where the majority of people go into IB or oil & gas are beneficial to society. However, there are STEM courses which are beneficial to society- you are never going to find alternative energy sources without engineers, and you are never going to preserve the environment without ecologists and biologists. Equally, there are lots of non-STEM courses that are hugely beneficial to society.

I would also say your perception of Germany is possibly skewed, having known people who have lived there- certainly their health systems is not free in the same way the NHS is free. Equally, due to the way their tax allowances work, low income people are generally better off in the UK. IMO, countries with a population of less than <10 million aren't really comparable to the UK.

Obviously, in a utopia, we would tax the rich more and make corporations actually pay tax properly, but political parties do have to be pragmatic.

Why can't the NHS choose to? They have the buying power to do whatever they like.

I guess the DWP is a humanitarian organisation.

What planet are you living on where the NHS has billions of spare change to spend on sustainability programs? Why are you completely avoiding responding to the points I'm making whilst making unhelpful sarcastic remarks?

You just need to cut the repayment threshold. Can leave fees were they are.

The Government has never made money on fees, They still end up paying an LEA top up.

Sorry about the lost post, happens to me too often too ):

I've starting a degree in Earth Sciences. I'd argue that this is one of the most beneficial courses in existence since it specifically trains people to understand the planet and how it works, giving them a really excellent understanding of why it's so important to be sustainable and how to go about doing this. I personally cannot understand how so many people can spend years studying this beautiful planet and then go into a field that's as destructive as O&G (or as unhelpful as IB), but that's the fault of their consciences (or rather, the lack of it) rather than being the fault of the course. There are plenty of people in the Earth Sciences that do a lot of good with their degree. If you judge the usefulness of occupations, it should depend on what people actually do with their degrees rather than the title of the degree they took. Engineering, you're completely correct, is a very important area. Yet many top Engineering students also go into IB and O&G, as well as high-end engineering consultancies that serve the personal indulgences of the elite.

And I know that the German healthcare system isn't exactly the same as the UK, but they also invest more money in areas that we invest less in so I do think the two countries are comparable. And I don't really see why countries with smaller populations are incomparable - they've still got the approximately same ratio of taxpayers to university students.