Platform: University fees: impractical, immoral and unnecessary

Published on Tuesday 31 March 2009 23:10

JOHN Haldane (24 March) argues the Scottish Government should introduce university tuition fees.

This is an impractical, unnecessary and immoral suggestion.

If students are charged, they need to borrow money to pay. Either they borrow from banks or the state. The former is impossible; banks are no longer willing to gamble on lending to students. If we accept John Haldane's argument that the state cannot afford to invest in education at the moment, then it also cannot afford to lend students the money to pay fees at the moment. Student loans will not be paid back for years. In the short-term economics of a recession, lending is the same as giving.

If fees are impractical, they are also unnecessary. A very parochial comparison is made between Scotland and England. Both spend a lower proportion of public money on university teaching than almost any other western country. The Slovak Republic, Korea, and Mexico for example, invest a higher proportion of wealth in universities than Scotland. Even after the anti-intellectual Bush regime cutting services to invest in the military, the US spends a higher proportion of public funds on universities than Scotland.

The decision by successive Scottish governments to systematically cut investment in universities over the past decade is disastrous. We have lost our industrial base to Thatcher and our financial services to the credit crunch. Universities are the only world-leading sector Scotland has left. How educated our population is will define our success as a country. Scotland's future depends on universities with proper public investment. Bankrupt students cannot fund a national economic strategy. Scots must once more take their place as the best-educated people in the world, and the government needs to pay.

Yet the government cuts investment in universities and spends millions on new roads and tax cuts for wealthy home-owners. We do not need student fees to properly fund universities, we need politicians willing to invest in Scotland's people.

Fees are also immoral. Scotland was built on the foundation of democratic intellect and we all benefit from a well educated society. Education benefits the person being educated – and benefits the rest of us much more. We are not the neo-liberal collection of independent individuals John Haldane suggests.

In Scotland, we know there is such a thing as society. We depend on each other. As we face a collapsing global economy and impending climate catastrophe, we all need a new generation of graduates to rebuild a sustainable 21st-century economy. We should all pay for that.

The argument for fees also ignores inequality. The impact of 3,000 on the son of a wealthy banker is not comparable with the impact of 3,000 on the daughter of a struggling nurse. Access to education must be based solely on ability and desire to learn, not on ability to pay.

The average Edinburgh student graduates with 13,000 of debt. Those from less well-off backgrounds can expect to borrow more than 20,000. The majority of students live below the poverty line. Our national strategy is based on education. The failure to fund students through this education is already almost bankrupting a generation. Fees would tip many over the edge.

We need to invest in universities. But that money should come from the public purse.

John Haldane's generation has left us saddled with debt, facing climate catastrophe, and rapidly running out of oil. Now he wants us to pay to learn the skills we need to clean up that mess.

&#149 Adam Ramsay is president of Edinburgh University Students' Association (EUSA)