Costs-of-living crisis: Calls for Scottish Government to write off paramedics' student loans

Rebecca Smith says paramedics left with thousands of pounds worth of debt are feeling ‘forgotten about’

The Scottish Government is being told to wipe clean paramedics’ student debt, as they struggle with rising debt during the cost-of-living crisis.

Since 2021 the Government has provided bursaries of £10,000 a year to those studying to become life-saving paramedics. However, those who studied paramedic science prior to this have been left with thousands of pounds worth of student loan debt.

Rebecca Smith, who graduated from Glasgow Caledonian University in 2021, said she felt her and her classmates had been “forgotten about” and “singled out” by the change to providing student bursaries.

Rebecca Smith graduated from Glasgow Caledonian University in 2021.

She said: “Those I went to university with and the years before me had to take out student loans to survive. In 2021 there was a big campaign because of our struggles with student loans, and now paramedic students get a bursary of £10,000 a year that doesn’t need to be paid back.

“So they have no debt, but we are having to pay back our loans every month and the interest is getting higher and higher.”

Ms Smith said her student loans, which were around £6,000 a year, only covered her rent and she had to work on top of her studying to make ends meet.

She said: “I got £4,000 a year less than students now. We couldn’t have lived without it.”

The Scottish Government is being urged to write off paramedics' student debt.

The interest on Ms Smith’s student loan has rocketed to 5.5 per cent in recent months. She is now having up to £300 a month taken off her pay check every month as a result.

Earlier this year paramedics got a backdated pay rise, and this extra money saw £500 coming out of her pay check to cover her student loans.

Ms Smith, who is now a paramedic in Forfar, said: “Paying off our student loans is a big chunk of our wages. And because of the cost-of-living crisis, our interest started at 1 per cent, but it is now 5.5 per cent.

“Last month I paid £250 and only about £100 of that was paying back the debt, the rest of it was all interest. It could take up to 20 years to pay it off.”

Ms Smith previously wrote to Angus North and Mearns MSP Mairi Gougeon asking for help. She has now submitted a petition to the Scottish Parliament asking for paramedics’ student debt to be written off.

“I feel we have been singled out because students now don’t have this problem,” she said. “This was a brand new course and we were some of the first to do it, and I feel we have been forgotten about.”

A spokeswoman for the Scottish Government said: “While we listen carefully to the committee’s consideration of this proposal, the current position is that students who commenced their BSc paramedic science degree before the bursary came into effect in 2021, will still need to pay back any student loans they have received before the introduction of the bursary in 2021/22.”