May will probably still be PM in two years time. The political chattering class love to work themselves up into a frenzy on a Sunday morning. On a practical note, the Tories should abolish tuition fees altogether, cutting Labour's ground from beneath it. Voters are not going to accept a cut in fees when the Opposition is offering to abolish them altogether.
No. That would mean raising taxes on skilled working class C2 voters who voted Tory last time and are mainly non graduates to pay off the fees of lower middle class C1s who voted Labour last time and more likely to be graduates. Political suicide.
Far better is to link fees to post graduate earnings, with degrees which lead to higher earnings paying more and the reverse as suggested Hammond may do on the Sunday Politics
Corbyn claims that he can abolish tuition fees without putting up taxes -he says that it can be paid for by putting up corporation tax. This has not yet been refuted. The Tories need to understand two things 1). Not a single member of the current cabinet will beat Corbyn in an election 2). Tuition fees have to go -at least for those whose degrees lead them to socially useful jobs like teachers/doctors etc.
We cannot gave world class universities without tuition fees though scrap them for.sone socially useful degrees maybe.
Corbyn cannot even get a poll lead against May with Opinium today
If the proposals re fees are really what @Big_G_NorthWales is saying, then I can't see that cutting much ice with students at all. All this does is cede further ground to Labour on this issue.
Meanwhile, looking at events this weekend, I'm more and more convinced that whenever the next GE is, it won't be won by the Tories. They are so bad that I honestly wouldn't rule out voting Corbyn in 2019/2020/2021/2022 (whenever the next GE is).
Given you never vote Tory hardly a surprise!
I'm a Labour supporter but a staunch opponent of Corbyn. I believe that a Corbyn government would destroy the Labour party and toxify Labour for a generation. A Labour defeat at the next general election would save the Labour party from that fate. The Tories might not be able to win the next election -although the belief that Corbyn will might well be the self denying prophecy that predicted Labour wins often are -but neither can Labour win an outright majority. A hung parliament with a minority Labour government at the mercy of the Liberals and other parties will frustrate Corbynista dreams of a hard left Jerusalem, anger a lot of people who will be disappointed by his broken promises in office, while at the same time annoying a lot of moderate voters and paving the way for a Tory landslide.
If Hammond cuts tuition fees from £9k to 4K, risk is that it makes Corbyn plan look more affordable.
ie Response will be "If you can suddenly find the money to cut fees that much then it's not that much more of a stretch to abolish them completely".
But politically probably still better for Con than doing nothing.
The proposals are to reduce fees to £7,500 with a government grant of £1,500 for the top universities. Also to reduce the loan rate and increase the starting figure from £21,000 to £25,000
Additionally to require value for money and address excessive salaries and perks at the top
£3k is about the highest defensible level. Reducing it to £7.5k is peanuts. It won't make any difference to your debt servitude if you are a graduate earning mid £20k per annum.
The point in the Times article is the concern that some degrees are proving near worthless with students starting on £12,000 - £16,000 salaries will the top universities graduates average £45,000 wthin 6 months.
Some of these so called Universities should be turned into FE colleges
They do not *average* £45k - te article says graduates from Russell Group universities earn "up to" that. But likely only the ones that have joined Goldman Sachs.
Comments
Corbyn cannot even get a poll lead against May with Opinium today