Should I vote Labour Mark 11

One thing, Corbyn said this morning they will be scrapped this Autumn , this is 2017 not 2018

This increase in income tax for the top 5% of earners is going to have to finance an awful lot of Labour's policies! Theoretically.

"Labour will abolish tuition fees for home students in England studying standard undergraduate first degrees at established universities and further education colleges from the academic year starting in 2018 – the earliest it will be possible to pass the legislation through parliament. (University is already free for EU students in Scottish universities)

· To discourage students who are planning to start university this September from deferring until after tuition fees are removed, we will guarantee to immediately write off their first year of fees.

· Students part way through their degree will not have to pay fees for the remainder of their course. Part-time students will be covered for the cost of their first undergraduate degree.

· Students who have already graduated will be protected from above inflation interest rate rises on existing debt. And we will look for ways to ameliorate this debt burden in future.

· We will seek to provide free tuition for EU students and seek reciprocal arrangements at EU universities as part of the Brexit negotiations. We will remove EU and international students from the net migration figures and preserve the current system of fees for non-EU students.

· The average student leaves university with almost £45,000 worth of debt, which they would pay off through their lifetime. Under our plans this will be reduced by an average of more £27,000 for students who don’t qualify for a maintenance grant, and to zero for students who do.

· We have costed the abolition of tuition fees at £9.5 billion annually in 2021/22 prices (the £11.2 billion figure for higher education listed in our Grey Book published alongside the manifesto also included £1.7 billion for maintenance grants). Over four years (from 2018/19 academic year, this is £38 billion). It will be paid for by increasing income tax for the top 5 per cent of earners and reversing the Conservatives’ cuts to corporation tax. The £9.5 billion is an estimate of the actual revenues currently being paid to universities through fees, and this money will all go directly back into universities so they will not lose out.

· In 2015/16 there were 365,700 full-time first year students studying their first undergraduate degrees in England (Higher Education Statistics Agency). In 2014/15 there were 38,600 part-time students studying their first undergraduate degree (own calculations). Assuming student numbers stay roughly constant, approximately 400,000 students will benefit each year."

Costings, just in case anyone doesn't want/can't be bothered to read links.

Did you take into account the currently unpaid loans and those they think will remain unpaid Elegran? Or the increased taxes that many of those with degrees can earn?

If only we had an edit button - of course, I should have added I will vote Labour. I only wish the LP had a different leadership team. It doesn't. Their policies are generally much better for the country and they do seem to have been costed. In any event, why should public services be destroyed because of so called austerity. We are a wealthy country. Countries that prioritise health, social care, education etc etc have better outcomes than we do.

press.labour.org.uk/post/160943491984/labour-will-lift-38-billion-debt-burden-from

Same with this.

I support spending money on the Arts - the recent focus on mental health confirms that the Arts are important in supporting our mental health. We need the arts to be part of school and ordinary life if we want to improve our society.

I don't support abolishing student fees totally. I believe £3000 a term for a couple of hours as week is extortionate. Two year degree courses, rather than 3 would lower student loans and for many degree courses would be achievable.

The fact that not all graduates "use" their degree in their working life shouldn't negate the importance of those who choose to, going away to university. I absolutely agree that the emphasis on A level and Degree level study detracted from proper vocational training or apprenticeships. other European countries seem to manage this so much better (as they do health and social care). The polarised discussions on so many of the political threads tend to confirm the need for all of us to recognise everyone's point of view is important and consensus, where its achievable, has to be better than all out war.

By the way, Annie used to read Labourlist, so she could have got this information.

labourlist.org/2017/05/pm-corbyn-would-scrap-tuition-fees-from-this-september/

Proper figures and timing here, Elegran.
Your figures are assuming that every student's fees are scrapped from September. That's scaremongering!

Enough has been said, angie, about the Tories "deliberately" targeting the poor because of their hatred of them, so why shouldn't someone say that Labour policies will ruin businesses? They might not be trying deliberately, but they could well succeed.

Not any more, I don't, roses. I know she used to be as she said so.

You mean, Socialists shouldn't be asking how sixteen and a half billion pounds can be produced in a few months for one part of their expansive agenda, dj?

I can see that ab is not a Marxist/Trotskyist as a great deal of Labour MP's and voters are not either.It is a crass comment to make durhamjen to belittle another poster in this way ( who you know is a staunch Labour supporter.)

roses "they will try and ruin businesses."??? Why on earth would they want to do that???

Here is a stab at costing free further/higher education.
University fees can be up to £9,000 per student per year
There were 2.28 million students in higher education providers (excluding further education colleges) in the UK in 2015-2016.

The cost of their fees could total
£9,00 x 2.28 million = £16,560,000,000.
That is more than sixteen and a half billion pounds a year (taking a billion as a million million) If you follow the US in taking a billion as a thousand muillion, it is over 165 billion pounds a year

This number of students seems not to include those in further education colleges. I couldn't find any numbers or costings for those, but they would add considerably to the total. Then there are the mature students taking advantage of "lifetime learning" for the rest of their lives.

If fees were paid, many more students would enroll who are put off at the moment by the cost. That would be a good thing for their education, but the cost to the taxpayer would be astronomical.

Promise anything that does the trick is the watchword.

No I haven't seen them either Jen - but then the Theresa May team doesn't seem to have done either.

Annie, you are most definitely not socialist.
No good pretending you are any more.

Who believes the Tory costings?

Sorry, forgot, there aren't any. They don't need to give us any until the Autumn budget, do they?

Can you confirm how these university fees will be paid in two months Whitewave?

Point made

You cannot promise all the things they are promising without tears before bedtime.

Who believes the Labour costings? It will be printing money and massive borrowing.On top of that they will try and ruin businesses.

Costed by an independent body is not a stab at costing, it is costed.

Tories have no costing whatsoever

But Angelab, making a stab at costing isn't costing . I don't recall the Tory manifesto promising a quarter of what labour are promising,

I understand they want to keep as many seats as they can but I think this is as far as they have thought, if they were to win the election the same would happen to Lsbour as happened to the Libs, and they collapsed because of one broken promise.

To be fair I don't think that TM has made any wild promises in her manifesto. Unlike the LP which just seem to be give, give give without the foggiest clue where the money will really come from.