{"id":19554,"date":"2019-07-18T10:06:13","date_gmt":"2019-07-18T10:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/smh.group\/?p=19554"},"modified":"2023-02-15T13:50:11","modified_gmt":"2023-02-15T13:50:11","slug":"student-fees-may-be-coming-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devstagesite.co.uk\/smhgroup\/student-fees-may-be-coming-down\/","title":{"rendered":"Student fees may be coming down"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A government-commissioned report has\nproposed significant changes to the funding of university students in England. <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Students resident in England (different\nrules apply in other parts of the UK) pay a maximum university tuition fee of\n\u00a39,250 per year, financed by a student loan. Further loans to cover maintenance\nplus interest at RPI+3% mean that at the end of a three-year course graduates\ncan start working life with \u00a350,000 of debt. That debt is currently written off\nafter 30 years, but until then repayments must be made at the rate of 9% of\nincome above a threshold presently set at \u00a325,725. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time of the last General Election,\nthe Labour Party\u2019s manifesto proposed scrapping future tuition fees at an\nestimated cost of \u00a311.2bn a year \u2013 the party\u2019s most expensive single\nmeasure.  The idea was predictably\npopular in many university towns and may have been enough to swing the vote in\nsome of them. After the election the government responded by setting up an\nindependent review of 18+ education in England.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That review, headed by Philip Augar,\npublished its report in June. There was a long list of recommendations,\nincluding:<\/p>\n\n\n\n