So uni fees are going to increase?

[nearlylovemyusername]

University sector calls on Labour to raise tuition fees to ‘stabilise the ship’ (ft.com)

Given paywall, the essence it this:

"One former university vice-chancellor said the fact that Labour had acknowledged the sector was “in crisis” indicated that Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer and Phillipson, who have not ruled out a tuition fee increase, were likely to act.

“The short-term pain of putting up fees could be blamed on the Tory inheritance . . . and then traded against a transition to a better deal for young people, which Labour can deliver before next general election,” he said."

So it won't be limited by VAT on PS, uni fees will be up, potentially significantly and repayments for higher earning grads will go up much more - this is what artical says.

What shambolic handling of the finances? You really can’t believe all the bollocks you post, surely?

@justasking111 Of course some 18 year olds plot what degree and what career. I agree loads don’t but they need to be shown data on degrees, unis and earnings. Of course if you plough on and do no evaluation, then you probably don’t get far. If you go to careers events, look at possibilities and put together a decent cv, of course you can get a career. As the majority do. However I do see lots who do have to take very basic non degree work and this now appears to include some science grads.

The shambolism is well documented! Selling off gold reserves when price was at lowest/deliberately creating a client state of dependency by reframing welfare as ‘tax-credits’ )!) that people are entitled’ to and creating an entitlement culture where people who are perfectly capable of working full time choose only to work 16 hours to keep their ‘benefits’ And yes I know them personally-they talk quite openly about their Br9own-enabled scam.

However I do see lots who do have to take very basic non degree work and this now appears to include some science grads

That's always been the case though, and not really a problem - the cost to the treasury was calculated to be about 60% of loans repaid - that kept it pretty much the same cost wise as pre-loans.

75% get a grad role within 15 months - most of those remaining 25% will too - it might take a little longer that's all. Their degrees aren't going to evaporate if they work in a warehouse for a couple of years while they work out what to do with their lives.

A very small minority will never get grad jobs - mostly women who become SAHMs (so financially comfortable and invested in their dc's education).

I doubt very much that anyone mentions their “Brown enabled scam” when he hasn’t been anywhere near power for 14 years. Almost a decade and a half, incidentally, in which the Tories could have changed this “shambolic” policy. Why do you think they haven’t?

@titchy I think it is a problem and there are so many more grads having to do this.So many more do to uni and expect better. Disappointment is rife after parents have forked out. It’s also clearly illustrated by the grad premium for lifetime earnings getting lower and lower. Ifs has crunched the numbers. We have student loan “debt” of £250 billion! We could use that money elsewhere!

We seem to want more and more young people to go to uni. It expanded like topsy during austerity and now we are paying the price.

Brown conducted a Pensions raid resulting in people losing confidence saving for the long term and invested in property instead inflating the prices and contributed to the current housing crisis

We have student loan “debt” of £250 billion! We could use that money elsewhere!

Well yes, we could fund unis directly like we used to, and like most of Europe still does! Not that an English Gov will ever do that.

The premium may be less than it was, and yes I am familiar with IFS, but it's still there and still substantial.

The fact remains, the vast vast majority get graduate jobs and graduates out earn their non-grad peers by a good chunk. That's a success.

I despair. All the posters of the smug threads on here, just desperate for the Tories to be voted out and labour to get in, will then be devastated when it costs THEM more.
It’s ok for other people to pay of course, but not them or their little darlings. It’s hogwash. The system is utterly broken, billions wasted and not a person of integrity to vote for in any party. I would honestly rather put all my money on an actual bonfire than give a single penny of it to Angela Raynor or Nigel Farage. But then the Tories are shit too. Literally nothing to celebrate and no one to vote for in our political system. Whatever government we get moving forward, we will ALL end up paying more, for it to be pissed away.
Oh and for the person who said British Business doesn’t invest in their staff? Again, hogwash. We have a small business but we have put staff through degrees, through IOD qualifications and numerous vocational qualifications. I absolutely do my bit to upskill people for the future, all the whilst paying a fuck ton of tax. Not every business owner runs off zero hours contracts (I wouldn’t DREAM of it. My staff are the highest paid in our sector, we pay far above living wage to everyone, even apprentices, And I’m proud of that) and exploitation. It’s bloody frustrating though when you are paying SO MUCH and apparently, it still isn’t enough?

All the posters of the smug threads on here, just desperate for the Tories to be voted out and labour to get in, will then be devastated when it costs THEM more

I personally would be delighted. I value functioning public services over a few extra quid in my bank account.

And while your theory about pensions and house prices is interesting @Mycatsmudge, I’d like some evidence that any economist shares your view.

@titchy You know as well as I do, that’s not affordable! At least this way the uk gets some money back. It also subsidises all those less well paid careers that now require a degree. Yes, we could go back to the good old days when the health degrees weren’t needed. That would help everyone! If we want 40% carry on going to uni, and a degree educated nhs, plus degree educated actors and artists, 100% state funding just isn’t possible. Nor is thinking about money from hard pushed alumni from unis that have been around for 30 years and mostly train for lower paid jobs. We need a rethink on quality and quantity.

I know it's not affordable - that's why I said an English Gov would never do that. Fees HAVE to go up (and I think they will).

I support nursing (and teaching) being made into grad professions as it goes - but do think some sort of loan forgiveness should be available to those who work for the NHS for a number of years (and yes I am aware this is Reform's policy....).

Agreed. That was one thing in the Reform manifesto that I actually agreed with - remove interest on tuition fees.

The whole system needs to change - have a graduate tax instead of a "loan". I'm old enough not to have paid fees but I have paid for my university education multiple times over through my taxes.

We need a well educated workforce - charging tuition fees is an odd concept and one we've sadly imported from the US. Most European countries do not charge them. We also need way more apprenticeships at all levels and carrots and sticks to get employers to train people instead of expecting other employers to do it for them.

That pension raid soured a lot of people. There's talk of it being raided again with the lump sum withdrawal being taxed on private pensions.

It's not just pension lump sum - last year Starmer promised to reverse increase of annual allowance, so most likely it's going to be 40k, not 60k pa and it's nearly certain that marginal tax relief rate will be replaced with some much lower one.
Separately, pension is not a part of estate now under IHT rules, Guardian articles a few days back says it will become one.

Well the money has to come from somewhere I guess 🙈

Pensions have been attacked for tax. Labour seem to think their voters don’t have pensions. It’s utterly foolish. It also keeps people away from benefits for longer. Saving won’t be worth it.

They dropped the plan to tinker with annual allowance. The main issue they will have with lowering the annual cap or reintroducing LTA is huge swathes of senior medics who will not do the work to clear waiting lists as it would be punitive.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cd11n2krmm4o.amp

It won’t be them. Labour will exempt them. It’s everyone else who will be hammered. Doctors walk on water don’t they? Isn’t everyone else considered rich and fair game if they have similar pensions? Even ones where the government didn’t make a massive contribution? Eg the self employed.

It's not about LTA though - it's about how to accumulate a decent pension pot in you're on DC and how it's taxed then. And yes, agreed with PP, at some stage Starmer did say that doctors and civil servants would be exempt from LTA. It's yet another change from him.

Money possibly have to come from somewhere, but before taxing the same group even more and killing any incentive, they should consider how to spend available money more efficiently.

Didn't Labour bring in university fees in the first place?

Yes. They had to as part of their policy for 50% of the population to be graduates. How else could that have been paid for?

The IFS have clearly been keen watchers of this thread. and published a whole new report on the topic at hand.

This is the Press release
https://ifs.org.uk/news/difficult-choices-higher-education-finance-ducked-main-parties-manifestos-freeze-tuition-fee

Cherry-picking from it

• Universities’ finances have fared unexpectedly well in the last five years. In 2021/22, the sector-wide surplus (adjusted for mostly one-off pension effects) was 6.1% of income.

• Strong growth in the number of international students has shored up university finances in recent years. By 2021/22, international students accounted for a quarter of all students (eg undergrads and postgrads) at English universities. But because they pay more than domestic students, international fees accounted for 44% of total tuition fee income in 2022/23, up from 32% in 2016/17.

• However, at 3.7% of income, the adjusted sector-wide surplus in 2022/23 was lower than in most years since 2015/16, with one in five institutions now in deficit.

• Providers’ forecasts suggest only a tiny sector-wide surplus for 2023/24, and even this is based on optimistic assumptions about strong growth in international student numbers.

This worsening financial situation is largely down to a long-term squeeze on teaching resources for UK students, which – due to a long-running cash-terms freeze in the tuition fee cap – have now fallen by nearly 20% in real terms since 2012. This is approximately the same real-terms level as in 2011 (before the tuition fee cap was trebled from £3,000 to £9,000). This continual erosion of per-student resources cannot be sustained indefinitely.

A new government could let the current freeze expire at the end of the 2024/25 academic year. In the following year, this would see the tuition fee cap rise to £9,450 and prevent a further real-terms funding cut of around £260 million. By the end of the next parliament, the cap would stand at around £10,500 on current forecasts.

Increasing tuition fees would increase student loan balances. As loan repayments don’t vary with the total amount borrowed until the loan is paid off, two-thirds of graduates from three-year courses wouldn’t make higher repayments until at least their 40s, in the late 2040s.
^^
Alternatively, a new government could increase teaching grants to make up for the effects of a continuing freeze. Graduates would have lower loan balances to pay off, but this would be around four times as expensive for taxpayers as allowing tuition fees to increase in line with inflation.

Then this is the full report

https://ifs.org.uk/publications/higher-education-finances-how-have-they-fared-and-what-options-will-incoming

From the Higher Education Statistics Agency updated data linked earlier in the thread, that in part answers some of the questions around income and operating costs that a number of pps have posed.

This is the income breakdown for the 20 unis with the highest income for the most recent published year, plus a second slide showing what each of those elements represents in terms of their income percentage.

and for additional context the view for unis overall (league table listed) since 2014/15 in terms of those income components.