Just as plays have a classic three-act structure, so too do tricky political decisions: first you rule out a potentially popular alternative, then you put out the bad news and finally you sweeten the pill as you try to avert people’s worst fears.
Last weekend saw act one on the tuition fees message, with Vince Cable taking to email to rule out a graduate tax – and trying to pre-empt Labour support for it by emphasising that party’s own previous opposition to the idea. (Given the subsequent news of now Shadow Chancellor Alan Johnson’s continued opposition to a graduate tax, that policy looks to be firmly dead.)
Act two was the publication of the Browne report and Vince’s acceptance of the broad thrust of it. Comments from both himself and Nick Clegg left a large “read between the lines” gap, talking about how the government’s plans would be based on the Browne report whilst also clearly indicating that they would not simply implement it as presented.
Today brings the first part of act three – the sweetening of the pill in the form of over £7 billion to help the most disadvantage children all the way through from pre-school to university. In a speech later today the Deputy Prime Minister will say,
I can announce today that in the Spending Review we will provide extra funds – a total of over £7 billion – for a “fairness premium”, stretching from the age of two to the age of twenty: from a child’s first shoes to a young adult’s first suit. This is more than £7 billion spent on giving the poorest children a better start in life.
First, all disadvantaged two year olds will have an entitlement to 15 hours a week of pre-school education, in addition to the 15 hours already available to them at three and four years of age. By offering more help at an earlier age to the most disadvantaged children, we will directly tackle the gaps in attainment that open up in the critical early years of life.
Second, a Pupil Premium to help poorer pupils wherever they live in the country. Schools will receive additional funds to offer targeted help to every pupil eligible for free school meals and reduce educational inequalities.
Third, we must make sure that bright but poor children grow up believing that a university education is not out of reach. So we are looking now at what can be done to remove the obstacles to aspiration that hold back bright boys and girls from deprived backgrounds. Their passage must not be blocked. Alongside new reforms to Higher Education, we are proposing to provide a form of student premium for the least advantaged students…
The spending review is a difficult process. As a government, and as individual ministers, we need to be able to look ourselves in the mirror and know we did the right thing, even when – especially when – it is a hard thing.
But all of us in the coalition government, including the Prime Minister and myself, were not willing to compromise on, or negotiate away, our commitment to ensuring a better future for our children. There’s been lots of talk of “red lines” in the CSR process. It should be obvious from what I’ve said today that the reddest line of all is the one around our commitment to their future.
This announcement is very good news in its own right – a major investment in education and in helping the least well off in our society. (It is £7 billion over the CSR period, within which it builds up to an annual commitment of around £3 billion per year.)
But where does it leave us on tuition fees?
Added together with the Browne report, what looks likely (pending further Comprehensive Spending Review announcements) is that the cost of tuition fees will in effect be abolished for those from the most disadvantaged backgrounds, reduced for many others of the least well off (the IFS analysis of the Browne report was that the 30% least well off would benefit, and that is before today’s announcement) and increased for everyone else.
That leaves two problems. First, the opposition made to raising tuition fees by many Liberal Democrat candidates and in many Liberal Democrat leaflets. One reason so many Liberal Democrats readily campaigned against tuition fees – promising to vote against any increase and calling for their abolition – is that it is a crucial issue for many in the party. Liberal Democrat ranks are heavily loaded with graduates who have seen the benefits of a degree to themselves and whose liberalism makes them deeply committed to sharing those benefits as fairly as possible.
Second, the messaging. The whole situation would have looked very different – still troublesome because of the tuition fee increase pledges, but very different – if Vince Cable had emailed party members at the weekend to say, “We’re going to abolish tuition fees for the least well off. As we’re in coalition, we’ve also got to stomach increasing them for everyone else, but the Liberal Democrats remain committed to abolishing them and we will continue to press for the numbers for whom fees are abolished to be increased”.
This is not simply a political messaging problem, it is also one that could hinder the policy itself. As we saw far too often with policies such as complicated tax credits from Gordon Brown, policies which technically look good for the least well off don’t work if the presentation is so complicated that take-up is low.
In the case of tuition fees the overall message from the last few days is that the costs of going to university are going up and people will have even bigger debts. That in itself will almost certainly put some people off going to university even if, sitting down to work out all the detail post-CSR, it turns out they are in the a category who is going to be financially much better off under the plans.
It is also notable that the last part of my hypothetical Vince Cable statement – a repeated pledge to work towards abolishing tuition fees – has been stated by the party’s Federal Policy Committee (who have to approve the party’s general election manifestos) but not by Nick or Vince.
Even so, according to YouGov’s polling this week, Liberal Democrat supporters back Vince Cable and Nick Clegg’s change of stance on tuition fees by 56% – 30%. For one of the party’s most controversial decisions in the last decade, a majority backing is far better than it might be. However, the real risk is elsewhere: from the potential damage to the party’s activist base and from the party finding it harder to appeal in future to those who currently don’t support it.
£7 billion is a major step forward. But the lack of accompanying rhetoric about abolishing tuition fees for as many people as possible and as soon as being the third-largest party allows suggests that Nick Clegg and Vince Cable now do not view it as desirable or achievable to abolish fees even over the six year period planned in the Liberal Democrat manifesto.
Will the steps such as scrapping fees immediately for the poorest students (more generous that the immediate steps a majority Lib Dem government would have taken) and reducing payments significantly for many students be enough to avoid a Lib Dem split in the parliamentary votes? Most Lib Dem MPs pledged to oppose any fees increase (and the proposals currently allow for big, possibly unlimited, increases). Yet they also supported, without any votes against from their ranks, a coalition agreement that (only) said they could abstain if they rejected the Browne report.
Today’s speech is certainly the start of the third act of this three act political play, but it is unlikely to have been the end of it.
Note: post updated with some of the further details made public this morning.
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32 Comments
Welcome though this sounds, most of it is simply a rehashing of the existing Pupil Premium plan – let’s not start repeating Labour’s shameless multiple re-announcements of the same spending commitments.
Fundamentally, your article puts your finger on the problem: this Party is, quite rightly, committed to the abolition of tuition fees across the board, for everyone. That remains party policy, we have a fully costed plan to achieve that and the vast majority of our members (& hopefully MPs) remain committed to it. It is very sad that Messrs Cable and Clegg see fit to pursue their own, misguided agenda on this.
Good news now how about something to help school leavers find work and training then they can start paying tax and helping the defecit.Now thats a big society.
How much would keeping the cap on tuition fees cost? I heard it was £1.4bn. Can we not have that out of the £7bn they’ve found down the back of the sofa so that we can keep our integrity by keeping our pledge?
@ r patey – there’s first for everything; I agree with you ;o)
The pupil premium is great if Education weren’t going to be one of the departments in the firing line for the cuts. But we all know it is. So whether this is announcing £7Billion (over 4 years) to sweeten cutting an even larger chunk, we’ll have to wait till next week. And you’ll pardon me, but I don’t think there’s going to be too many people who trust Nick at his word after the Fees farce so whatever he says now will have to be scrutinised to see if there’s any ‘catch’.
Calling the Fees disaster a ‘tricky decision’ is masterful understatement.
I look forward to hearing Nick and the Party called a liar on the doorstep then rebutting with the killer line that it was a tricky decision. He might wish he lives in a world where he didn’t lie but the general public tend to view these things rather harshly.
It also seems ridiculous that if this £7Billion could be found seeming out of the blue then what on earth was Nick talking about when he blamed economic circumstance on abandoning Party Policy ?
The YouGov poll is interesting but early. And beyond the figure you plucked out are some very worrying signs of just how clearly divisive this is. Closing ranks and pretending all is well is not an option unless you intend to alienate a huge part of the voting base.
I fiercly welcome anything that helps disadvantaged and poor children and I doubt there’s many Liberal Democrats who won’t feels some relief at this, but if this is reheated money and spin to try and cover Nick’s shame and far bigger education cuts then he will simply reap an even greater whirlwind on his blundering Fees farce. Nick wasn’t photographed with the pupil premium signing an unambiguous pledge on it no matter how much we support this measure.
The bottom line is that reddest line of all is still that which makes the Nick and the whole Party look like unprinciple Liars and Nick crossed it.
The cuts will now make or break Nick.
Excellent news, the parents of those children will be happy. It will be nice for them to know that theres extra funds for their schooling whilst at the same time less money for them to try and put a meal on the table.
“How much would keeping the cap on tuition fees cost? I heard it was £1.4bn. Can we not have that out of the £7bn they’ve found down the back of the sofa so that we can keep our integrity by keeping our pledge?”
Because it’s not £7bn a year, but £7bn over the whole parliament. Apparently £5bn of that will go to the pupil premium, so it’s going to be £2bn spread over 5 years shared between the pre-schoolers and the poor students.
It’s not very clear without proper figures, but it looks as though the higher education component of this represents only a small tweak of what Browne recommended.
If the total per year from 2015 will be £3bn, and £2.5bn of that will go on the student premium, that will leave £0.5bn to be divided between preschoolers and students. Suppose the students get two thirds of it – that’s a third of a billion. But Browne already suggests that government spending in maintenance grants should increase from £1.4bn to £1.8bn.
Maybe the additional money would allow an extra £600 of annual maintenance grant for the poorest students, but I doubt that will be much help to those who are put off by annual fees rising to £7000 or more.
Interesting YouGov poll. Opposition to the tuition fee proposals is higher among the baby-boomer age group than it is among actual 18-24 year olds.
No dice, as Anthony Aloysius St says, when you take out the Pupil Premium and take into account the fact that this is over 5 years, this is really just pocket money.
You have remember the YouGov figure relates to current Lib Dem supporters, not those who voted Lib Dem in May. According to YouGov, 56% of that would represent 6-7% of the 24% who voted Lib Dem in May.
Surely Cable and Clegg should be gouging something painful from Cameron & Osborne in return? This is a massive compromise being demanded from the Libdems. What’s in return?
@Anthony – 6-7% as opposed to the 24% in May, surely? Otherwise we really are in trouble! (6% of 24% being a mere 1.5%…..)
My difficulty with the proposal for free nursery care for those on benefits with 2 years olds is that it is another disincentive to get off benefits, when what we need, as even IDS now appears to accept, is an integrated universal tax and benefit system which encourages work by tapering loss of benefits. How do you taper benefits in kind?
“6-7% as opposed to the 24% in May, surely? Otherwise we really are in trouble! (6% of 24% being a mere 1.5%…..)”
Yes, I meant 6-7% out of the 24%.
‘Premium’ sounds like dreadful policy speak as do 3 point plans. Nick has to do better than sound like a policy robot programmed to emit the word ‘fair’ every 10 seconds to sell this properly. He’s getting more distant and Balirish with every policy speech. Not a good sign.
In fact since Vince had to take the brunt of announcing the Fees U-Turn it’s strange that Nick thinks this good news is his privilege while any tricky decisions/lies he and Cameron decide to inflict on the Pary should be announced by the less fortunate MPs. That doesn’t seem particularly ‘fair’ to me.
SP: “distant and Blairish” That’s it! I’m getting a new keyboard. It’s my usual excuse for sloppy typing. 😀
@Anthony Aloysius St & Mark pack
Posted 15th October 2010 at 9:17 am | Permalink
“How much would keeping the cap on tuition fees cost? I heard it was £1.4bn. Can we not have that out of the £7bn they’ve found down the back of the sofa so that we can keep our integrity by keeping our pledge?”
Because it’s not £7bn a year, but £7bn over the whole parliament. Apparently £5bn of that will go to the pupil premium, so it’s going to be £2bn spread over 5 years shared between the pre-schoolers and the poor students.
………………………..
Interesting point Anthony …. if you are correct this is no a misleading article Mark . The headline gives everyone the impression it is 7BILLION A YEAR. Did you know this when you wrote it or were YOU mislead by Cleggs speach.??
Anthony also makes the very good point of the limited supporters that we now have left by definition being ones who do not object to being mislead ….or new supporters who were too right wing to join before.
@LDV Bob “Vince had to take the brunt ” – I shouldn’t count on it. Vince is by far the most enthusiastic proponent of the higher fees approach, he’s long thought like this. Not for the first time, Vince has been the driving force behind promoting an ill-thought out policy that the rest of the Party hates 🙁
The pupil premium was also a Conservative manifesto pledge. So the deal appears to be – Lib Dems shred their integrity and credibility over fees and in return Nick gets to pretend the pupil premium wouldn’t have happened without Lib Dems in govt. I’m really struggling to see what we are getting out of this coalition. Touted policy successes turn out to be marginal or things that would have happened anyway or things which probably won’t actually happen. It appears that members are just meant to be grateful that Nick is Deputy PM free to pursue his own policy agenda without reference to the views and aspirations of the party or the voters. The party shouldn’t be allowed to be broken by the vanity of one man. If the leadership are not held to account the fees fiasco will dog the party for years.
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This has probably more to do with getting people bringing up children off benefits. Nursery for two year olds is not education. It may be a nice idea to think the minds of three year olds are being stimulated by interacting with others, but there’s no evidence to suggest this produces desirable outcomes. In fact, if you watch 2-4 year olds in a pre-school environment, they don’t play with each other, they play alongside each other. Indeed, far from being a benefit, other children are a menace! It’s a disruptive environment – not a constructive environment. I don’t believe children under the age of four should be dropped-off and picked-up each day from child care centres in order to fit in with parents’ lifestyles. Under-fours should not be made to feel like an inconvenient pet.
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Mark wrote above: “Last weekend saw act one on the tuition fees message, with Vince Cable taking to email to rule out a graduate tax”
I think it’s important to realise that there was no mention of a Graduate Tax in the Manifesto. This was a red herring introduced by Vince in the summer, as something to be investigated by Browne, but which was later ruled out. Perhaps Vince, normally so thorough, had neglected to read the Labour document they are now citing which explained why it was unworkable? Or perhaps he knew all along, and was softening up supporters for reneging on The Pledge?
The clear intention of the Manifesto was that the money for not raising fees would come from existing taxation, closing loopholes, etc. It is not on to now say ‘ we must put up fees; a graduate tax was the only alternative and is not feasible’.
@Mark Pack
“Second, a Pupil Premium to help poorer pupils wherever they live in the country. Schools will receive additional funds to offer targeted help to every pupil eligible for free school meals and reduce educational inequalities.”
Now we know why the Blue and Orange Tories rescinded the eligibility for free school meals for a further
600, 000 pupils as soon as they took office!
What assurance is there that the pupil premium will actually be spent on those pupils for whom it is intended and not subsumed into the school budget in order to replace funds which have been removed because of education cuts? What guarantee is there that the pupil premium will not be spent on general provision? And if targets are to be abandoned how will the efficacy of the pupil premium be measured?
@Valeriet That doesn’t surprise me. As a graduate whose education was largely paid for by other taxpayers I feel very strongly that I would rather pay a bit more in income tax so that others can enjoy the same opportunity than see students in the future pay an additional 9% tax on income below mine. Most of the people I was student with feel the same way.
“Schools will receive additional funds to offer targeted help to every pupil eligible for free school meals and reduce educational inequalities.”
Not a great believer in democracy our Nick. The DfE is currently consulting on the best way to identify pupil deprivation. One of the options is free school meals. It sounds like Nick has made his mind up before the consultation ends.
Grammer Police
I’ll have to up my game.
@Liberal Neil
Posted 15th October 2010 at 5:21 pm | Permalink
Valeriet That doesn’t surprise me. As a graduate whose education was largely paid for by other taxpayers I feel very strongly that I would rather pay a bit more in income tax so that others can enjoy the same opportunity than see students in the future pay an additional 9% tax on income below mine. Most of the people I was student with feel the same way.
…………
@Liberal Neil.
Fully agree …. nice to find an issue on which we do fully agree 🙂
Clegg is fast becoming one of the most untrustworthy of MPs.
http://blogs.channel4.com/factcheck/factcheck-nick-cleggs-word-count/4423
That 7 billion is going to look pretty poor when spread around all those that are about to or already have been pushed into poverty by this coalition.
@LiberalNeil and John Fraser – indeed, I nearly wrote “guilty baby boomers!”
Re. the 2-year-olds – one thing that this policy will do is give them valuable exposure to English if they don’t speak it at home, at an earlier age. My daughter is home/community bilingual (we speak English at home and she speaks another language at preschool) and I really wanted her to start nursery at 2 for this reason. Aged 3, they’re more self-conscious of the fact they speak a different language, and it’s not as easy a start. I know the popular perception is that “they soak it up like a sponge,” but it’s not that straightforward.
The new pledged £7B to tackle and provide new opportunity for the worst off ,so that children can break out of poverty from the most disadvantaged homes is a good staring point for those who stand to get most from their chances in schools and universities.
`The `Pupil Premium’ will help provide find more targeted Teachers and introduce designed special one to one mentoring help in schools.It also will begin to address the startling fact, that only 3% of children on `Free School Meals’ are currently attending the higher achieving schools.This being a testament to the failure of Labour to do something concrete about educational inequalities…
The pledged £7B must be clear water new spending on children and not part of the roulette wheel of the CSR on 20/10/10 .It must be new money an done a new spending ledger and with targets e.g. immediate 130,000 pre-nursery places for 2 years.
The main angst for out talented top table Leadership is not just to convince the 7 million L/D voters from the May General Election that we are those who care about hardships of the student population but to see delivery in this policy today.
I belive that the Liberal Democrat most progressive part of the `Coalition Government’ has to be counted on progressive Education policy to the least off and also to be fairer to the middle income families, who have now taken a hit with the loss of child benefit, that had to be done.But they will not countenace two hits on loss of child benefit and much higher `Tuition Fees’ with out some remission.
I do believe and keep faith with the `Coalition Government’ that the earlier reduction of the `structural deficit’ is of primary importance but not at the cost of pulling up the darwbridge on all promise on making new Education chances for the worst off especially at the best schools and Universities that the Country has to offer them.
The Economy and its taxpayers should not be asked to pay off a profligate debt caused by the combine of the legacy of 13 years of irresponsible Labour fiscal rule and high spending stepping Bankers without tackling both problems.
The Bankers were given licence to earn and pay themselves excessive bonuses, as if there was no tomorrow and virtually given the right of passage to live the high life on champagne and caviar, in the City, with untaxed exorbitant lifestyle.
The point is that it was has not been the young and least off families that have caused the appalling `National Defict’ of £258B and nor was it the hard working middle classes the so called `Middle Englanders’.
Better to make the Bankers pay out larger taxes.This is Firer and pragmatic to the rest of taxpyers.
The naked unrependent grandeur of the reaping of £70K single sum bonuses will reverberate and resonate. It will continue to modulate the angst in the all targeted help going out from Governmnet to better the least off chances of all families to break out of poverty .
@ MacK
You have seen the problem with the pupil premium- schools will use the money on the general budget. With the scrapping of targets there will be no accountability for how the money is actually spent.
Would each and every head teacher be willing to account for every penny- on which particular pupils and exactly how it benefitted them?
Don’t think so.
Just a bit of gloss – better to have provided 600,000 kids with one decent meal a day.
This is what is meant by extra funds for education?
http://blogs.channel4.com/factcheck/spending-review-the-price-of-the-pupil-premium/4555