From James Graham’s Quaequam Blog, I see that a majority (18 of the 29 members) of the Federal Policy Committee have declared that they will vote in favour of including the tuition fees pledge in the manifesto. James, the Secretary of the Social Liberal Forum, writes:
Some of the names on this list are surprising. They can’t be dismissed as lefty malcontents – far from it. I would be very surprised if there weren’t other FPC members who would have signed the letter had the organisers managed to track them down in the short time period on Tuesday.
The letter, published in today’s Guardian, notes,
as a clear majority of members of the FPC, we think it would be valuable to clarify now that we predict that our commitment to scrap tuition fees, as part of our plans to create a fairer society, will indeed be included in the manifesto and that the party will be united in strongly campaigning on this in the run-up to and at next year’s general election.
Declaration of interest: I am a member of the Social Liberal Forum.
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16 Comments
That’s brilliant news.
Charles Kennedy, Steve Webb, and especially Evan Harris deserve profuse thanks for standing up for the right thing.
Pity. A university education is not a right, and it shouldn’t be treated as one.
The main reason for opposing this is that the student and middle class vote is desired. There are far greater injustices (including the injustice of minimum wage workers being taxed to send middle and upper class children away to university for 3 or 4 years).
Declaration of interest:my household has debt from both a UK university education (a paltry amount really) and a US private university education funded through loans. Its not as bad as politicians make out – and would be far better if we did not have to contend with inflated housing and rental prices and other unnecessary costs.
Only someone called Tristan could make that point! I suspect a rosy, middle-class view of debt…. (and apologise in advance if Tristan’s dad is a dustman!)
No, University education is not a ‘right’, and is not treated as one. It has to be earned through entrance exams, A levels, interviews, etc. But it IS a social good. It benefits the whole of society, including the poor who pay far less towards it than the middle-classes (and will pay even less or nothing at all with Vince as Chancellor, whilst having a better chance of going to university with smaller class sizes). It deserves our support. Well done FPC for standing up to be counted. Clegg needed his wings clipping, and they have been well and truly clipped. The recession is serious and the national debt is large. But it is not so serious that we should undermine our investment in the brightest of our future. Growth will return, and the debt will be repaid. Savage cuts now will undermine recovery in the same way they did in the US post 1929. Oh, for a bold Roosevelt, rather than this puny orange booker.
Hurray! This should surely be one of our defining policies for fighting the next general election.
Terry is absolutely right, some cuts in spending we may need to support, not savage cuts. Educating our young people will be for not just for our social good but also our economic good. The economy will need more educated and skilled individuals to advance our competiveness. Surely the Conservatives can advance the unattractive Thatcherite monetary policies, supported by the media, we are the party of Keynes let us oppose them.
Ok, Joe, answer the point well made by Tristan – its not a universal right to go to University, Vince has made the point that too many go already…so, how can the country afford this policy? What’s the point of a manifesto with lots of promises and plenty of goodies and no strategy on how the country can afford it? Bonkers – will be dismissed as “fantasy politics” by the anchorman of Newsnight again. All Nick was saying is this “of course we want to abolish tuition fees – but, it cant be done right now, its 12bn of money the country doesnt have.”
Nick was also right to say the party proposes savage cuts – a good word – when you consider remove 100 billion pounds from defence spending with the cancelling of the next Trident fleet, how much more money do you have to cut before the word savage is appropriate?
A pity the “bubble” at Bournemouth doesnt see the Daily Mail, Daily Express, the Sun, the Mirror and the Telegraph, what the rest of the country has on its breakfast tables each morning, its just too easy to just talk among ourselves.
I completely support scrapping tuition fees being in the election manifesto. I have said in the past the scrapping of this policy would see me seriously questioning my membership of the party.
I also however support the gradual long term reduction of undergraduates number (to a level and in subjects actually required by the economy not some arbitary high level that leads to graduates doing jobs non graduates could do), which would help make this policy more affordable.
Ultimately though if the Labour Government’s claims that graduates earn more money in their lifetime than non graduates is true then this policy should self financing in the long term as graduates would pay back more in extra taxes over their lifetime than their university education cost in the first place. (I have done the sums on this based on the Labours claims)
As Tristan notes, inflated housing and rental prices are the biggest burden young people face as they come into adulthood and seek an independent life. A big contributing factor to this is the extraordinarily light taxation we have on property in this country, leading to this unproductive form of investment being very popular and pumping up the prices. Why are we being urged by so many now to weep at the prospects of those who have houses bigger and more luxurious than anyone’s actual needs being asked to pay a small tax on them, and not to weep for those, who because of the lack of such taxation cannot afford housing which would meet the minimum needs for family life? Why tax people on the income they are working hard to gain and maybe become million-pound house owners, but not when they are sitting on unproductive wealth of million pound houses? Are we so flush with spare land in this country that there is no case at all for even the tiniest financial incentive not to sit on more of it than you need?
Media commentary on this is so biased because the media is largely owned and run by the sort of people who own million pound houses, and not by the sort of people (a rather bigger share of the population) who have no prospect of owning such houses and no prospect, even if they work as hard as they can, of owning even a house of decent size to bring up a family. Those same commentators will, of course, pontificate at the breakdown of family life, which high housing costs is a huge factor in causing. The “middle England” line will be brought in to lead those who are really in the middle to support the cause of those who are at the top rather than their own.
On tuition fees, yes it is a big expense, and our leadership is quite right to tag it as a commitment that may have to be dropped in current economic circumstances. Following the outcry, the correct response is then “Well, if you value this commitment so much, what else would you drop to pay for it?”. We are told millions of young people will not vote because they think “it isn’t worth it”, “they’re all the same”, “it doesn’t change anything”, “they don’t care for us”. So, here we are, if we go ahead with this policy, and state the tax rises that will be needed to pay for it, we can prove all those statements are wrong. It is political honesty to balance spending with tax, to put it as a real choice, “We will do this nasty to pay for this good, we are prepared to accept the criticism for the nasty because we believe in that good, voting does make a difference because voting for us will give you that, voting for the others won’t”.
There is too much juvenile politics, where the politicians talk about the goods and hide the consequent nasties, but critics (including politicians when talking about the other parties) do the opposite. The anti-politics movement plays on this, leading people to suppose that tax is imposed largely because politicians have a sadistic delight in taking money from people, and cuts in services are made largely because politicians have a sadistic delight in taking them away. A grown-up politics which exposes the hollowness of the anti-politics movement would be a great service for democracy. This is what I would expect from the leadership of our party.
Anyone going to tell us where the £ 12 bn is coming from to pay for this pledge?
Anyone going to tell us where john zit comes from? And why?
I hope everyone pledged their cash with Mark Littlewood on this happening before this morning’s news. I got my tenner accepted at 8/1 with him on Monday evening…
Surprise, surprise!
“The Liberal Democrats’ high command appeared unconcerned by a letter written to the Guardian by 18 of the party’s 29-strong federal policy committee, which predicted that the current commitment to scrap tuition fees “will indeed be included in the manifesto”.
Danny Alexander, Clegg’s chief of staff, said it would not be down to the committee alone to decide the nature of the party’s next policy platform, saying that would happen only in partnership with the leader and his “shadow cabinet”.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/sep/23/nick-clegg-liberal-democrat-conference
Help with tuition fees should be targetted, not awarded regardless.
I suggest Danny reads the constitution. Preparation of the Manifeso is the responsibility of FPC and it shall be prepared “in consultation with” the Parliamentary party.
In consultation with is not the same as partnership, nor is the leader the same as the Parliamentary Party.
We certainly have every intention of consulting the Shadow Cabinet and the rest of the Parliamentary Party before we decide what will be in the final manifesto. Both are also well represented on the FPC.
We may, of course, also find that there are a range of views in each.
On the issue itself – yes there are well rehearsed arguments in favour and against our current policy.
However it is not the job of the FPC to change our policy, that has been decided by Conference, but to prioritise it for the Manifesto.
That is what the real debate is going to be about.