Loophole for free tuition fees?

ste_coxy

Oldernotwiser wrote: »

This might be beneficial regarding fees (although I doubt it) but what would the student live on? EU students aren't eligible for maintenance funding in the UK.

erm get a job of course!

callum9999

The_One_Who wrote: »

I'm really struggling to understand your post. Why does a UK citizen need to use EU law to get around immigration? There shouldn't be a problem for them. What laws and what problems are people trying to get around by working in the EU for six months?

There are residency conditions attached to the free tuition fees, you need to have been ordinarily resident for three years prior to the start of the course. Also, the fee situation is reciprocal, in that a Scot could go to France and not pay tuition fees. A Scot cannot go elsewhere in the UK for free, and actually most Scots can't go south because of the difference in educational systems.

Also, if an English/Welsh/NI student comes to Scotland they pay less tuition fees anyway, about half of those elsewhere.

It definitely is not a reciprocal arrangement, in fact, there is no arrangement whatsoever. The rules simply are that each country has to charge EU citizens what they charge their own students.

If France has free tuition for French students, then the Scots would get it free there as well, but so would the English. If they charge French students, both the Scots and English will pay that charge.

And there is nothing stopping Scots studying in England, I'd be shocked if there were any universities that don't recognise the Scottish Highers as a valid qualification - they accept the qualifications in dozens of other countries for a start.

The last bit is correct, except medicine which is almost the same.

And MissMoneypenny - you cannot just choose to follow the relevant EU or UK law. Unless EU law says otherwise, you will always be following UK law, and in this case, EU law doesn't override it as its not strictly relevant. An Englishman going to Scotland and vice versa is strictly a UK matter.

Oldernotwiser

ste_coxy wrote: »

erm get a job of course!

Part time work to pay for extras is fine but work to completely support yourself is going to have an adverse effect on a student's future and pretty pointless when only done to work a fiddle for tuition fees!

The_One_Who

callum9999 wrote: »

And there is nothing stopping Scots studying in England, I'd be shocked if there were any universities that don't recognise the Scottish Highers as a valid qualification - they accept the qualifications in dozens of other countries for a start.

What is stopping a lot of Scots going south is the Scottish education system. Highers are of course recognised, but few schools offer the Advanced Highers that are really needed in order to make the jump to university level, and a lot of universities ask for AHs in the entrance requirements.

cn123_2

I'm not sure whether the approach you suggest would work - but if British citizens are also citizens of another EU state, say both British and Irish, there is legal precedent that suggests that those people can use EU law to demand equal treatment and so avoid paying full tuition fees in Scotland or in Wales.

This is particularly useful because Ireland has some very lax citizenship laws which means that pretty much anyone who has at least one grandparent who was born on the island of Ireland (i.e. in the Republic of Ireland OR Northern Ireland) can claim Irish citizenship by returning a form and some paperwork to the Irish Embassy. In doing so, such a person would then be eligible to claim the lower rate of tuition fees in Scotland or Wales on the basis of being a national of another EU state (i.e. Ireland).

With there being well over a million people in England who can claim some form of Irish ancestry, there may well be quite a few people able to make use of this loophole!