The Daily Mail gets outraged at the Flippancy of David Willetts

setmefree2

'Don't be frightened by your £70,000 student debt... it's just a lifetime of payments': Outrage at flippancy of universities minister

Sally Hunt, general secretary of the University and College Union, said:

'Mr Willetts' comments are a blatant attempt to try and find an acceptable name for fleecing students and the state abdicating its responsibilities for our young people.
'If the minister is insistent on calling this a tax then he should call it a tax on learning and ambition.'

Not quite sure about this bit??????

He is also considering a mechanism to allow the very wealthiest to repay the full amount in one lump sum, avoiding hefty interest charges.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2064364/Outrage-flippancy-universities-minister-David-Willetts.html#ixzz1eRvdKV5T

Two brains Willetts should really try using one of them!

Taiko

Probably means exactly the opposite, given that it's from The Daily Mail.

LauraW10

I'm sorry David Willets. I, unlike you, have only one brain, but this analogy is absolutely laughable. The whole point is that many, many children and their parents are indeed going to be horrified by a tuition fee deficit which they will see as a debt, not a tax. It shares all the qualities of a debt - a specific figure, tied to your name, for which you will be pursued, personally, until it is paid off. Psychologically speaking, a tax is quite, quite different - no-one stays awake at night worrying about the income tax that comes off their payslip every month because there isn't a finite figure attached that follows you because of a decision you made (to go to university).

You can have an argument about semantics all you like to try and justify the tuition fees increase, but every single person I have spoken to disagrees with your categorisation.

Sorry but I don't agree either with fees or future tax levies. It is becoming an English disease, to which at least the Welsh and Scots do not subscribe.
Why don't I agree?
Because education, like health care should be free at the point of delivery. And. like health care it should be freely available to whoever needs it.Because it is an investment that we all benefit from. Juts because I'm not in and out of hospital all the time doesn't mean I'm not ready to pay my contribution. Just because I'm not being educated by the state doesn't mean I don't buy into the notion of state education.
Because fees result in barriers from those from poorer families.
Because when you agree to one the princple of 'future taxes' for one part of the population, it becomes a 100% certainty that it will be used for other services AND you can bet future governments will vary the rate of future tax and decide to screw those people at some as yet undetermined point.
Bottom line: I believe in the welfare state that our parents and grand-parents fought for and allowing the envious, malicious, selfish and greedy to undermine it is a sign of a morally bankrupt society that none of us should tolerate.

LauraW10

What's the difference between this proposal and an actual graduate tax?


It's got nothing to do with being able to pay-off your student debt entirely, and everything to do with the government (at a later date) being able to sell off the Student Loan Book as a debt, and collect a windfall, whereas a tax could not be delegated or sold to a private organisation.
Half the reason I'd prefer a graduate tax to this system is because I don't think graduates should be paying a quasi-tax to a financial institution that won't reinvest in higher education, just because a future government needed the windfall from the sale to balance its books.

LauraW10

And whilst I'm at it don't forget that Willetts said this in April

Willetts said feminism was probably the "single biggest factor" for the lack of social mobility in Britain, because women who would otherwise have been housewives had taken university places and well-paid jobs that could have gone to ambitious working-class men.

Spiv_2

Laura why should the taxpayer be responsible for the thousands it costs to accomodate and teach 'young people' interest degrees??

If young people want to study and improve their mind then fine they should do so at their own expense. I did an open uni Masters for an interest degree which I paid for myself. Should I expect the taxpayer to have paid for that too?


I find it comforting to think that there are such people like yourself out there with these very noble and high ideals, unfortunately these ideals are normally paid for off the back of hard-working and more driven people.



Furthermore what if those people who produce, who create wealth and contribute through enormous taxes finally have enough too?

unhappy_shopper

LauraW10 wrote: »

And whilst I'm at it don't forget that Willetts said this in April

How come he was not ousted like Larry Summers or at least taken to task?
A politician in a responsible post uttering such words of discrimination!