Only one in four

There is a feeling that the coalition government is in to much of a hurry to make changes, with to many announcements uncosted or has insufficient detailed information attached.

In today's Independent on Sunday, there is a claim that only one in four students will pay off their tuition fees, with a best case scenario of half paying them off.

This must have very clear implications for the sustainability of this new scheme for students and universities alike.

It would appear that the coalition government are to borrow an additional £5.6 billion by 2015 to pay for the new tuition fees scheme, it is claimed high earning graduates will pay these loans, but the Independents accountant claims because of interest and inflation, groups such as teachers will never pay off the capital.

These new tuition fees, increasingly sees the state withdrawing it's financial support for tuition and placing it firmly on students, yet Employers benefit from educated students, Government benefit from educated students through higher taxes, communities benefit from degree educated students and of course the students benefit themselves, I'm not sure the coalition government has got the balance of payment for the cost of fees right.

The next debate is the abolition of the Educational Maintenance Allowance, this allows poorer young people to stay on to take A Levels, and to qualify for university, if we are genuinely interested in greater participation, cutting this allowance makes no sense.