Tuition fees: teetering on the brink

Editorial. New official forecasts suggest that write-off costs have reached 45% of the £10bn paid out in student loans each year. It is generally assumed that when Nick Clegg dies, or if his Liberal Democrats suffer a comparable fate at the May 2015 election, the words "tuition fees" will be found engraved on his heart. But now it seems he won't be alone. On the latest calculations, the whole system of student funding introduced by the coalition four years ago – when the maximum permissible university tuition fee was hoicked up from £3,000 to £9,000 – is in serious trouble. In essence, the system in England requires graduates, once they're earning £21,000 a year, to repay their fees over a 30-year period. Read more...