It was bound to happen, wasn't it? The government, it appears, is very much mistaken about education costs and the loan system currently in operation.
It has seriously underestimated how much universities would be charging in fees ... and equally seriously overestimated how much graduates would earn over their working lifetimes. Sad to say, that doesn't come as much of a surprise. The Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) says the money the government expects to get back from student loans repayments is "highly uncertain", but the government, unsurprisingly, says it believes its modelling to be reasonable.
It also says that the government has overestimated graduates' future earning potential, even though it's already been lowered from an assumption they'd be earning a six-figure salary. The current estimate is now down to £75,000. The Office for Budget Responsibility says ministers were wrong to think universities would limit their tuition fee hikes to just £7,500 a year.
Again, sad to say, that doesn't come as much of a surprise either. In this world, everyone seems to be out for as much as they can get (think MP's expenses, for example), so why should universities be any different? So what's going to happen about education loans in the future - and their repayments? Bahram Bekhradnia, a director at Hepi, says: "Either future taxpayers will need to pay more, or other parts of the higher education budget will need to be cut, or student numbers will need to be held down even further than presently planned, or former students will have to repay more."
A Department for Business, Innovation and Skills spokeswoman says: "All long-term estimates have a margin of error, but we continue to believe our modelling is reasonable and neither unduly optimistic nor unduly pessimistic." So this may be one more reason to change their minds about education at degree level at least at university. It's an unpleasant surprise to be told you're going to have to pay so much at a certain rate after your stay at uni ... and then to discover, some years later, that the rate you're prepared for has gone in the same direction as tuition fees have done recently.
An alternative to university, such as an apprenticeship, means that when it comes to the process of training towards the qualifications you need, there will be few surprises - and even then, the majority of them will be pleasant.
