Yesterday, the cross-party Treasury Select Committee published a damning report on our student loan system, and its conclusions are clear: the system is broken and in urgent need of reform.
I have previously argued that young people deserve honesty about the debt they are taking on and what it will mean for their financial future.
The Committee has now found that students were effectively mis-sold their loans. The Government compared repayments to the cost of a mobile phone contract, failed to make clear that the terms could be rewritten after graduates had signed up, and then relied on exemptions from consumer protection law that mean borrowers have virtually no legal recourse.
It also accuses successive governments of taking the "politically convenient option" of loading more and more of the cost onto younger generations, while recommending that the Government reverse the repayment threshold freeze because it has a moral obligation to honour the promises made to graduates.
The reality is that a 9% deduction on earnings for graduates, running for up to 40 years, functions less like a loan and more like an additional tax on young people specifically.
This ‘tax’ makes it harder to save for a home, build a pension, start a family or accumulate wealth in the way previous generations could.
There is now growing cross-party recognition that this cannot continue.
The Government now must listen. Reversing the repayment threshold freeze is the right place to start, but it cannot be the end of the conversation. We need a student finance system that is transparent, sustainable and fair, and I will continue working with colleagues from across Parliament to make that happen.
If you’d like to read the full report, you can do so here: https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/54019/documents/301142/default/
