Fool me once, shame on you
However, let’s put Mr Clegg’s new promise into context. Lest we forget Mr Clegg’s 2010 position, which was that under a Liberal Democratic government, these fair lands would “Say goodbye to broken promises”. Pah.
Yes, we have ended up with a coalition Government, so what we seem to get is compromise in smoke filled rooms (democracy in action, kids). Nevertheless, the whole £9,000 debacle still to this day, with many of Bath’s student body now paying £9,000, reeks. The Lib Dems, however rightly or wrongly are a party of the establishment now; they can no longer complain from the side lines, not fearing the consequences of what they say. This latest promise could very well be some last minute tinkering to prevent annihilation in under two years time.
Political parties are never pure, and they will never be perfect. They will never keep all their promises. Most of us grew up under Labour, who of course promised no tuition fees at all before being the ones to introduce them in the first place. This is not bathimpact calling people naïve to the political system, no; people should expect their politicians to keep to their word. The question is whether we should maybe should all take it with a pinch of salt.
Nick Clegg is different though, isn’t he? He played the political game and won. He seemed like the good egg who would keep all of his promises, but he let us down. He let the students down. The pill of £9,000 fees is always more difficult to swallow when a party seems to make out that free higher education is one of the founding and enduring principles it holds, like Labour and the NHS, or the Conservatives and low taxes.
Higher education funding is an absolute mess, that much is undeniable. As the UK government has cut the amount of money it gives to universities, they have in turn been forced to increase fees. To the credit of Clegg though, the £9,000 cap which the current government introduced was not recommended by the Browne Review (which said there should be no cap whatsoever).
Mr Clegg wants us to look ‘at the reality of the system’. Whatever the arguments over the fairness of the new system - as far as what you pay, when you pay and all that political gumph – as far as bathimpact sees it, the hypocrisy of the UK government is clear. What we have is a government that trumps on about the financial situation, the ‘national debt’, and the benefits of fiscal prudence but yet are willing to see generation after generation of young people start their lives with a crushing amount of debt to pay back over the rest of their lifetime.
Perhaps this is why Mr Clegg’s £16,000 ‘promise’ seems so empty. He’s ‘promising’ it in response to the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University, Professor Andrew Hamilton, who has said that it costs £16,000 per year to educate each student. Professor Hamilton may be perfectly correct, but bathimpact would suggest that the burden to cover the cost of students should be placed back on the state – we are of course as his mate, the Prime Minister likes to remind us, in a ‘Global Race’ which requires young people to have the best skills possible.
We are getting to a point in Britain where the state is shedding all of its responsibilities. It may be higher education first, but what’s next? I’ve got a promise for Mr Clegg though that I will be keeping; I won’t be voting for his party in 2015.