The good news is that British Conservative Party appear, at long last, to have developed a will to challenge the Labour government. The bad news is that they are doing it by moving to the left:
A Tory government would scrap university tuition fees in a wide-ranging overhaul of higher education unveiled last night as part of Iain Duncan Smith’s campaign to offer voters “a fair deal”.
Parents whose children expect to go to university after 2005, the likely date of the next general election, would no longer have to worry about finding £9,000 to pay for an average three-year course if the Tories won.
Not only are the Tories moving to the left, they are actually positioning themselves to the left of New Labour. It was Blair’s first government which scrapped the taxpayer-subsidisation of higher education, hence the introduction of ‘Tuition Fees’ which simply means that those who wish to attend University have to pay to do so.
The Tories are promising to place this burden back onto the exhausted taxpayer.
The Government will find itself arguing for charging students more, while the Tories will be proposing a return to free university education.
Only in a country such as this, where there is barely any concept of the link between government spending and taxation, can subsidised education be described as ‘free’. As if the act of the Treasury raiding your bank account in order to pay for your University course is much fairer than relying on you to raid your own bank account.
But, bizarre as it is, that is the way things are seen over here and I suppose I cannot blame the Tories for wanting to pander to the bottomless British appetite for more government and ever-higher taxes. After all, their job is to get elected.
Speaking for myself, I can’t be bothered to vote. There is nothing to vote for.
David:
Why don’t you run as a Libertarian?
I’d think about doing that here, except that we in New York have the most insane ballot-access laws known to man. (You have to get an inordinately large number of signatures, and signatures have been invalidated because people used the wrong method of fastening petition sheets together.)
The Tories wanna fund higher ed? This idea is as wrong as it looks, but it could have a silver lining for the future:
Now add just two more details to the mix: make it a voucher system, and allow for any competent organization to be accredited. (BTW, I am not from the UK so am not aware if the latter point is already in effect or not).
Consider the practical consequences. If I am allotted a certain amount of funds for my higher education, where will I spend my dollars? At a Hard Left indoctrination camp for four years? Or will I prefer to complete my curricula in two or three years, retaining my unused funds for future educational upgrading, as well.
Not only that, but I hit the job market a year or two sooner. I am less inclined to hang around the U longer than need be, because I now have improved alternatives.
Would I still waste my time on the horseshit courses such as “Blaming Others For My Failure. It’s the System.” Or would I be motivated to choose my courses wisely, focusing on my career, and husbanding my resources?
The effect would be to open up Academia to competition, consequences, and choice. This is the Left’s major stronghold, as the training ground for tomorrow’s leaders (as well as the J-school grads who spin the results).
Maybe the above ain’t a perfect-world solution, but as a means to salvage something useful from this latest development, it ain’t bad.
And it may be inevitable. With the govt picking up the tab, you can expect the costs to rise. People will spend other peoples’ money with ease.
When the system passes the point of sustainability, ideas such as using vouchers will rise on their own, if only as a survival mechanism. At which point, the 2nd requirement – that any competent org be allowed to do the job with minimal interference – becomes key. Hold to it, and Academia can actually be smarted up instead of dumbed down.
Just a thought. Comments, anyone?
rick,
Well, I believe that the state should get out of the education business entirely but, as a halfway house, a voucher system has merit.
Not a floater over here though where the commitment to Central State funding and control is very ingrained.
Ted,
I wish it were so easy. Running for office over here is also expensive and very time-consuming even at local level. You really need, at the least, a party structure and funding behind you and I wouldn’t have that.
Even if those hurdles could be overcome, there is currently a great public mistrust of free market ideas and I would be highly unlikely to pick up more than a handful of votes.
I know its sad but that is the way it is.
Reminds me of the fact that in the US you can vote for either flavor of Statist, Demopublican or Republicrat.
David omits from his description of running for office over here that it is also very bureacratic, and getting more so. Even politics is steadily (and nearly silently) being nationalized.
OH yes, and when you do get elected, the legislative branch (so to speak) has no independent power.
rick, etc: even leaving aside the fact that all state subsidization is just plain ethically wrong, vouchers are a nightmare. They always come with strings attached. Vouchers are back-door nationalization.
You miss the crucial point, which is that the cost to the taxpayer of scrapping fees will be offset by reducing the total numbers of students because many Mickey Mouse degrees will be scrapped and the worst universities will merge. Those who currently spend years doing surfing studies and David Beckham (real courses with no academic merit) will instead get the vocational training that Britain needs far more than more media studies graduates.
Maybe this is more left-wing than Labour’s policy in some ways, but it is far more practical and common-sensical too.
You miss the crucial point, which is that the cost to the taxpayer of scrapping fees will be offset by reducing the total numbers of students because many Mickey Mouse degrees will be scrapped and the worst universities will merge. Those who currently spend years doing surfing studies and David Beckham (real courses with no academic merit) will instead get the vocational training that Britain needs far more than more media studies graduates.
Maybe this is more left-wing than Labour’s policy in some ways, but it is far more practical and common-sensical too.
You miss the crucial point, which is that the cost to the taxpayer of scrapping fees will be offset by reducing the total numbers of students because many Mickey Mouse degrees will be scrapped and the worst universities will merge. Those who currently spend years doing surfing studies and David Beckham (real courses with no academic merit) will instead get the vocational training that Britain needs far more than more media studies graduates.
Maybe this is more left-wing than Labour’s policy in some ways, but it is far more practical and common-sensical too.
Sorry, triple post. 🙁
There IS a Defence! 🙂
It’s feeble, but here goes. First the case for the prosecution:
I nearly had to have two fried eggs, this morning, on the ol’ Atkins diet, when I heard the Tories were going to scrap tuition fees on Radio Pravda. It was like that bit in The Matrix where the mirror dissolves, and nothing makes sense any more.
I thought my wife was accurate, when she said “This is the trouble with you Tories. Nobody believes you, because you keep changing your mind just to get votes. We all know you’d like to get rid of state funding, so when you say you’re going to increase it, you look like hypocrites. At least Tony Blair has the guts to do your dirty work for you.”
Ho hum. The problems of being an occasional blue-rosette wearer.
But now the case for the (admittedly feeble) defence:
I suspect this could be a Letwinesque move. The curly-haired one could be hiding behind a Popperesque philosophical smoke screen.
Still in a bemused state on the Central Line this morning, I managed to get from page 114 to page 118, in Popper’s book, The Open Society and its Enemies I: The Spell of Plato. In a serendipitious moment, I found this choice quote staring up at me:
So if you dance the right moves, the full defence can be made Popperesque:
Labour have given the Tories just enough breathing room for their move this morning, by IDS fig-leafing it with a promise to get rid of the nonsensical 50% access rule, and the access regulator. Letwin (I reckon) will have persuaded His Leader, to run with it, to try to drag down the average age of the Tories from 837, to 23. He can sleep at night, if he’s a Popper man, under the two following caveats:
Letwin, sorry IDS, is then philosophically out of jail.
Alright, alright, it’s about as convincing as a Tony Blackburn wig, but it’s all I’ve got! 🙂
PS: From a purely Westminster Village point of view, it was also imperative that the Bald One try to help widen the overnight Labour Party split caused by Clare Short’s outburst on Tony Blair, to isolate the Sainted One even more from the British public. When the socialist idiots remove Blair, they’re finished; the sooner this can be brought about the better. If Blair is Julius Caesar, and Gordon Brown Mark Antony, Alan Milburn is no Octavian. The rule of Mark Antony Brown, will be short, disastrous, and ruinous to the Labour Party’s next fifteen years, at least. Excellent! 🙂
PPS: As one who normally tries to work out what Ms Rand’s Howard Roark would do in my position, before I make a decision on anything, this morning has been a tough one. But Herr Popper’s treatment of Plato is a fascinating one, which has softened me up a bit, and I thoroughly recommend it to anyone who hasn’t read it yet. Can’t wait till he starts taking Hegel and Marx apart, in Part II!!! 😎
But Peter,
But who are the Conservative Party to say that Surfing Studies or Golf Course Management are not worthy of study. Yes, maybe they don’t have the earnestness of civil engineering, classical Greek or even, dare one suggest, Medieval studies; but surely someone has to take care of the greens at Wentworth and West Wittering and Newquay do very well out of surfing. I’d rather have the invisible hand of the market decide what is worth studying and what is not thank you very much.
I can see what Andy Duncan is driving at even if I don’t like it very much.
There is considerable hostility to ‘Tuition Fees’ especially among the Middle Classes whe expect their teenage charges to get a degree. At a time when there is growing weariness and cynicism about Nulabour, perhaps the Tories reckon they can capitalise.
In other words, maybe its just good politics. However, I still don’t like it and I’m not sure it is going to work.
Sorry that this is off topic.
But Germany’s Bild tabloid are running a campaign for lower taxes.
Their graphic shows a Prussian eagle flexing his bicep on one arm and giving a thumbs up with the other. The slogan says, “Taxes down! Make Germany lively”.
It seems to me the tipping point was inceased duty on cigarettes and alchohol, not the giant welfare state.
Nevermind, good luck anyway.
Hi David,
I fear you could be right, that it isn’t going to work. Even if there is some ersatz Popperite fig-leaf covering it up, what my wife said may be more of a political “reality”; that voters will suspect IDS of ditching principles to win votes, and therefore be even less inclined to vote for him.
We’re then into Hagueite “Backfires’R’Us” territory, and yet more years living under Mr Blunkett’s jackboot.
Still, hope springs eternal. If this, and other gimmicks, do go wrong, it could herald the beginnings of the Oliver Letwin/Boris Johnson dream ticket, which I reckon really could do the trick.
And then I wake up, from cloud-cuckoo land! 🙂
Rgds,
AndyD
Andy D
How do you do italics and big text in your comments? I can’t find anyway to do it.
Cydonia
Might be clever politics, (appeal to younger voters, looks superficially generous etc) but I think one of the reasons for Statist socialism surviving in Britain is that Britons are nurtured in a state run and financed environment during their education.
Education is worth paying for, working your way through college and valuing. If you want to do Beckham Studies at your own expense, good luck.
David Carr doesn’t know much about British politics if he thinks we run for office in the UK. We don’t – we stand for it. Or not.
It takes 10 voters’ signatures to stand for Parliament or a local council seat. There is no deposit in local elections: £500 in Parliamentary ones (refundable if you get 5% of votes).
You could take a leaf out of the Trotskyist book, infiltrate an elderly Conservative Constituency Association, get nominated as council candidates, and after election defect en masse to a Libertarian Party of your own fabrication. Of course, you’d have to be arsed to all move to the same area. I suppose whining on the Internet is easier.
Historical note. In good Queen Victoria’s golden reign, electoral registration was conducted on libertarian lines. Voters had to register themselves – no state mollycoddling by council canvassers or letters asking if the entry on the roll was still correct. In practice, of course, the parties paid people to canvass & put their supporters on the roll. This, I agree, might make life a tad harder for you.
They had one more rule in those days which still has a quaint appeal. There was no limit on candidates’ expenses (although bribery was illegal – presumably you disapprove) and the losers were jointly and severally liable for the winners’ expenses!
Innocent Abroad,
“David Carr doesn’t know much about British politics if he thinks we run for office in the UK. We don’t – we stand for it. Or not.”
Erm, at what point did I say that we ‘run’ for office in the UK? I don’t mind in the least being corrected but I would prefer it if it were for mistakes I have actually made.
Mark, I agree with you that the market decides these things best, although I think your relativism is a bit of an insult to most people’s intelligence.
But the Conservative Party has to get elected and make the country better. It is not a libertarian pressure group with the luxury of maintaining ideological purity. This proposed system makes the party more electable, ends the tuition fee discrimination against students from wealthier families and reverses the damaging 50% target. A policy that radically improves the present situation and will be popular electorally – it seems a good pragmatic response to me.
Of course we could consider the argument that the benefits of a [worthwhile] degree extend far beyond just the student, so expecting the student [and/or students’ parents] to bear the cost alone is not entirely fair. The economy as a whole benefits from having a skilled workforce, society is made fairer if kids from sink estates have one more chance of getting themselves out, and so on. Obviously none of this applies for the significant proportion of students who will not benefit from university, whether through doing pointless courses or just through being so un-committed that they may as well not be there, but dropping the 50% target should deal with that.
Peter,
I think your relativism is a bit of an insult to most people’s intelligence.
Rot. These are degree courses. Services rendered. Not bound Chinese feet.
Eldan,
Skilled workforce yes. University educated not so. Two of the developed world’s wealthiest countries have the lowest proportion of university graduates. Switzerland and the USA. Contrast the opposite case of somewhere like Germany where you can eke out 8 years of growing a bum fluff beard on the Unter den Linden, er sorry I mean studying, whilst consuming taxes and not creating any wealth what so ever.
David:
You did use the term “running for office”, but only in response to my question in which I used that phrase.
I’m surprised that we haven’t heard from the disabled lobby that “running” and “standing” for office are both terms that are biased against the wheelchair-bound. 🙂
Ted,
Oops. You’re quite right, I did. You bloody Americans and your cultural imperialism 🙂
Mark: Certainly a skilled workforce is about more than having as many BAs as possible, but university education is an important part. I think it’s also worth noting that America and Switzerland both have very high quality University systems – it seems to me that the smaller number of graduates is directly related to a very small proportion of mickey mouse courses.
Perhaps the most important (but sadly half-baked) part of the Tory intiative is talk of putting more people through vocational courses, but where they fall short IMHO is that I haven’t seen any practical proposals for how to make people in this country take non-university qualifications seriously. That’s an area where Switzerland is a shining example – there are plenty of non-degree courses for school leavers that are seen as giving them useful skills (mainly skilled manual labour), and are popular because they are known to increase one’s earning potential.
Eldan,
I can’t disagree with anything you’ve said.
I don’t pretend to have any solutions. I certainly don’t believe or want the state to come up with them. I
believeknow that a free market can provide one given enough rope. Did the government create City and Guilds? Given their name I doubt it. They were valuable trades qualifications. The BTECs that followed them weren’t shabby either. And then in the mid nineties the Conservative government indroduced GNVQs and NVQs which were seen as a complete joke right from the start. A dumbed down one at that. And, I think, insulting to the very clever and able skilled workforce of this country. It’s no wonder that so many people would rather do a crappy degree than a crappy FE course and we now have too few technicians and plumbers and a glut of media studies grads manning checkouts the length of the land.I think it’s worth chipping in with my own experiences.
Infact I have two “vocational” certificates myself . A BTEC ONC and HNC both in electronics. They weren’t called vocational back in those days of course, they were technical.
Incidently I had to pay to study for my BTECs at Devonport College. It was a day release course. All other pupils had their fees paid by their employers (the dockyard and British Aerospace most of them) and they got paid for the day they were there. I had to use my day off to go and work on Saturdays. If I remember rightly the first year (1991-2) cost about £280 and the fourth (1994-5) about £350. I then did a year of BTEC level four maths one evening a week which must have been about £65. After that I quit my poorly paid job and started BEng Electronics at Plymouth Uni. Given that an HNC was deemed higher rather than further education and it was in a pertinent field I was allowed to go straight in on the second year. I did an industrial placement at the Toshiba factory and after writing the program that programmed the memory chip in Michael Jennings television I decided that I didn’t like electronics after all (at least not the analogue side) and with a similarly minded friend managed to jump ship the the final year of BSc(Hons) Computer Systems. So that’s what I got. 2.1 and all.
And it was worth it. The expense of the BTECs, the loss of a day off, the homework, the student loans which I’m still paying off four years after leaving. It was a sacrifice but I reasonable standard of living and a good job writing C++ and Java in which I use hardly anything I learnt at uni. My friend, incidently uses even less. He went to America to learn to fly helicopters and now flies back and forth from Aberdeen to oil rigs. That cost him a fortune and didn’t expect or get a penny from the state either.