Callum George

TREASURY COMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE STUDENT LOANS (inc Plan 2). Within that there is a questionnaire for (potential) students, graduates, university leavers & others to feed your views into, which is worth doing... committees.parliament.uk/work/9682/stud… Its good to see, and lets hope it brings pressure for improvement. PS Treasury Committee is a cross party committee of MPs, not part of the government. Its job is to scrutinise policy, examine legislation where relevant, and hold ministers and public bodies to account on behalf of Parliament. While it can publish reports and put pressure on the government, but it doesn't have any direct power to compel the government to act.

The justification for charging tuition fees, with reverse triple lock interest, and resulting 9% extra income tax, is the graduate premium. This, you are told, is the extra lifetime earnings from which you will benefit as a degree holder. And we believe that to be between £100,00 - £150,000 over the course of your career. But “believe” is the operative word. The thing is, we don’t know. But the government does. That’s because they have something called LEO data - Longitudinal Education Outcomes. And it tracks the university, course, and earnings of nearly 40 million people. Here’s the kicker: they won’t release the full data to the public, to you. Only to pre-approved researchers. And even then, they don’t get the whole dataset. That’s because pressure groups that represent universities have lobbied for it to remain private. They say you can’t measure the value of an education in a salary. That it’s about the soul and the mind and enrichment and growing up. And I agree with them, if only for the fact that they did have a really specific idea of the value of an education when they were taking my money. And indeed the government does too: +9% on my marginal tax rate. So the ask is simple. Release the records. Let graduates make an informed choice about the actual value of their degree. They just have to press publish. What have they got to hide? x.com/lfg_uk/status/…

The moment has come to stop calling it "student loans:" it's not a loan, it is not repaid in full, and there are no fixed T&C. It's a graduate tax that applies only to young workers. And it allows governments to increase taxes on a single generation while protecting the others.

The govt's Student Loan Plan 2 repayment freeze in April 2027 must be reversed. It isn't moral. I'm concerned that my debate with Kemi Badenoch this morning distracts from the most immediate problem. In April 2027 Rachel Reeves will freeze the Plan 2 student loan threshold until 2030 which by then will increase graduate repayments by £300/yr more. This is effectively a unilateral negative breach of the student loan contract. Students were told the threshold would rise with average earnings. No commercial lender would be allowed to do this. The govt shouldn't do it either. Changing the terms of future students loans is a political decision - people may not like it but it is transparent. Negatively changing the terms of contracts already signed, and long in place, is a breach of natural justice.

81st min Callum George from a free-kick surely wraps this game up! @stjustafc 1-5 @PendeenR @StPiranLeague

We have completed the transfer of Alexander Isak from Newcastle United on a long-term contract 🙌🔴

WOWWWWWW SZOBO!!!!!!! 🤯

RRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We won our 20th Premier League title while he wore the number 20 on his back. Retire the shirt number forever.

Jeremie is a Red.

Second season, mate.

Lads, it’s Man United!

😉

These two 😮‍💨🤳 #TeamPixel | #Ad

Your 2024/25 @premierleague champions 🤳

Together 🔴

Twenty times.