University Alliance has submitted its response to the Treasury Select Committee’s inquiry on Student loans and taxation of graduates.
Our response summarises why our higher education system is, and will continue to
be, a national asset that benefits individuals, employers, our public services and society.
In our submission, we outline four system-level principles that should underpin a fair and sustainable funding system. These are that:
- Contributions should be rebalanced over time to reflect the public and private benefit of higher education.
- Higher education funding should cover the cost of providing high quality teaching and research.
- The loan system should be fair, support widening access and protect those with lower lifetime earnings.
- The loan system should be transparent and predictable.
Additionally, we highlight three key and interrelated considerations that have informed our approach to this submission:
- that each adjustment to the system brings about its own
risks and trade-offs; - our concern that the inquiry “will not look at the funding of universities”;
- that this debate is not taking place in isolation from other fiscal constraints and policy
shifts.
