Last updated: 01/12/07
Comment: Why I don’t support South East weighting

This academic year I have been coerced into signing two petitions, the first I half-heartedly signed was an ultimately doomed attempt to ban Coca Cola on campus, the second I positively flew to sign was a petition condemning the violence against monks in Burma.

The third petition levied before me has angered me greatly. Kent Student Union have taken it upon themselves to campaign for a South East weighting on top up fees.

Ostensibly it sounds brilliant, more money for all, what could possibly be wrong with that?

However, what KSU and presumably other student unions in the South East have been failing to tell the masses of students clamouring to sign their petition is that ultimately all this ‘free money’ has to be paid back. So they are effectively campaigning to increase our debt burdens. The rate of interest charged on our student loans recently doubled to match the rate of inflation, it now stands at 4.8%, who did the union tell about this? Not a soul. Furthermore with the old Etonian David Cameron looking like a strong bet for election in 2009, we could end up paying commercial interest rates of up to 10% on our loans.

The KSU Education Sabbatical Tom Christian reminded me of the plight of the poor student, in a failed attempt to get me to sign the petition. However any idea that the South East weighting will either encourage poorer students to attend university or dissuade them from dropping out, once their debt mountains have begun to peak, is incredibly misguided and ill-informed. A poor student will not be fooled into receiving an initially greater sum of money only to, as a result, suffer sky high levels of debt. Instead the poorer student deserves to receive more financial support from the Union, the University and most importantly the Government. Who have progressively and incessantly ignored the plight of young people and according to right wing think tank Reform “are in the process of mortgaging the future of a generation.”

Students are at their most financially vulnerable when they graduate, desperately seeking that first rung on the housing market and that cushy graduate job. The extra burden of the South East weighting will only add to our debt levels on graduation and as many of us will return to our less affluent hometowns or countries, the supposed greater potential to earn back our debt seems to be just a pleasantly fact obscuring mirage purported by student unions and the Government.

The main reason for having a London weighting on the student loan was that capital city students have to pay an extortionate amount for their accommodation. In Kent and other areas in the South East, rents are typically much cheaper. I would have to pay at least double what I currently pay per month, to live in my current Canterbury abode, if it were suddenly uprooted and transported to London. Moreover the cost of living in the South East is broadly comparable to the UK’s other big student cities. Therefore wouldn’t it be equitable to also have a weighting for places like Edinburgh and Bristol? Quite frankly it sounds ridiculous.

Student unions in the past have rallied against racism, apartheid and campaigned vociferously for women’s and gay rights, currently our union is going to Downing Street in an attempt to saddle us with even more debt. This pointless and potentially damaging protest needs to be stopped. Instead student unions should be campaigning for and providing a greater level of financial support for all students, particularly the poor, and they should be doing this now.

Comment by Charlie Baylis