Ed Miliband stood up yesterday and said that if Labour were in government right now they would “cut” tuition fees to £6,000 a year. What struck me about this is that no one batted an eyelid – the conversation simply degenerated into tribal mud slinging without even the briefest of pauses to examine the extraordinary claims the Leader of the Opposition was making.
Here’s what gets me about Miliband’s proposal: He is “cutting” tuition fees from a current £3,290 per year to £6,000 per year – and we are to feel grateful for that. Yes, you read that right. It is true that from 2012 onwards tuition fees will be, for most intents and purposes, £9,000 a year – but right now they’re not. Right now Ed Miliband is saying if Labour were in government they would “cut” tuition fees from three grand to six grand. I’m sorry, what?
The second thing that got me was the reaction from Liberal Democrat circles on Twitter to Miliband’s announcement. @markwhiley opined, “I think Labour owe all those Lib Dem members they convinced to sign up on the back of fee increases BECAUSE of them and the Tories, a refund”. There was something almost smug about @aligoldsworthy‘s “What #lab11 are showing this morning is that there isn’t an easy solution to HE funding in current climate. We Lib Dems know that pain.” And @AAEmmerson tweeted at party president Tim Farron, “have you looked at Eds tuition fee proposals? Why arent we out briefing it’s a tax cut for the rich?” (To Tim’s credit, he responded that he didn’t brief but stood behind anything he said.)
“[W]e are only pointing out labour’s opportunism and hypocrisy over fees”, quoth @WoollyMindedLib, before explaining that it was still Lib Dem policy to scrap tuition fees while Labour policy would be to double them.
What none of these vocal Lib Dems on Twitter seemed to understand is that, had their party not broken their election pledge and enabled the trebling of tuition fees, we wouldn’t – we couldn’t – be having this absurd conversation right now. It was the Lib Dems’ support of the coalition government’s policy to treble fees which has ensured that scrapping them is now permanently off the table, and that Labour can come along with a proposal of fees of “only” £6,000 and seem like a saviour.
Right now, the only people I trust on tuition fees are Tories promising full deregulation and privatisation, and the SNP. Everyone else is probably lying.