Press Release
For immediate release – Tuesday 30th August 2011

University Fees in Scotland cause consternation in England

Aberdeen  University has become the first in Scotland to announce that it will increase fees for students coming from the rest of Britain, sparking fury amongst the unions it was reported by the Morning Star Online on Sunday (28th August).  From next year annual fees will be set at £9000 with the ‘generous offer’ of the fourth year being free and follows Scottish Education Secretary Michael Russell’s announcement in June that universities will be able to increase fees for students coming from outside Scotland which means English students, the largest group will suffer. The University and College Union(UCU), and the National Union of Students (NUS) have expressed their concerns that Universities may end up charging the highest possible fee whilst not supplying adequate bursary provision, and that students from the rest of the UK will be treated as little more than cash cows. “If the NUS feel this way then maybe National Union of Students president Liam Burns should start calling for a democratic voice for England and a government for England. Only then will English students stop being ‘cash cows’ and have the democratic voice that will protect them”. Stated Eddie Bone Chairman of the Campaign for an English Parliament

Tuition fees have become a major political hot potato in recent months, and students based in England in particular can only see this as yet another in a long line of serious body blows to their future education. With fees south of the border already set to treble it would certainly appear that slowly but surely prospective students from lower income backgrounds in England are having their options stripped back. And on Wednesday 31st of August, Michael Moore, the Scottish Secretary of State is discussing devolution for Scotland. Let’s hope he will apologise for his part in implementing these further fees that are now only fuelling English frustration with the botched devolution of the UK. These unfairly implemented tuition fees penalise the English by undermining the opportunities for future careers. Surely it’s time Mr Moore faced up to the fact that the kind of undemocratic and unfair voting system now operating in the UK Parliament is totally unacceptable in the Modern Age. Eddie Bone Chairman of the Campaign for an English Parliament went on to say “An English Parliament will be the only way the English will ever feel they have “equality”. An ‘equality’ that allows them and them alone to democratically choose between the virtues of free education or tuition fees”.

James Black and Eddie Bone
Campaign for an English Parliament
Eddiejbone@aol.co.uk
Mob 07980667732