University for the rich, by the rich, of the rich.

Over the course of 13 years, Labour extended the franchise of higher education to everyone.
They improved the quality of teaching and the quality of Primary Schools, Secondary Schools and Colleges. Opening up higher education by increasing the amount of young people entering Sixth Forms and Colleges with new courses whilst improving old ones. But most importantly, Labour opened up universities.
A university degree opens more doors in life than GCSE's or A Levels, in other words, it permeates class boundaries.

David Willetts has expressed today that university fees will rise Considering the average student debt is £22,000 upon leaving university, David Willetts words that students should consider university fees "more as an obligation to pay higher income tax" than a debt, are completely ignorant and misplaced. It is perfectly clear that Condem don't understand students and student struggles, their mummies and daddies paid for their education so I'm sure it must have been a terrible plight for them.

The "Liberal" Democrats come across as little more than weak, whipped liars. They gained votes among students (the student vote is a core section of their vote) on the promise of no tuition fees, so to then say that not only will it take 6 years (which, I should remind you, is longer than the maximum life of the current government) but that they will simply abstain from voting on the issue and let the Tories raise tuition fees shows a complete betrayal of progressive values. The wishy washy liberals strike again.

As a direct result of Labour's actions, more women are attending university than ever before, outnumbering men. University is now seen as the obvious next step for college students, regardless of race, gender, background or household income, as well as now being a viable option with support available for mature students.

What cannot be ignored is the implications of raising tuition fees. Do the Tories really expect people from lower income families and working class backgrounds to foot the bill for university if it's going to be hiked up? The answer - No, they don't.
And that's the point. Raising tuition fees excludes more and more people from university education. In other words, keeping the poor out and the rich in. Labour turned university into a right, and the Tories are turning it back into a privilege, for the privileged. The Tory party are preparing to oversee a return to an income based class system, re-initiating the cycle that stops people young people from low income families from breaking out of low incomes.

Cuts , cuts and cuts! ....same old Tories.

Well, we're just far enough in for the Tories to reveal their actual policies, i.e. not the ones David Cameron talked about.

For those of you who didn't take a look at the budget, it's looking grim. Talk of 'efficiency savings' by lowering public sector jobs equates to freezing employment in the north-East, where 1 in 3 are employed in the public sector. The cuts are harsh and in some cases ruthless (Wales, for example, is already massively underfunded). They say we must all tighten our belts, but cutting regulation in schools is not something parents want to see.

They say something that on the surface sounds good, like they want to give more power back to head teachers, but what they actually do is just take power away from the likes of Ofsted and abolish the General Teaching Council - both of whom keep uniformity in education, trying to keep schools to a good standard. Organisations such as these have been hugely important in Labour's turning education around, for the Tories to now come and unpick Labour's 13 years of hard work.... they can claim they have a mandate to provide change of direction, but not to undo 13 years of progress.

And Academies are the Tories way of cutting state schools without technically cutting education..... The Condem government stated recently (via Michael Gove) that they would not be opposed to the idea of businesses who back the academies making a profit on children's education. This is disgustingly absurd!

After what I said in my last post about how government should not be treated like a business, they are now deciding that children's education is something that can be auctioned off to the highest bidder to try and make money from.

When we talk about investing in children, we didn't mean put them on the stock exchange.

I already disapprove of this privatisation of education ideologically and morally. It is simply wrong, and there are no two ways about it.

So to summarise;

• Condem making cuts sneakily by disguising them -  Same old Tories.
• Privatising education as a way of saving money at the cost of children - Same old Tories.
• Lib-dem ministers whipped by Cameron, or just playing the nodding dog. - Same old Libs.