The interest rate is this country has little baring to what we would owe if we borrowed more. A lot of our debt is with oversea's investors and involved with the bond market which is totally different to our bank interest rate.cyberdonblue wrote:I don't think Corbyn is trying to con anyone - young or old - but merely saying that, with interest rates at record lows as they are now, we'd be foolish not to borrow now and put ourselves back on the map as manufacturers. We should spend money on the young to guarantee them a future with a worthwhile job and a decent income. Train them, teach them the skills that have been lost for too many years.
I do agree though we should invest in our young, but don't think free tuition fees are the way to go. Firstly it doesn't really work in Scotland as places are very limited, because the Uni's end up excepting more students that pay from elsewhere, because they need to make a profit and so Scottish born students miss out. In fact only just over 50% are non fee paying students and some 16,000 Scottish students failed to be excepted in 2016 alone.
Also if we borrow more to pay for free Uni tuition, then all of the young in this country will get saddled with paying down the national debt down later in life regardless if they went to Uni or not. Also spare a thought for the less academic in our society. If the clever kids suddenly don't get lumbered with £30,000 of debt, what do we do for the one's that don't want or not educated enough to go to Uni? The one's that just want to be plumbers or builders or just work hard in a car plant day in day out? I think they will feel pretty left out considering that when these students leave Uni with their free degree with no £30k+ debt and then will most probably go on to earn more as well in better paid jobs, just to rub salt in the wounds. We have to come up with a plan that is fair to all not just the gifted few. Students now only have to start paying back once they earn over £24,000 a year and that seems fair enough to me.