A recording of the Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell, reveals Labour’s plan to end tuition fees, should they win the election, and the return of maintenance grants.
In recent interviews, Labour party members have hinted that and end to tuition fees may be in the party manifesto, however footage of John McDonnell has been released, of a speech in Mansfield, in which he states Labour’s plans to end tuition fees ‘once and for all’.
‘[We] want to introduce – just as the Attlee government with Nye Bevan introduced the National Health Service – we want to introduce a National Education Service’ McDonnall said during a speech in Mansfield.
‘It means scrapping tuition scrapping tuition fees once and for all so we don’t burden our kids with debt for the future.’
McDonnall is the first to explicitly say that Labour is planning to abolish tuition fees and in interviews today the party have hinted that changes to tuition fees may be in the party manifesto. When asked about changes to tuition fees whilst speaking at Leeds Community College, Angela Rayner, the shadow education Secretary, said to ‘watch this space’ and that she ‘didn’t want to give too much of the manifesto away’
In the 2015 election manifesto, Labour pledged to cut tuition fees to £6000 a year, by raising corporation tax or increasing national insurance for the highest earners, however faced criticism that this was not drastic enough. Earlier this week, Labour announced plans to increase education spending by raising corporation tax, however it is unclear how tuition would be funded, with university officials suggesting that £8bn would be needed to cover the fees in England and £2bn would be required for maintenance grants.
When Jeremy Corbyn was asked about the party’s plans he stated he had ‘some stuff in his pocket’ but that he wouldn’t be giving more information until the release of the party manifesto, asking: ‘Can you cope with the excitement?’
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.