Paul Joseph Devlin, at 8:17pm 26th Nov 2007, wrote:

He'll most definitely get my vote, that apr rate is daylight robbery. At least Dick Turpin wore a mask!

Beverley Skoyles, at 6:25pm 27th Nov 2007, wrote:

the goverment are advertising for more people to become teachers, but you can't become a teacher unless you go to university, and get a student loan. He's just making it harder an more expensive for people who want to study at univeristy. It seems that if your a normal family with parents that work hard and get an average wage you can't do anything. You either have to be well off or be on benifits for an easy ride at univertsy. Gordon brown sucks !!

Dee, at 8:28am 28th Nov 2007, wrote:

Sorry, but how can it be daylight robbery? The student loan is there for people (like me) who come from working class backgrounds and cannot afford exhorbitant fees (bear in mind we have to pay for all books, which average at £30 each). It's not as if the student loan is subsidised and we never pay it back. I graduated 2 years ago and I am paying back every penny of my loan. Adding that rate of interest is just going to discourage people to go to university and get a good education. The country already pays out too much in benefits, so they should be doing all they can to encourage people to get a good education and work for a living.

Caroline Lamming-Chowen, at 4:01pm 28th Nov 2007, wrote:

this is half the problem, its not just my generation of university students that it effects all persons with a degree who still owe student loan are effected what is this like 1/5 of the population????!!!! at least conservative still have the right idea.... education may become increasingly subsidised if they get in.

morriarty, at 3:49pm 30th Nov 2007, wrote:

how come when they were in opposition they disapproved of the loan, and now they are in power they are making swingeing increases to the loan. Here's one. How can you tell when a politiciancial is lying. "When his mouth is moving."

Maverell, at 3:12pm 1st Dec 2007, wrote:

Come on - this is a labour government we are talking about - tax, tax ,tax tax and more tax. This increase is just another form of taxation.

Dick, at 12:23pm 3rd Dec 2007, wrote:

This government has completely lost the plot economically. They seem to have ignored the 'money supply' as an economic indicator, hence the grave problems we now face. As a nation we are massively over-borrowed and payback time is rapidly approaching. This increase in the student loan rate is just one small symptom of the problem, but I sympathise deeply with anyone affected by it. But we need to be ready for a much rougher ride financially than most of us will ever have known! But at least we have a vote!

Adam, at 3:20pm 5th Dec 2007, wrote:

i am currently in my final year of university, i have strugled through the last two years with hardly enough cash to survive, luckily i live with my parents and they have helped me cover any large bills such as car insurance. this intrest increase is robbery. thank you labour.

jon, at 12:17pm 15th Dec 2007, wrote:

This is a joke, who else would get away with doubling your interest rates?

The bank of england have just dropped their rates, with another looming yet our student rate doubles, students are poor no money, so where the sense in that?

No wonder first time buyers (students and me) cannot buy their first homes, when all the earnings are being taken in interest. 2% is fair 5% isn't!

Labour are gone its only a matter of time. We need a government thats not corrupt and taxing mad.

Im going to write to watch dog, most people wont even notice the rates being doubled.

Soon i'll be able to get a cheaper loan from the bank! In fact if i get a mortgage anytime soon i'll pay it off, and owe it to the bank!!!!

steve adkins, at 11:43am 26th Dec 2007, wrote:

Just another aspect of Anti English behaviour of this government. If you save and work for a better life New Labour hates you. They only love you if you are Gay, an Asylum seeker, or a foreign billionaire that can lend the party some cash in return for a peerage.

Caroline Lamming-Chowen, at 3:53pm 4th Jan 2008, wrote:

trust me they do not love you if you are gay...

Hayleigh, at 8:16pm 10th Feb 2008, wrote:

i think the fact that people want to better their lives and do something is great. better than sitting on the social and waiting for hand outs. we should be helping these people who want to learn and not make it harder for them!!!!!.

susan harper, at 11:01pm 14th Feb 2008, wrote:

if its gone up that much in that short space of time what is it going to be like when my child wants to go to higher education

Beverley Skoyles, at 7:47pm 15th Feb 2008, wrote:

i am at uni at the moment and i have to say i have never struggled so much finacially since i started work when i was 14. I get my full loan for my tuition and accomadation fees (like 99.9% of people who go to uni) but the maintance grant (the one ur meant to live off) is means tested by your parents income. My parents are extreamly hard working people. They are up at 5 every morning and my mum does 12 hour shifts 5 and 6 days a week just to earn a little over £30.000. But this also means i hardly get any matanace grant at all, i get £500 a year (which is nothing when trying to live off it)but my parents can't keep me becuase once a morgage and bills have been paid where is the money left for me? My freind on the other hand, his mum sits around doing nothing all day an collects benifits (even though there is nothing wrong with her, she will tellyou that herself) and he gets a full £2000 grant. And it is hard to find a job when your a student as there are another 2000 students at the university looking for job. I think its wrong to means test grants as people like me always draw the short straw and then they have the cheek to put interest rates up is awful. If i was sat at home claiming benifits, making no effort to do anything with my life or going out on the streets and causing trouble i would more than likly have it alot easier than i do now, rather then doing the goverment a favor and training to be a teacher.....as they have made it clear by there tv adverts there is a shortage. And where is the interest goin anyway....to asylum seekers or to people on benifits...its a joke.

louise williams, at 5:39pm 16th Feb 2008, wrote:

what a joker lol

Andrew Paliwoda, at 4:50pm 20th Feb 2008, wrote:

This is ironic when the government is talking about the high number of people that drop out of higher education due to the high amount of debt.

hollie neale, at 11:53am 6th Mar 2008, wrote:

I droped out of uni after 2 years due to debt. i was doing teacher training and the course was fantastic i loved it. At the time i went i had no help with rent or childcare and i was a single parent so i had to lend to the max. I applied to attend again last year and got a place but was not informed untill the friday before fresher week that i could not get any funding due to my previous study so i am now currently unemployed and looking for someway to get the qualifications i need through sponsorship or apprenticeship but i am having no luck so it doesnt look like i will ever be able to qualify as a teacher!

Marina Wood, at 2:07pm 22nd Mar 2008, wrote:

If Caroline is a student perhaps we should be worried that she is unable to spell the name of the Prime Minister correctly!

rapson89, at 6:10pm 18th Apr 2008, wrote:

errr....

whats that steve guy on about!? whats a flippin loan got to do with being gay!? FREAK!

Anyway...

far too much fuss over nothing! It is a very small interest rate and if you want to play the poor person and say you can't afford it, get a job, save up, then go!! its not like you have got to go as soon as you leave school or college! Many other manage!

Joshua Worthington, at 2:01pm 21st Apr 2008, wrote:

An increase in the student loan apr along with the increase of the tuition fees just sums up this government. Scottish students still benefit from free university education. It wouldn't be an issue if you could see where the money went to but as there have been so many wasted projects and with the country heading into a recession it's clear that this extra cost is just another way for Gordon Brown to try and sort out the problems that he has caused this country.

Kieran England, at 3:01pm 22nd Apr 2008, wrote:

it's just a joke that the government lie about inflation rates and still put the interest rate 2% above inflation.

Emma Halls, at 8:41pm 3rd May 2008, wrote:

I am really unhappy about this. I think that students (like myself) can get themselves in enough debt. Its simply not on....if you're going to do that then lower the standards so kids dont have to go to university. It unbelievable!

Pete, at 9:42am 7th May 2008, wrote:

This is disgraceful, someone give me one reason why i would have chosen to take out a student loan if the interest rates were almost that of a standard bank loan.

The interest rate was that of inflation. Come general election gordon brown will have a great student backing for sure.

I feel sorry for several of my fellow students who come from a poor upbringing having to take out larger loans than most, they who have less to begin with are getting more than everyone else taken away from them.

Since when was labour supposed to focus on making the poor poorer (hipocrates)

Nikki Wilson, at 4:41pm 28th May 2008, wrote:

Rapson89....not quite sure you understand the whole interest rate situation...I graduated 3 years ago and will be paying my loan back for many years to come. I roughly pay £70ish each month of which £28 is interest, so times that over the year...that equates to quite a lot of interest!

I do agree people don't have to go to uni straight after A Levels but for people like myself practicing Law, the competition is tough and it's not always beneficial to take time out, especially when your mind set after A Levels is still on education. Thats my personal opinion anyway!

Claire, at 5:29pm 28th May 2008, wrote:

what people must understand is that the labour party is no longer the working peoples party and have not been for a long time, the taxes that have been put up on everything recently means that only rich people can afford to keep a car and go to university, now tell me how are they a working peoples party looking after their own?

Jason Barclay, at 5:27am 3rd Jun 2008, wrote:

If you people were so educated at university

you would know that foriegn students pay 3 times as much as you and therefore are subsidising your education, inflation is at 4%

so the interest charge is fair, and unemployed and assylum seekers have nothing to do with your debt. The country doesn't function for you to laze about for four years studying art and philosophy, we can now import talent from abroad for pennies in the pound.

There are too many students, basic supply and demand tells you the government wants this to bring wages down, therefore more profit for uk plc.

Signed

Benefits claiment!

Jason Barclay, at 7:10am 3rd Jun 2008, wrote:

Your student loan is measured by cpi or rpi

you have been lucky paying at only .5% when inflation has been above 2% for years.

Wake up and smell the coffee.

world recession is looming, people will lose houses and the shirts off their backs, jobcentre claims will triple and nobody will care about a bunch of students who don't pay taxes and think they rule the world, when they are just puppets of New World Order and dont contribute nothing to the economy except more

debt which pushes up inflation, and then makes the government charge them more for loans.

Well done Gordon Brown if i have to pay 90% tax on cigs, i dont see why a student shouldnt pay a measly 4.5% on debt, after all it is debt that has got us in this mess we call the economy in the first place.

Signed

Benefits Claiment

and P/T Forex trader!

Jason Barclay, at 7:23am 3rd Jun 2008, wrote:

Your student loan is measured by cpi or rpi

you have been lucky paying at only .5% when inflation has been above 2% for years.

Wake up and smell the coffee.

world recession is looming, people will lose houses and the shirts off their backs, jobcentre claims will triple and nobody will care about a bunch of students who don't pay taxes and think they rule the world, when they are just puppets of New World Order and dont contribute nothing to the economy except more

debt which pushes up inflation, and then makes the government charge them more for loans.

Well done Gordon Brown if i have to pay 90% tax on cigs, i dont see why a student shouldnt pay a measly 4.5% on debt, after all it is debt that has got us in this mess we call the economy in the first place.

Signed

Benefits Claiment

and P/T Forex trader!

Jason Barclay, at 8:02am 3rd Jun 2008, wrote:

Claire, Labour have never been a working class party, both parties are controlled by and serve the same master,Rich elites and powerful corporations, although your university professer wouldn't dare teach you this for fear of losing their job.

They had two parties in the past, and you had to be rich to be an MP in the past so how can they be serving the poor.

"When we hang the capitalists, they will sell us the rope" - Joseph stalin

"The people who cast the votes decide nothing, the people who count the votes decide everything" - Joseph Stalin

Beverley Skoyles, at 12:23am 6th Jun 2008, wrote:

Benefits claiment

i take it you have never actually stepped foot in a university in your life. Students don't just laze around fo 4 years, university is actually quite hard an time consuming, that degee don't earn itself you know!!!

And we don't pay taxes now but when us muppets get a job, a good high standtard paying job that we have had to get are degree for, we will certianly be paying out noses then....al for other peoples benifit....an people go to uni becuase they want to make somthing of themselves and have good jobs and lives for themselves, its shudn't cost the earth just to do that......an am actually quit glad they put the tax up to 90% on your cig. Cigs are meaningless things that cause cancer an cost the nhs (which i will be paying for in a few years) millions of pounds each year....being addicted to somthing that kills you should well be made more expenive, going to university to better youself an help out the goverment and other people (for example becomng a nurse....who will treat people an look after people when they are ill through lung cancer) should not be made more expensive, in fact it should be far less cheaper!!!

mandy, at 4:55pm 6th Jun 2008, wrote:

i agree with you beverly, smoking costs the government millions every year, a cost yes to the nhs, as well as a cost to mpeoples lives, so why not put them up ? i think if they did, then many people would have to stop smoking, and then that would mean the government wouldnt have so much in tax, and thats what the british government is all about. You look at cost of fuel, the government go on about the cost to the environment, public transport costing sky high, the over day me and my daughter made a trip from abergavenny to nantyglo, only about 5 miles if that but it cost me over £7 ,and yes i only paid half fair for my daughter. Why not the government allow a child to go free with a full paying adult. This would encourage more to use the public transport provided. And help those on lower incomes, my husband works, and i cant drive so i do catch the bus if it is dry and the distance is a good way, though i do prefer to walk if i can Because of the cost, its healthier and i do enjoy walking. TAX TAX TAX, whomever is in power i do believe will not change, though david cameran, i think may improve things , WE LIVE IN HOPE, ITS RIP OFF BRITAIN TO ME.

Jason Barclay, at 4:12pm 19th Jun 2008, wrote:

Ok girls first of all i didnt say studying to become a nurse is useless, i'm merely saying

don't blame jobseekers for everything, some jobseekers are lazy so are some students.

And second the tax on cigs alchohol and fuel

pays for the NHS many times over, if you think the government taxes cigs to make people stop

you are seriously naive,tobacco companies put chemicals in cigs to make them more addictive so we cant just stop, they were exposed of this by a high ranking employee whos life got threatened in america when he tried to tell the media. And as for David cameron changing things i already told you both parties serve the same master, no not Bush, but the United Nations and the EU.

" Politics is supposed to be the second oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first".

-Ronald Reagan

Jason Barclay, at 4:32pm 19th Jun 2008, wrote:

Ok girls first of all i didnt say studying to become a nurse is useless, i'm merely saying

don't blame jobseekers for everything, some jobseekers are lazy so are some students.

And second the tax on cigs alchohol and fuel

pays for the NHS many times over, if you think the government taxes cigs to make people stop

you are seriously naive,tobacco companies put chemicals in cigs to make them more addictive so we cant just stop, they were exposed of this by a high ranking employee whos life got threatened in america when he tried to tell the media. And as for David cameron changing things i already told you both parties serve the same master, no not Bush, but the United Nations and the EU.

" Politics is supposed to be the second oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first".

-Ronald Reagan

and yes i have been inside a uni and studied level 4 science at the Open University, and it was very hard and interesting and i didn't have to borrow £3000 to do it, if you cant study full time go part time and you wont have debt or go to the OU.

Jason Barclay, at 5:22pm 19th Jun 2008, wrote:

herbicides, food additives and pollutants caused by government and industry also costs the NHS millions, we are all paying for this whether by our depriciating fiat currency or

with our depreciating health, no doubt after 20

years of breathing in our polluted atmosphere

one of you student nurses will have to look after me.

Heather Eyre, at 12:11pm 24th Jun 2008, wrote:

The rate has shot up, and it shouldn't have gone that high but it was at an unworkable level before (2-3% would have been fairer).

(I am a third year student out on placement getting taxed by the way)

There are alot of degrees that lead to very little at all...these are often just a way of putting of getting a job.

BUT

There are far too many people content to live on benefits, take that northern town where a squash picker could earn £25000 a year..the local unemployed 'dole dossers' wouldn't do it, Polish immigrants did it instead!!

Its all too easy to stay on benefits...did anyone see that program about the incapacity benefit changes? And what about '13 kids and wanting more??'...lizzy beardsley ring any bells?

free prescriptions, and getting paid for doing nothing but turning up to a job centre..or those who go see their doctor if the benefits are stopped? These people cost the country millions.

Also

The maintanence grant, that really really annoys me. Both my parents work so I get £70 grant over the whole year. I don't get any money off my parents for anything (they can't afford it) (and despite the fact I stay at home - another financial decision - I pay all my own food bills etc), so I personally am in that rubbish situation where I get no money from my parents and no maintanence grant, so just have my loan plus £35 every other week from work...

yet a girl I know gets the whole grant despite the fact she is far better off than my family..her dad rents property beside his job and doesnt declare it. great how you can f**k the system if you know how, and have the lack of concience.

you can't do the course I do at the OU!

Jason Barclay, at 12:05pm 30th Jun 2008, wrote:

Heather, £25000 per year squash pickers, that is your imagination going wild, the queen is estimated to have net worth £1 billion, and still gets 30 million - yes million, off the taxpayer every year, she is the largest scrounger in britain, slightly ahead off the government, what do you mean i cant be doing the same ou course as you, i told you i studied at the ou and i'm in between courses

that makes me a student like you!

You should study OU economics and then you will

see who the real scroungers are!

mandy, at 11:43pm 13th Jul 2008, wrote:

OH HOW I AGREE WITH YOU JASON ,bout the queen being the largest scrounger in brit, the queen mother herself had debt upon debt, and what does the queen do??? apart fom travelling all over the world, and attend venues, etc, oh and how many houses have she got ? there are some people whom havent got 1 , and then theres the government they have hughe increases in their wages everyyear ? you cant blame the polish for coming over here put in their postion wouldnt we do the same ? but you can blame the government for allowing them to come in the first place and making britain so attractive to people from elsewhere

Jason Barclay, at 5:10am 16th Jul 2008, wrote:

The EU is to blame for opening up britains borders,, thats why the irish didn't ratify the constitution lately, because having been an EU member for a while, they know they are nothing more than a new world order, and want to break down national sovereignty, and make us obey an unelected world government, and they wont even let us vote on it , because they know we will veto that as the irish did.

In the meantime they are robbing us blind through that hidden tax (inflation), in fact according to ex US Federal Reserve Chairman - Alan Greenspan: They (government) "use the welfare state to stay in power, they engage in massive deficit spending by issuing government bonds because they haven't got the stomach to directly tax us, this causes massive inflation" as we are seeing today, and is the reason why the US confiscated everybodys gold after the great depression, because if the government wants to print endless amounts of money, "there must be no way for the citizens to protect themselves",

e.g during the great depression the world was on a gold standard, and every citizen could hand in their pounds and dollars to the treasury for a fixed amount of gold which many people did, thus protecting themselves against government inflation, thats why we came off the gold standard, it was a threat to government printed paper and the welfare state.

Greenspan goes on to say "The welfare state is nothing more than a confiscation of wealth, this is the shabby secret of the welfare statists, gold gets in the way of this of this insidious process"( as people dump their currency and buy gold in times of inflation) "Gold is a protector of wealth and property rights".

That is why gold is $950 dollars an ounce my friends, during the great depression it was $20 dollars an ounce, so why did it rise so much you may ask? Because the dollar has depreciated in value since the great depression by $930 but the same amount of gold has held its value. US debt is $8.8 trillion dollars, UK £1trillion+, £30 billion of uk budget goes to pay the interest on this debt every year, it was created because we have no way to protect ourselves against it. Government usees this money first while it has some value, then by the time it has trickled down through the banking system and into the economy causing inflation, this money becomes worthless, look on google type in Hungarian hyperinflation (the worst the world has seen)and you will see a picture of an old woman sweeping wheelbarrows of hungarian money into the sewer. And in the german weimar republic you will see a woman using the Reichmark as fire fuel even though she has coal next to her, Why? because the money is depreciating every day and the coal is going up in price.

If you look at the news the US dollar looks to be heading this way, our generation has never experienced this, before but it is a real threat.

Jason Barclay, at 8:43am 16th Jul 2008, wrote:

If the american people ever allow private banks(US Federal Reserve is a private bank) to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property, until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered... The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs."

Former US President, Thomas Jefferson, The Debate Over The Recharter Of The Bank Bill, (1809)

-

“Who controls the issuance of money controls the government!”Nathan Rothschild said (1777-1836):

“I care not what puppet is placed upon the throne of England to rule the Empire. The man who controls Britain’s money supply controls the British Empire and I control the British money supply.”

Nathan Rothschild - of Rothschild banking Dynasty.

Jason Barclay, at 10:23pm 17th Jul 2008, wrote:

Inflation is the one form of taxation that can be imposed without legislation. -- Milton Friedman - Nobel prize winning economist.

Jason Barclay, at 11:23pm 17th Jul 2008, wrote:

It has been said that "the wealth of Rothschild consists of the bankruptcy of nations"

Jason Barclay, at 5:02am 18th Jul 2008, wrote:

It has been said that "the wealth of Rothschild consists of the bankruptcy of nations"

In his book, Fritz Springmeier says:

“According to one source ‘it was estimated that they controlled half the wealth of the world’. At one point, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York was controlled by five banks which owned 53% of its stock. These five banks were controlled by Nathan M. Rothschild & Sons of London. Control over the U.S. ‘Fed’ is basically control over the world’s money. That fact alone shows how immense the Rothschilds’ power is.

"The few who understand the system, will either be so interested from it's profits or so dependant on it's favors, that there will be no opposition from that class." -- Rothschild Brothers of London, 1863