Today we have seen an announcement that Student Loan Interest Rates will be risen to 6.1% from 4.6% in September 2017 because of the post-Brexit inflation.
So what does this mean exactly?
It won’t affect you currently as a student or your monthly repayment amounts after you graduate, what it does effect is the grand total you will need to repay after you graduate. For current graduates who started in university post-2012, they will also be affected by this rise in interest rate, but it is dependent on the salary a graduate earns and is decided using a sliding scale, any graduate earning £41,000 and above will receive the full 6.1%.
This increase only affects students studying in England and Wales, Students from Scotland and Northern Ireland will remain at the current rate this September.
Our Response
After increase and increase of students’ debt, from fees increasing from £3000 to £9000 and set to increase further to £9250 this Autumn. NHS Bursaries being cut, Student maintenance grants being cut and replaced with loans. The government need to realise they are failing the current and future student population.
Our students are being forced with more financial stress, having this debt looming over them as they leave University, your mental health needs protecting and your quality of living after university needs protecting.
The government also needs to think how this will affect future recruitment of students. Young people from a lower economic background are going to be deterred from applying for university due to the sheer mass of money that it costs over a lifetime and having a debt of nearly £50,000! What sort of young person would be attracted to join University with that?
As a Students’ Union and as your representatives we collectively condemn this overly steep increase of Student Loan Interest Rates and call for the Government to not punish students for inflation caused by Brexit with steeper inflation rates than any other economic area.
Signed,
Jaime-Lee (President)
Darren Clarke (Vice President & President-Elect)
Swetha Reddy (Vice President)
Ben Malbon (Vice President)