Boris,

Its a shame your party has chosen this time to announce its U-turn on Higher Education funding. A well developed Society and Economy, that is moving into a tertiary and quaternary industry phase clearly needs to have a skilled labour workforce ready to take up the challenges of tomorrows Industry challenges, and by supporting a fees based education system, you are not only limiting the opportunity of so many of our potential high-achievers; especially those who are from a multi-cultural or disadvantaged background, but also damaging the fibre of our country, which will only serve to increase the inequalities between the rich and the poor, as we know debt, or the perception of debt, has clearly proven that those from a lower socio-economic background tend to base their choices career and educational choices around these fears, and not their aspirations, or their ability to achieve, and that must be stopped.

I'm proud to say that I am the first person from my family to ever enter into the Higher Education World, and the comments that came from my parents and grandparents were 'do you think you can afford it' and we are/were a class transgressional family, which was in a financially comfortable position, it has to be accepted that.

A Free, Fair, and, Funded Education, at all levels of Education system is the only viable model for our society and something the Government should realise and invest in.

Specifically, for me, aside from the introduction of top-up fees and fees in general, I'm concerned that the Government uses an archaic formula for the majority of student funding that is based around parental income. I thought that turning 18 gave independance yet within this model parents are expected to subsidise there children to upto 25% of the pitifully low amount that the Government says is the minimum financial support that a Student needs to get through Higher Education, this figure isn't high enough for those lower area living costs let alone higher cost areas such as those found in the South-East (Oxford Brookes) where I study.

Here's more food for thought, currently LGBT people in crisis fall through the cracks of the support funding system, and often 'forgotten' by successive Governments, so when I was disowned from my parents at the age of 17 due to my sexuality I had to bare the brunt of both emotional turmoil and the prospect of not being able to attend University as the financial burden for me was far too high. Luckily I was able to fight my LEA to be considered under their discretionary powers, and this was only achieved because I put hours of work into gatering supporting evidence, and finding out from the regulations that this power existed. This gap in supporting LGBT Learners must be filled.

Is it any wonder then that LGBT Campaigs around Education has consistently found out that the percentage of LGBT people who go on in Education is substantially less than their Heterosexual counterparts due to these issues surrounding funding arrangements, alongside bullying and harassment, which only serves in stunting there personal development, and ultimately that of our Society.

The Higher Education sector must put in place stratergies for overcoming these barriers so as to include my community.

I look forward to hearing your comments,

James-J Walsh