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'The parental contribution in the Scottish Education Department's Students' Awards Scheme shall henceforth be abolished and the amount of allowance shall be raised annually by a rate which shall not be less than the rate of inflation calculated on the basis of the retail price index'.—[Mr. Canavan.]
§ Brought up, and read the First time.
§ Mr. CanavanI beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
The parental means test for the student award scheme and the resultant parental contribution have been with us for a long time. There have been numerous complaints about it. A student—a young person of either sex—may get married at the age of 16 years, and yet we still have a system whereby for the purposes of the student award that student is considered to be dependent upon his or her parents. Some parents do not pay the parental contribution to the student.
It is about time that we moved to a scheme whereby all young people, irrespective of their parents' ability or willingness to pay a parental contribution, were assured of an adequate student award for the payment of tuition fees and maintenance allowance so that they might continue their studies into higher education. The anomaly has been with us for far too long. I accept that it may be expensive to get rid of it at once, but the Minister could give us a helpful reply on a phasing-out process. Perhaps he will tell us the current cost of getting rid of the parental contribution.
§ Mr. Alexander FletcherI truly understand the point that has been made by the hon. Member for West Stirlingshire (Mr. Canavan). The whole question of the way in which the parental responsibility is dealt with is unsatisfactory. Short of recasting the whole student grant system, which is not practicable—as the hon. Member knows, we have considered the matter since the last election—nothing can be done at this time, simply because the funds are not available to carry on the Exchequer the parental allowance for student grants.
§ Question put and negatived.