§ Mr. DrewTo ask the Secretary. of State for Education and Skills if he will make a statement on the operation of computer software at the Student Loan Company; and whether potential applicants have been prevented from applying prior to the deadline due to operational problems. [176114]
§ Alan JohnsonWe have been modernising the arrangements for the delivery of higher education student finance over recent years. Central to this modernisation is the new IT system, implemented by the Student Loans Company, which LEAs are now using to assess and process paper applications. There have been122W some teething problems with the system, which you would expect with an IT project of this size and complexity. However, at this stage we have no strong concerns that students who apply on time will not receive payment at the start of term. We are of course monitoring the situation closely.
The intention was that the new IT system would also provide a service for students to make their applications on-line from this April. However, in order to give the national launch of the new IT system in LEAs the best chance of success, we have decided to delay the introduction of this service. This reflects the fact that this year we had always expected the vast majority of students to apply using paper forms. Postponing the launch of the online facility has not prevented in anyway students from making applications for support on-time as paper application forms have been made readily available to them as in previous years. We remain committed to providing an on-line service in line with e-government targets.