Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between David Chadwick and Josh MacAlister

Monday 2nd March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

21. What steps her Department is taking to improve the student loans system.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Josh MacAlister)]

We will consider ways to make the student loan system fairer, as the Prime Minister said last week. This Government have already reintroduced maintenance grants and raised the repayment threshold to above average graduate salaries, and we are acting across the board on the cost of living by bringing down inflation and tackling transport, energy and rental costs.

[David Chadwick]

Many graduates feel as if they are drowning in debt and that they were sold a promise—that a university education would help them to pay off their debts quickly—which has not come true. Their debts continue to mount. Will the Government consider scrapping the planned freeze of the repayment threshold?