Parliamentary debate 5 June: use of figures etc

On 5 June, the Scottish Parliament debated this opposition motion (at col 20747) drawing attention to reductions in grants and calling for the cuts to be restored.  A brief overview of the debate is posted separately here.

Contributors from all sides in the debate drew on a range of figures to defend their positions and made a range of assertions about the financial, behavioural and cultural effects of current and potential policies in Scotland and the rest of the UK.  As a contribution to monitoring how policy debate is conducted, this report examines some of the specific claims made in detail.

student support – parliamentary debate evidence use

This blog is mainly interested in how we are (or more often are not) discussing reductions in grants.  However, in practice the strong emphasis of government-side speakers in particular on tuition fees rather than grants means that claims about fees (as ever in any attempt to talk about student funding in contemporary Scotland) take up much of the space.