Student grants: media coverage 13-20 June

On 13 June, a piece in The Scotsman carried a quote from Hugh Henry MSP drawing attention to the grant reductions.

On 15 June, The Herald ran a piece in its personal finance section on a campaign encouraging students to submit their applications for support, including grants, on time.  This included the standard government lines about the improvements represented by the package and how it compares with the rest of the UK, but with no reference to changes in grants.  There was similar coverage in the local press.

By contrast, tuition fees continued to excite more media interest.   On 14 June, a piece in The Herald picked up the coverage earlier in the week of the Raafe research on widening access and what it might or might mean for tuition fee policy.  On 17 June, Holyrood Magazine ran a piece about the views of Labour Ministers in 1999 on Scottish policy on fees, on 19 June a piece highlighting how the debate on fees appears to be less settled than might have been expected by the NUS and on 20 June a piece analysing recent comments from the First Minister about the  fee treatment of EU students in an independent Scotland.  The last of these picked up on comments highlighted by the New Statesman, reporting an interview with the First Minister.  On 19 June, The Scotsman ran a piece responding to recent legal advice on tuition fee policy and EU students commissioned by Universities Scotland.