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Our politicians are worryingly silent on university funding

UNIVERSITY funding has become a major theme of the Holyrood election, not just because of the ancient Scottish tradition of free education but because parties know that if they can win over a student they may land a voter for life.

But the debate has been oddly one-dimensional.

It has been almost exclusively about whether to adopt English-style tuition fees to close the funding gap between institutions either side of the Border to avoid Scottish universities becoming relatively second-rate.