AN EU-wide system of countries reimbursing each other for university students studying across the continent is the best way forward to tackle fees and funding issues, two independent economists have warned.
Former civil servants Margaret and Jim Cuthbert made the claim after they looked at the way the existing system works across Europe and Scandinavia.
They said in a report they gave to a politics website: "Scotland should work with other EU countries to lobby for the adoption of an EU-wide reimbursement system that would see administrations paying for the cost of educating their own students, no matter where they study within the European Union.
"This would be a simple financial solution and should be neutral therefore in a student's decision as to where to study. The Nordic countries, Austria and the Netherlands are already in favour of this kind of arrangement."
While the number of European students coming to Scotland has risen as numbers going to England have fallen in recent years, Scotland has few levers to deal with this under existing powers.
The Cuthberts argue that Scotland "would not be out on a limb" by charging moderate tuition fees, which could be offset by an Irish-style administration fee refundable to Scots students through a grant.
They have produced figures to show that of 19 nations or regions in Europe 11 have no tuition fees, while England has the highest by "a considerable margin."
Some charge little for fees, except in Ireland where costly administrative fees were included.
The Cuthberts say Scotland is "doubly disadvantaged" as England has taken a unilateral decision which "grossly disadvantages us," and at the same time Scotland does not have the range of powers to respond which are available to other countries.
They say: "This anomalous constitutional position needs to be sorted out. This is no equal partnership of nations in the UK union."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article