The Saltire Scholarship Award would achieve this. Money follows the students wherever he goes in the UK but it does not disrupt the price structure. With regard to student maintenance, living costs and hardship, the Conservatives were taking a look at how that system might open up and improve access. They took the view that the present student loans could not be used to fund student maintenance due to the simultaneous expansion in student numbers. The position now was that subsidised loans were being offered to all students in the form of subsidised interest rates, so loans were attractive to students who didn t need them.
Loans have to be rationed through the means testing now introduced.
Conservatives objected to means testing as it was important to treat students as adults. It was perverse to look at the financial background of parents. It also created a new poverty trap. So the student should be means tested, not the parent. Conservatives saw no point in such a system.